1000 Lumen the quick and dirty way + active cooling *AA*

Z

z_The_bad_Frag

Guest
Hi there



My first homemade flashlight. :twothumbs



This was a project just to gain some experience with leds. Before I never did anything with leds. Next summer I have a rc car project to build with leds in it so I don't want to start testing when I need to know how it works. I don't like to break expensive stuff because of not knowing what I'm doing. :eek:



So by the way I needed a bright flashlight that can light up a whole room for min. 1 hour in candle mode.



Parts I used:

15 Year old Ucar flashlight 0€

Old AMD Athlon CPU cooler 0€

LED Boost driver LED Senser V2 30€(The original setup had 3 drivers each with its own switch but that didn't worked because those ebay drivers flickered and didn't got more than 680mA)

3x CREE XP-G R5 on Star 19,50€

1x CREE LXP Optik 10° 2,49€

1x CREE LXP Optik 26° 2,49€

1x CREE LXP Optik 46° 2,49€

2x 4*AA Battery holder 3€ (I accidently destroyed 1 with my chair so I had to improvise :shakehead)

1x Mighty Mini Blower 15€ (When I saw it while I was looking for the battery holders I knew I have to buy it no matter what it costs (planed setup had an old Radeon 9600XT fan))

Some cables and stuff like that... 2€





Tools I used: (This should be an experiment so I didn't even looked at the lathe)

Knive

Pliers

Soldering iron

Hand saw

Electrical grindstone

Screwdriver

Beer

Cordless drill



p2250020.th.jpg




The screw in the middle is battery + for the LEDs. The spring is 4xAA + for the fan. Yes I know those batterys should get empty before the other 4. But the fan only needs ~45-50mA so that doesn't matter. Also I put in those 4 slots the batterys in which have more charge than others. Those 2900 Ni-MH have +-200mAh when I take them out of the charger.





p2260021.th.jpg




That copper plate on the back is battery - for LEDs and fan. The copper plate is cut of from the CPU cooler... :devil: ...I still have lots of them... :naughty:





p2260022.th.jpg




You might say those edges from that copper plate look very sharp... ...I can tell you they are very sharp. I was just too lazy to get a file from the basement. :sick2:





p2260023f.th.jpg




There you can see the mighty mini blower. I love that fan. Such a nice piece of fan-technology... :naughty:
 

The_bad_Frag

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 13, 2011
Messages
233
Location
Germany












Tommorrow I will redo the original post with all the links and stuff...
Also I will take some new photos because now I smoothed those super sharp copper plates.(btw original design was with 4 plates on the outside but I was to lazy to get them on until now...) That's better for your finger health. :D And I will do a photo of the inside. :wave:
 
Last edited:

Richie086

Enlightened
Joined
Dec 15, 2008
Messages
417
Location
Long Island, New York
Thanks for the larger pic links. It's much clearer seeing the larger photos how you went about your build. I also like the battery holder modification. Can't wait to see the additional photos.
 

flashflood

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 9, 2011
Messages
608
That must've been fun.

Your pics remind me of another quick and dirty way to 1,000 lumens: three Thrunite Neutron 1Cs and a rubber band! :naughty:
 

The_bad_Frag

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 13, 2011
Messages
233
Location
Germany
Here's the corrected version of the first post:


This was a project just to gain some experience with leds. Before I never did anything with leds. Next summer I have a rc car project to build with leds in it so I don't want to start testing when I need to know how it works. I don't like to break expensive stuff because of not knowing what I'm doing. :eek:

So by the way I needed a bright flashlight that can light up a whole room for min. 1 hour in candle mode.


Parts I used:

15 Year old Ucar flashlight 0€

Old AMD Athlon CPU cooler 0€

LED Boost driver LED Senser V2 30€(The original setup had 3 drivers each with its own switch but that didn't worked because those ebay drivers flickered and didn't got more than 680mA)

3x CREE XP-G R5 on Star 19,50€

1x CREE LXP Optik 10° 2,49€

1x CREE LXP Optik 26° 2,49€

1x CREE LXP Optik 46° 2,49€

2x 4*AA Battery holder 3€ (I accidently destroyed 1 with my chair so I had to improvise :shakehead)

1x Mighty Mini Blower 15€ (When I saw it while I was looking for the battery holders I knew I have to buy it no matter what it costs (planed setup had an old Radeon 9600XT fan))

Some cables, thermal glue and stuff like that... 2€



Tools I used: (This should be an experiment so I didn't even looked at the lathe)
Knive
Pliers
Soldering iron
Hand saw
Electrical grindstone
Screwdriver
Beer
Cordless drill



The screw in the middle is battery + for the LEDs. The spring is 4xAA + for the fan. Yes I know those batterys should get empty before the other 4. But the fan only needs ~45-50mA so that doesn't matter. Also I put in those 4 slots the batterys in which have more charge than others. Those 2900 Ni-MH have +-200mAh when I take them out of the charger.



That copper plate on the back is battery - for LEDs and fan. The copper plate is cut of from the CPU cooler... :devil: ...I still have lots of them... :naughty:



You might say those edges from that copper plate look very sharp... ...I can tell you they are very sharp. I was just too lazy to get a file from the basement. :sick2: *update* Now those copper plates are smooth like b**bs. :naughty:



There you can see the mighty mini blower. I love that fan. Such a nice piece of fan-technology... :naughty:


And now some new pics:

The inside of the reactor.



And some more inside...

And btw the fan is a VERY VERY VERY good battery monitor. When the fan speed drops hard it's exactly the right time to get those NI-MHs into the charger.

Somehow this flashlight made me sick. Now my brain keeps telling me: "Do more flashlight mods! Do more flashlight mods!" Damn it. :sick2: :help:
My next mods will be much more quality and also very high tech. :knight:
 

Got Lumens?

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Mar 12, 2011
Messages
2,458
Location
Champlain Valley
Nice Update. Post looks better now.

Question: It looks like the intake for the fan is partially blocked by the PCB. Is that so, just camera angle, or not the intake for the fan:eek:.
 

The_bad_Frag

Enlightened
Joined
Mar 13, 2011
Messages
233
Location
Germany
Correct. But it's meant to be like that.

It's a radial fan which sucks in air from the side of the pcb and on the side where its glued to the heatsink. First I had the driver also in another place in the lamp. When testing I noticed that the flashlight was running a bit hot in candle mode. But when I measured the temperature of the air which was blowing out of the fan I saw it was pretty low. The fan was sucking lots of cold air from the flashlight body. Then I just took the driver and blocked 50% of the intake on that side. This cools the driver really good and made the fan sucking in more hot air from the cpu cooler. Now it's running a lot cooler.
 
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