Mini Tap Light Conversion using 3 LEDs (LOTS-O-PICS)

Mini Tap Light Conversion to LED

Mini Tap Light Before and After


PROBLEM: The Mini Tap Light puts out too little light and drains too much juice!

SOLUTION: Replace the crappy little excuse for a bulb with three bright white LEDs.

MATERIALS:
3 - bright white 3mm LED's from eBay: 3mm, 3.3V, 30mA ($.60)
1 - Mini Tap Light from the dollar store (guess how much it cost... wrong... it was TWO for a dollar!) ($.50)
1 - 10 ohm resistor. ($.10)

Total Cost: $1.20

INSTRUCTIONS:

First step is to take everything apart and remove the cheap christmas tree light bulb. NOTE: I marked the three pieces, the dome, lid, and base with a marker to make sure I put all the pieces back in the same spot... this WILL help!



Next I wired the three LEDs in parallel and stuck in the 10 ohm resistor. This tap light uses 3 AA batteries which is perfect! I used the leads from the LEDs to connect them to eachother and create a frame for them to rest on. I hot-glued the whole framework to the base.




Finally, I put everything back together (remember I marked the pieces for easier assembly)


For comparison, here are the two lights side by side. I measured the draw and even though the new LED light is MUCH brighter, the draw is considerably less! The original light on the left draws 155 mA while the light on the right was drawing about 98 mA!




Comments, Questions, Suggestions, (or warnings that something I made is about to blow up) shoot me an email!

Original posting is here:
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/mini-tap-light.php

Excellent! Nice clean work. More light, less power draw, longer runtime, less heat, never burn out...what more could you want?

Awesome. An LED taplight is worth having around. A normal one now though I wouldn't even consider.

And I was going to chuck those useless tap lights sitting around the house.

Great idea, and seems simple enough to do. Thanks, reviewum!

Thanks for the comments! I use to think these were useless also... that is until the baby needed to be fed in the middle of the night!

Instead of the wife turning on all the lights she just hits one of these bad boys and viola.... perfect lighting!

I've been playing around with a bunch of them for higher drain (more LEDS) and little drain (one LED). Using NIMH batteries, these things last forever!

Hey nice mod! How much to make me a couple, Rob?

very nice!

a while ago i modded my sisters taplight with a couple leds. she wasn't too happy at first...until she turned it on /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

reviewum, that's some fine work! Now I've gotta frequent the dollar stores to pick up some modding hosts. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Yup...off to the dollar store! (Well up here they are more like $1.49 or $1.99 stores!) Thanks!

I'm a dollar store junkie to my wife's dismay. That is where I picked up this little beauty:



http://www.candlepowerforums.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=UBB14&Number=342555

The think I like best about these tap lights is the fact that they run on 3 AA batteries... not two, not four! It works perfect with my LEDs.

I'm almost tempted to just canabalize the switch and battery casing for other projects!

reviewum, I think the image didn't work because there's a line break before the [/image] tag. Put the whole thing on one line, and it should show up.

Edit: Maybe you fixed it while I was typing this message, or maybe my browser was misfiring? When I got back to the thread, the image was there.
/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon3.gif

Almost forgot... regarding the 3AA in the tap light, the one problem is that you won't run the batteries down to where they're truly dead. AA alkalines want to run all the way down to 0.8V each, and the Vf of your LEDs won't allow that to happen.

However, if you use 3AA NiMH rechargeables, it would be a GREAT match! Those cells have a much flatter voltage discharge curve. You'd end up with a highly efficient light.

Milky - yup, I fixed the image as you were typing! Thanks anyway!

I am fully a NiMH kind of guy, so I'm glad to hear that this is an even better match than I could have ever expected!

The last tap light I modded for my wife lasted for a month before I noticed the light dimming a bit... and she was using it all the time. I wonder if I didn't have the loss associated with self discharge if the light would have lasted a bit longer!

BTW Milky, I was just looking at your website when my wife brought in our new baby to say hello... and let's just say she made a tribute to your name all over me!

Here she is in all her holiday glory:

reviewum, what a cute picture! I've never in my life seen a better jack-o-lantern. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Congratulations on your baby!

Here's the origin of my username, bravely modeled by my wife... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/yellowlaugh.gif


(That's a FULLSIZE BATH towel!)

I need to update my site with some new photos. As you saw, I haven't posted any in months. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif

Dang, I thought the 4 for $10.00 regular tap lights at Target was a bargin.

I just modded one of the target ones. Mine doesn't look as good so I won't post my ugly mod.

Nice work milkyspit.

dat2zip, thanks for the compliment. Although reviewum was the modder of the tap lights. My hat's off to him.
/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif

Or were you referring to my baby and his milky spit, depicted in the photo from the previous post? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif

NICE reviewum /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif
White, bright, long life time, and long runtime, like Evan said, what else do you need? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

woops, gotta runs to the store before it runs out of these nifty little lite /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

My first stop in every dollar store is the "tools" isle where I find all kinds of goodies. A lot of the stuff is pretty cheap (ie bad quality) but every once in a while you find a gem.

A while back when I went I couldn't find a good light to mod, so I bought a fan and modded it:

BEFORE:


AFTER:

(do you see the salvaged computer "Turbo" switch?

For more pics, go here:
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/fan-light.php

Nice work reviewum, for both the tap light and fan/stalk light. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif I've been doing those taplight mods since I saw the first one sitting on my parents' table. But those ran off 4 AA. I started by putting in a dummy cell, but finally figured "what the hey" and used a small resistor and let it be overdriven. I kept thinking of using a buck regulator, but it just doesn't make economic sense. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon3.gif But I can't help feeling that it's criminal to waste power like that. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif

Steelwolf, one clever way of handling the 4AA case is to choose a resistor such that you can run on 3 fresh cells plus a dummy OR 4 partially depleted cells. Also 3 lithium AA cells or 4 NiMH cells if desired. I have some 4 LED PR-base bulbs built be a former CPFer, jbechto, which work exactly this way. It offers lots of flexibility. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif