FlashTorch

Lego-Man may have wanted a little excitement when he set out to construct the Lego LED flashlight, however, the gadget certainly seems to have been a productive exercise in the use of “discarded” Lego pieces. Additional items required for the Lego LED flashlight include:
• a 2x6 lego brick
• a 2x6 matching lego panel
• small flexible insulated wire
• electrical tape
• 1 superbright LED (white is nice, but you can get a color to match a brick)
• a switch (i used a small toggle switch from RadioShak)
• 3 LR1130 button cell batteries.

Continue reading "Lego LED Flashlight - Instructable" »

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The folks over at WikiHow have put together a very simple version of an ordinary flashlight which does the job of providing illumination on the cheap. You may not need to construct a light at the moment but the exercise is worthy of note since you never know when the information may prove useful. 'There are plenty of flashlights on the market today--ones that you shake, crank, twist, or click. But if none of those tickles your fancy, or if you don't want to shell out the extra bucks for bells and whistles, here's how to make your own flashlight from supplies you can find in your home.'

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If you want to try your hand at building a Lego hand crank flashlight similar to the instructable you will need a Lego Mindstorms motor, a few lego parts, short lego cable and an LED. 'Start with putting a 90 degree angle "attacher thingy" (I know,very technical lingo) on the end coming out of the motor. then attatch a "stick" the another "attatcher, then another "stick". Attatch the LED by pulling the leads appart, then wedging it in the bottom of the block on the side free side of the wire. each lead should be toutching the contacts diagonal from each other.'

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An interesting tutorial has been posted over at Instructables detailing the steps to follow in the construction of a night vision headlamp. 'Headlamp flashlight technology takes a quantum leap! You can have it all: * Intense brightness * Lightweight * Long life * Low cost * Rechargeable * Unbreakable * Small * Waterproof * Unique shocking turquoise color. Race proven! I put the light to the ultimate test by competing in the Gold Rush 24-hour Adventure endurance race in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California. Many of the other competitors had $500 HID lamps from NiteRider, Light & Motion, etc, yet throughout the race nearly everyone that saw my light commented as to its extreme brightness or asked where they could get one. It was that much brighter than anything else.'

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The folks at Instructables have submitted an easy-to-follow guide to build your very own USB Powered LED Torch. 'It's never going to photograph great, but as you can see it throws off a useful light. In comparison to my brand-name keychain light I'd say it gives maybe 50% of the spread, but greater brightness in the centre of the beam. Maybe using a wide-angle LED would be a good idea.'

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Posted by Flash Torch Admin at 1:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you desire to build your own homemade flashlight/lantern but would rather not have to contend the the use of a soldering iron, there is a handy tutorial over at Instructables which should be of interest. Of course you will need to assemble the parts which comprise of a 9v battery, flashlight bulb, bulb mount, film canister, 9v battery snap connector and some hot glue. The instructions seem simple enough, so head on over and have some fun in the process.

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Here is another do-it-yourself mini flashlight project which can be constructed from some very basic items. 'The battery clip, LED, and resistor(s) can all be purchased at RadioShack or some other similar electronics store. The tact switch came out of an old broken VCR - check some old junk electronics that have buttons that click, and you'll probably find some tact switches inside. However, you could buy them new from digikey.com or something like that if you wanted to. If you are going to get your tact switch out of something, though, you'll probably need to use a desoldering iron (or something similar) to remove it. A solder sucker works just as well.'

Continue reading "DIY 9v Led Flashlight At Instructables" »

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Got Marko got some inspiration from the other efforts at flashlight construction and built one primarily from "discarded garage door remotes". 'After building a couple of TicTac flashlights that were happily received by the boys, I ran across a couple of old key chain garage door remotes that were left over after replacing an old garage door opener. I opened one of the remotes up and found that it used a 12V battery and that 7.5V was easy to get between the main opener switch and the battery, I hit upon using 2 13,000mcd bright white LEDs from Alan Parekh in series with a small resistor since I had the power.'

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While the concept of building a mini flashlight from the discarded batteries of household appliances along with strips of wire and an incandescent bulb (used in flashlights and bike lights), occupied the attention of many a pre-teen of previous generations, the presence of the new led bulbs brings a new excitement to the entire affair of home-grown flashlight construction. 'Start with localising the anode (+) and cathode (-) of the LED. Mark them up as I did (with a felt-pen), red for anode (the longer leg) and black for cathode (shorter leg and phased edge on the bottom of the plastic of the LED). I will in the following text write red and black. Then you need to open the old battery, as we will use the plastic part with contacts on the top. Don’t forget to throw the rest in recycling for batteries.'

Continue reading "Flashlight Project: How To Build Your Own Compact 9v Led Lamp" »

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Ernest G over at QJ.Net outlines the five fairly simple steps to follow if you desire to put together your very own Inkjet Cartridge Flashlight. 'It fits inside of a regular Inkjet cartridge, so it's small enough to shed light into tiny areas (like that little space on your printer where you put in the cartridges) and since it uses LED technology it should provide a reasonable life cycle. Unfortunately, this project requires a bit of soldering, a bit of wiring skill and a lot of patience, so if you don't think you're up to the task, you might want to ask a friend for help with this one!'

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Posted by Flash Torch Admin at 9:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The project by "I Make Projects.com" to construct a led flashlight has produced a very impressive looking Led MegaLight (the PVC Tac Light). While the prospect of building a simple TicTac flashlight maybe somewhat intimidating to some folks, the time and investment involved in the building of the "more complex" MegaLight puts this device squarely in the purview of the amateur do-it-yourselfer. That said, it is indeed gratifying to know there are alternatives to acquiring a 'high beam' led flashlight without the having to spend in the triple figures.

Continue reading "MakeZine.com: How To Build Your Own Led MegaLight" »

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You may not need to make your own flashlight at present but maybe at some point in the future the probability of you having to put together a light source may become a critical reality. What would you do then? Put together a flashlight from whatever nicknacks are available. Better yet, take a look at the procedure over at Grynx.com where a candy wrapping provided the housing for a rather handy looking "throwaway" flashlight. 'A disposable torch with long life (I hope I don’t invent the wheel once more) I bought ‘tic-tac’ mint candy and found out that this package must be ideal for 3 AAA batteries to make a small torch (or lamp) with. Yes the batteries fitted perfect - I soldered them in series and used a small micro switch from an old circuit-board together with an ultra bright white LED (25.000 mcd - 3,8 volt and 20 mA - 35 degrees) and a serial resistor of 27 ohm (to make it 3,8 Volt).'

Continue reading "Grynx.com: "Do It Yourself" TicTac flashlight" »

Posted by Flash Torch Admin at 1:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)