Portable Led Light

thingiverse

This is a portable LED light that can be attached to anything I have and runs on batteries or an external power adapter. I've found that this model works well but requires a bit more sanding and gluing than I'd like. It's a very bright, lightweight, and versatile light fixture. On one side, there's a 1/4-inch thread for connecting to any standard photo/video tripod, along with a flash-leg-like connector that fits any photo lightstand with a cold-shoe and can even be mounted on a camera. On the other side, there's a 10mm hole for fitting a worklight tripod, along with a convenient carrying handle that can be held or hung on any hook. It can be powered from a set of four AA batteries (I recommend rechargeable ones because very bright LEDs consume quite a bit of power) or a 5-volt power supply with a 5mm plug. You can add a DC-DC converter (or a cable with an inline DC-DC converter) to run off a power supply that isn't five volts. Designed with SketchUp, STL cleaned up with Microsoft 3D Builder, the copy in the photos was sliced using Cura and printed on my Robo3D R1+. Required non-printable parts: * The LEDs - Five Round SMD "beads" LEDs, seven-point-five millimeters in diameter, as bright as you can get. I used those one-watt LEDs from AliExpress. * Resistors - Match the resistors to the LEDs (or at least look up an online LED calculator). * A 4xAA battery holder - Five point-seven centimeters by six point-two centimeters by one point five centimeters in size, from AliExpress. * A switch - Three-pin SPDT toggle switch, internal part size thirteen millimeters by eight point five millimeters, six-millimeter hole, from AliExpress. * A 5.5mm socket - Note that there's only ten millimeters of space behind the hole, from AliExpress. * (Optional) One-fourth-inch hex nut * One or two short two-millimeter diameter screws * Some electrical wires Printing instructions: I printed everything except the dome in PLA, three shells (one point two millimeter walls) and one-point-two millimeter top/bottom. The base part requires support, but the supported part is internal and we don't care - it will come out nice. You can make the support sparser than normal. Also, the base needs some infill to make the handle stronger - I used ten percent. Except for the base, the parts don't need support or infill. The plate part should be printed in black or white, to avoid any color cast (or use yellow or orange to warm up the light or blue to cool it down). White is best because it will reflect more light out - I used black because that's what I had when I printed it. The dome needs to be white (unless you want colored light) and almost transparent, not fully transparent because the LEDs are painful to look at directly. You can get this with very thin opaque filament. I printed it in ABS because that's what I had - with two shells, couldn't get the center of the dome to print with just one shell, even with two shells there are areas that aren't quite solid in the center. Assembly: Start with the plate and attach the LEDs to the plate (hot glue works really well here). Solder the LEDs to the resistors and wires. Place the battery holder into its position in the base - pass the wires through the small rectangular hole. Make sure the back fits into the base - you may need to sand the edges of the little flaps that go into the base. Connect the socket to the back and the switch to the switch cover. Solder the negative wire from the LEDs together with the negative wire from the socket and the negative wire from the batteries. Stick all the positive wires into the small rectangular hole in the back - solder the positive wire from the batteries to one side of the switch, the positive from the socket to the other side, and the positive from the LEDs to the middle. Glue the back into its position on the base. Glue the switch cover into the back - make sure the switch direction matches the arrows on the back. Insert the hex nut into the hole in the flash hot-shoe like side - lock it into place using the screw cover. This should pressure-fit and is very tight - you may need to hammer it in a little. That's it, enjoy your light.