jross20
Newly Enlightened
Howdy all. I've been away from the forums for months now due to some personal (and family) health issues...but now I am trying to get back into my hobbies. With that said, I recently added a new-to-me soviet era flashlight to my collection and it gave me the desire to try to design a similar light.
This is the style of light I am talking about. I've seen it called a pocket/belt/chest light. A pretty cool style of light in my opinion.
So, what I am looking to design would be something fairly similar although potentially a little larger if necessary. I like the idea of such a light as being something one could mount to their belt OR to a chest strap, for general illumination. Basically something you could walk around with, and have a nice flood in front of you. I'm thinking a very floodly light using an aspheric lens, but with some kind of shield at the top to avoid blinding the user. Or perhaps the lens could be recessed to avoid the nearly 180 degree output that I've seen? I feel like 100 to 250 lumens would be more than enough in terms of brightness, but I would need to experiment. I figure 3 C cell nimh cells would provide a decent enough runtime. A balance between AA's and D cells, not too heavy but not to little power. I'd like to use something like a nichia emitter, or anything that could provide good clean 90 CRI light at 3000k to 4000k. I spent some time learning to solder so I feel that I would be good enough to at least make a prototype... haha.
So, my questions for you guys in terms of help are as follows:
Update 1 - Desided that potentiometer style control would be best. Perhaps will still look into using a mechanical switch as well.
This is the style of light I am talking about. I've seen it called a pocket/belt/chest light. A pretty cool style of light in my opinion.
So, what I am looking to design would be something fairly similar although potentially a little larger if necessary. I like the idea of such a light as being something one could mount to their belt OR to a chest strap, for general illumination. Basically something you could walk around with, and have a nice flood in front of you. I'm thinking a very floodly light using an aspheric lens, but with some kind of shield at the top to avoid blinding the user. Or perhaps the lens could be recessed to avoid the nearly 180 degree output that I've seen? I feel like 100 to 250 lumens would be more than enough in terms of brightness, but I would need to experiment. I figure 3 C cell nimh cells would provide a decent enough runtime. A balance between AA's and D cells, not too heavy but not to little power. I'd like to use something like a nichia emitter, or anything that could provide good clean 90 CRI light at 3000k to 4000k. I spent some time learning to solder so I feel that I would be good enough to at least make a prototype... haha.
So, my questions for you guys in terms of help are as follows:
- Does anyone have experience designing a light, and if so are there any pointers that I should know about?
- What would be the easiest way to build the body? Are there companies that can build a metal body based on plans? Or should I 3D print it?
- What would be the best way to go about building an LED emitter and also mounting the lens? I get the idea, but the "driving" part is a bit confusing to me currently.
Update 1 - Desided that potentiometer style control would be best. Perhaps will still look into using a mechanical switch as well.
Last edited:
