limited production :: hand crafted :: high performance :: rechargeable :: premium flashlights

This is my blog about creating a startup LED flashlight business. I'm a designer, fabricator, and strategist and I'm passionate about making ideas real. I believe that products are about people, that they should be built to last, deliver real value, and that we need to do a better job than we have in the recent past.

Most of my career has been contract or freelance work and I've crafted products and strategies for both big international companies and startups. I also used to work in the "industry" fabricating special effects for film and TV, along with the occasional hot rod. Bottom line, I love making things.

I'm starting this blog so you can follow along, from day one, and see what it's like to start a business, or fail in the process. Only time will tell, but I hope you find this interesting enough to stay tuned, comment, link, like, tweet, and (most importantly) participate in turning this idea into something tangible and valuable.

For a good place to get started with general info about who, what, why, etc., check out the "Stickies" on the left side of the page. Thanks for stopping by and please don't hesitate to ask questions and get involved!

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Saturday, June 18, 2011

WIN!: Tried to bust it...can't

I hosted an open house at my shop last night. A great crowd of my random friends and a bunch of folks from Candlepower Forums were in attendance. Part of the diversion for the evening was drop testing one of my lights. I'd never tried anything like this before soooooo...the day before I took one of my lights and gave it a private beating in an "attempt" to no look foolish in front of the crowd in case it busted on the first drop.

My Toyota 4Runner weighs in at 4,800 lbs,
 putting 1,200 lbs. of weight on this Alpha light.
Alpha light says, "meh." 
After throwing it around for a while I started to get bored and thought I'd try something different. They drive cars over products to prove they are tough right? Pre-test I gave this a 50% chance of success, 30% chance of significant damage, and a 20% chance of catastrophic failure.

Turns out it wasn't an issue at all; the Alpha didn't even flinch. It did not deform at all and the threads are good as new. The photo shows the full weight of my 4Runner on top of the flashlight. This tire is not touching the ground at all (see the daylight underneath) and is fully supported by just the flashlight. Win? Win!
Posted by Jason at 12:26 PM
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4 comments:

  1. Stanley HuiJune 18, 2011 at 5:22 PM

    Crazy stunt and showed that good engineering and workmanship is still alive and well.. should have made a short video of this and put it on YouTube. Would have been good if the light was turned on during the test Congratulations!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousAugust 3, 2011 at 5:11 PM

    Just a suggestion: Call it 1,200 lbs of 'mass' rather than 'pressure'. "1,200 lbs of pressure" sounds like it can handle 1,200 psi (which it may be able to, but you'd need to test that).

    ReplyDelete
  3. JasonAugust 3, 2011 at 6:41 PM

    AH HA! I tricked someone into commenting! Okay, if you want to get all physics-y I'll change it, but would you settle for "weight?" :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Jason HeinzeSeptember 23, 2012 at 9:07 AM

    I agree with Stanley Hui: make this into a video, but do it with style. I'm sure that if you offered a flashlight in exchange you could get an arty-photog friend with a decent HD camcorder to turn this into great publicity.

    Outstanding products and great site. I'm considering a small CNC-based business and your blog has helped me to understand what I'm in for.

    Many thanks and best wishes,
    Jason

    ps - Congratulations on the recent paternity!

    ReplyDelete

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