Old Toasters & New Tools

I just had some custom made LED mounting bases manufactured, which are very awesome. However, it was going to cost and outrageous amount of money to have LED soldered to them by a third party vendor. Soooo, I decided to make my own Reflow Toaster Oven! Don't worry, that's not as terrible of an idea as it sounds. I purchased a Black & Decker FC150 Infrawave oven like the one below.

Black & Decker FC150 Infrawave toaster oven

Basically any toaster oven with infrared heating elements will work. The FC150 is very old and hard to find, but is one of the original "host" ovens used when this kind of mod became popular...oh...a bunch of years ago. The main reason I wanted this model, is I knew there was space inside the side panels for all of my kit. The upgrade involves some fancy electronics that you'd need a degree to identify and assemble, but in the internet age...ETS Techincal already makes a kit! Let's open this bad boy up shall we? 

Yes, it's as much of a mess as it appears to be. (Click for a larger image) 

I didn't really take any "process" shots but this is about 3/4 of the way through the conversion. It's reasonably simple if you have some basic knowledge of AC wiring, DC wiring, and relay wiring. No biggie right? :) The main part of the kit is a microcontroller with an integrated LCD display and external keypad. You basically disconnect ALL of the existing wiring/controls and install the new kit in the side panel of the toaster. I also installed a sheet of adhesive backed thermal shielding to help isolate the electronics from the heat inside the oven. Blah blah right? Where is the video?!

Best Viewed in Full Screen (1080P HD)!

VIDEO: Shop-Made Pneumatic Press

Hi folks, just a quick YouTube video of a pneumatic press I made to provide the correct pressure when setting the thermal adhesive tape I use to mount the LEDs in my lights.

Zipper Pulls V2 (Titanium boyyyyyye)

Okay so I was feeling a little frisky in the shop the other day. I ordered a 12" chunk of commercially pure titanium and decided to turn the whole thing into a bunch of zipper pulls. All of this was done on my Hardinge HLV-H manual lathe. No fancy computer stuff here, just old school handle crankin'.

Clean as...well, you come up with something

My friend Wilson looked at my first prototype and suggested I come up with some way to hide the knot. After some reflection I decided that was (1) a good idea and (2) perhaps even possible. This is what I came up with. The bottom of the pull has to be flat, instead of rounded, but I'm happy with the well balanced result.

So dear public, is this something you'd be interested in owning? Let's not talk about price yet...but keep in mind titanium is ridiculously expensive. I think these are awesome for adding a little custom touch to any mass produced garment, messenger bag, flashlight, pocket knife, camera bag, key chain, whatevs. I also think they would make awesome gifts that are unusual and classy (remember, it's titanium). Dear public, what say you?

Read on after the jump for more photos and explanation!

Integrating Sphere: up and running!

Woah, what is an integrating sphere!? Don't worry, it's not as fancy as it sounds. It's basically a doohickey that lets me take direct measurements of the lumen output of my lights. A lot of companies list the "laboratory rated" lumens of a light which is typically 25% higher than the lumens you actually get OTF (Out The Front). Only reputable companies actually measure the output of their lights. Less reputable companies just "make up whatever sounds good at the time." Really, I'n not kidding. If you want to hear a rant about that let me know. For now, back on topic.

In this shot the light is actually "on" 

Typically an integrating sphere is a multi-thousand dollar piece of lab equipment. The other alternative is home brew. Giant styrofoam ball, a lolly pop looking thing, a couple holes, and a high quality light mete...viola. It's not perfect, but it's a whole lot better than guessing. This sphere should be accurate to within +/- 5% of the actual output. The design is a tried-and-true method developed by several CPF members. It was nice not to re-invent the wheel (this time). More info after the jump!

Fabricating a stamping jig

WARNING: MACHINING CONTENT

One great thing about having a machine shop is that I can make strange tools like this one. I received my custom maker's mark a few weeks ago and I'm currently preparing my first regular production run. After fooling around with the mark I decided I needed some kind of jig to hold the stamp and the flashlight head in the correct and repeatable position.

Cutting off some aluminum stock I had laying around

I scrounged around my scrap bin and came up with the appropriate piece of material. A bit off topic, but I got this band saw for free a few years ago. It was sitting outside in the weather for two years and was a real wreck. I spent a couple weeks restoring it and now it works great! Here is a link to the project if you are interested.

DtD Update: Extraction tool

WARNING: MACHINING CONTENT

I have two parts that get pressed together for a semi-permanent assembly: the head and the copper sleeve that holds the LED driver circuit board. The press fit provides good electrical and thermal contact between the two parts. It's great once it's assembled...but how do you get it apart?

A "press fit" is when two parts are pressed together that have dimensions
that overlap very slightly. This can also be called an "interference fit." 

Funny, I asked myself the same question when it came time to remove a driver from a prototype. I knew in theory that I could pull it out, but how?I got the idea from Skip Adrian at Laser Center/Edge Finder. I just happened to have an appropriate pair of vise grips on hand that I could sacrifice to make a special tool.

Read on for more gruesome details...

New hotness: opinions?

Hi folks, I've been playing around with different surface finishes and I came up with the light pictured below. The body is bead blasted, grooves cut afterwards, and the head and tailcap are high polished. I really like it! So what do you, dear readers, think about this style?

Unfortunately this requires about the most hand finishing as humanly possible. There are ways to make batch processing easier, like vibratory tumbling, but I'll need 3-4 tumblers to the tune of about $750 bucks each. Not exactly the cheap route. I'll have to give this some serious thought. I might also have to start out making lights that have less finishing involved until I can justify the capital expenditure.

And an extra hour of hand finishing?...Check!

It also seems like it might be a bad idea to show all of the things I've been trying in case one is the clear favorite and I'm not in a position to immediately deliver it. (See above) After all, this kind of stuff usually takes place in some back room and the consumer never gets to see what is going on. Partly I hope this behind the scenes look will be interesting, but I also hope people will get excited about the process.

The appearance of production batches will be varied and represent a constant evolution. I don't expect there will be a "final design" until the distant future. Being limited production, I'll be producing small batches of different designs. Some may be "one time only" and others might get repeated. This will be driven by both customer response and whatever I'm excited about at the moment.

Haas VF-1 machining tail cap & PCB sleeve (video)

Hi all, I shot a new video a couple of days ago so check it out!

Prototype production run is under way!

These shots are actually from yesterday. Today I finished the CNC machining of 30 flashlight bodies. When finished, ten of these are heading out into the field for some user testing. 


I haven't picked the testers yet but I'll make an announcement about the same time I complete final assembly of the lights, so stay tuned!


(if you want to get the chance to do cool things like test future designs, be sure and sign up for my email list!)

Anyway, back to nitty gritty. My saw stop worked great and I spent time cutting stock to length while the machine was running parts. I also have to deburr the edge on every part (one end) so that there isn't any interference when clamping the parts in the vise. We need everything to be nice and straight.

Chicago Pneumatic right angle die grinder with an 80 grit abrasive disk
and a bunch of parts waiting to be deburred. 

Right now I'm using the red air grinder with an abrasive disk to deburr...hold the part in left hand, grinder in right hand, rotate part a couple of times. Not real slow, not real fast, but it's on of the things I might need to make more efficient in the future.

Tools for tools: Making a saw stop

WARNING: MACHINING CONTENT

One of the most common uses for tools, is making other tools. At least that's the joke among machinists...we don't actually make stuff, we just make tools. I'm not sure the previous was a complete sentence, but I recently had the need to up the ante on my efficiency. Each light has four main components that need to be machined. So, if I am making a batch of 20 lights, that makes 80 pieces of stock that I need to cut off from 10-12 foot bars. Kind of a pain, and 20 is a pretty small number. Time to make a depth stop for my chop saw.

The DeWalt Multi-Cutter is a low RPM chop saw
designed specifically for metal cutting. 

I made the stand for the saw back in welding school when I was living in Boston. Remember that Tushar? In any case, it's served me well but it's time for an upgrade. Most of my work is "one-sies" or "two-sies" so measuring each cut isn't that big of a deal. One of my quirks; however, is that I hate repetitive work...but love refining processes. That is to say, I can handle some repetition if I'm always learning something and working to make it better.

DtD Update: Soft jaws are finished!

Got the soft jaws finished up yesterday! Now it's time to start cutting some parts and tweak the programming. I've already done the body machining and tailcap machining. Today I'm going to be working on the head and the small copper post that holds the electronics.

DtD Update: machining soft jaws

So I'm starting this Day to Day (DtD) Update thing so you can see the drudgery associated with the bright lights and big city stuff. 

I had to have some bearings replaced on my mill before I could get to making actual parts. That was finished last week and I've been doing the last of the programming. So far I have about 70 separate programs to make this little light. That means there are 70 "operations"...not including the manual operations. For example: cutting all of the stock to length, sanding down the edges so they are smooth and even, etc. More on that in a future post. Suffice to say, there is a lot of work to do outside of the actual machining. Most of it is manual, and this is the kind of labor that kills product margins.

Soft jaws before machining

So yesterday and the day before I have been cutting the "soft jaws" that will hold my components that need to be machined. They need to be extremely precise and one mistake means they are ruined. Each jaw will have five separate locations machined...so that is five chances to wreck the whole thing. Ask me how I know.