ToddK
Contributor
Last year I built a Delrin canister LED light for myself, using an SSC P7 LED, and a Taskled HipCC driver. The canister and light head were both made from Delrin, using an inner aluminum head sink to hold the LED, reflector and driver. This first design left the switch boot totally exposed, and used a very small reflector. This year, I wanted to correct some of those short comings, and build a light for my dive buddy as a Christmas present.
I’ve tried to detail all of the dimensions and the part suppliers in this report. When I was making the original light, I worried quite a bit about whether all the details would work out, and would everything fit, so I want to provide this as a potential starting point for others. I’d like to say thanks to Wquiles, Packhorse, 350xfire for their awesome posts, and the book “The Divelight Companion” from AirSpeed Press.
Canister construction
The canister is 7.50” long by 2.5” wide on the outside, and has a 7” by 1.875” hole bored out for the battery. The entire canister diameter is really limited by the Agro gland and switch placement in the lid, so to get a little more room, I overbored the first 0.950” of canister length to a diameter of 2.00”.
I have a fairly small Harbor Freight 8x12 lathe, which is really about 14” between centers. Drilling or boring a hole usually requires 2X the length of the hole to allow for the length of the drill bit or boring bar when first starting out, which rapidly exceeds the length of my lathe for this design. Luckily I found that I could take the drilling & boring in three chunks. After putting a nice finish on the outside of the canister, and parting it off, I began by drilling a 1” hole using a stubby drill bit, to a depth of 2.5”. I then bored this hole out to close to the 1.875” final diameter, which then made room for me to place a 6” long, 1” wide drill bit into the bored out hole, start the lathe, and then drill out another 2-3” and repeat the boring process. I finished with a long 10” brad point drill, with the center spike ground down to be more flush. In using this bit, I run out of length to even chuck the bit, so I have to take the drill holder off the lathe, chuck the bit, and then put everything simultaneously back into the canister hole, and on the bed of the lathe. I have a nice ¾” diameter, 12” boring bar from Victor machining, which was absolutely essential for getting the inside of the canister made. After getting everything to almost the correct dimensions, I did finishing runs with the boring bar, to try and eliminate the sign of the chunks as much as possible.
Drilling with the medium length bit:
Drilling with the long brad point bit. The green tape marks the max extent of the drill into the canister:
Lid construction
I’ve tried to detail all of the dimensions and the part suppliers in this report. When I was making the original light, I worried quite a bit about whether all the details would work out, and would everything fit, so I want to provide this as a potential starting point for others. I’d like to say thanks to Wquiles, Packhorse, 350xfire for their awesome posts, and the book “The Divelight Companion” from AirSpeed Press.
Canister construction
The canister is 7.50” long by 2.5” wide on the outside, and has a 7” by 1.875” hole bored out for the battery. The entire canister diameter is really limited by the Agro gland and switch placement in the lid, so to get a little more room, I overbored the first 0.950” of canister length to a diameter of 2.00”.
I have a fairly small Harbor Freight 8x12 lathe, which is really about 14” between centers. Drilling or boring a hole usually requires 2X the length of the hole to allow for the length of the drill bit or boring bar when first starting out, which rapidly exceeds the length of my lathe for this design. Luckily I found that I could take the drilling & boring in three chunks. After putting a nice finish on the outside of the canister, and parting it off, I began by drilling a 1” hole using a stubby drill bit, to a depth of 2.5”. I then bored this hole out to close to the 1.875” final diameter, which then made room for me to place a 6” long, 1” wide drill bit into the bored out hole, start the lathe, and then drill out another 2-3” and repeat the boring process. I finished with a long 10” brad point drill, with the center spike ground down to be more flush. In using this bit, I run out of length to even chuck the bit, so I have to take the drill holder off the lathe, chuck the bit, and then put everything simultaneously back into the canister hole, and on the bed of the lathe. I have a nice ¾” diameter, 12” boring bar from Victor machining, which was absolutely essential for getting the inside of the canister made. After getting everything to almost the correct dimensions, I did finishing runs with the boring bar, to try and eliminate the sign of the chunks as much as possible.
Drilling with the medium length bit:
Drilling with the long brad point bit. The green tape marks the max extent of the drill into the canister: