DIY Canister Light and Lighthead

[puckvirus]

I've been diving in my dry suit now; I've got about 12 dives or so in it and use my canister light every time. The annoying problem I found diving is with out a Goodman handle its a little pain to put air in my suit while keeping my light from bouncing around and shining that powerful light in my buddies face, or just letting it go hanging then having to reach for it. So I decided to build a Goodman handle of sorts in a very cheep way, but in a way that'll make it very effective for me.

My solution that has worked thus far (2 dives)

I took 2 zip ties and tied them around my light head, then I took 2 more zip ties and tied them around the bottom thus changing the direction of the hole. I Found 2 pieces of Velcro we use at Microsoft to secure server cables and put it though my 2 zip tie holes and tightened them all together.

Doing this allows me to Velcro my light head to my hand in the normal Goodman style way with out having to worry about holding on to a handle. I feed the cable though my glove strap which secures the position of the light head for my preferred light head angle.

It is possible that after a few more dives my Velcro will loose its Velcro abilities. Fear not, my alternative plan is to use unlocking zip ties in their stead. These are the kind that have a little lever by the locking head that when depressed will allow the tie to become unzipped.

I have no pictures of this at the current time of this posting, however if one requests I'll be more then happy to take some and post them.

 

[regufool]

thanks for all of your great ideas i have been inspired to start my own but ive been reading about an msn group that i think padipro had set up i was wondering if some one might be able to fire that like over i cant seem to find it

thanks,

Steve!

 

[Padipro]

Here ya go Steve.

My DIY Site

Good Luck

 

[SIR VEYOR]

Hi all,
I've been finding reference to a McGill university paper or thesis report about a scuba light called "my personal sun". Unfortanately, I can't find it anywhere. I can only find the discontinued links. Can anyone elaborate on this paper?
Here's the bad link, in case someone can get it to work:
http://spiff.physics.mcgill.ca/scuba/light.html
Thanks,
Sir Veyor

Also, can a "signal" button be put into a light to allow morse code or similar to be used underwater? It's on a lot of military-style flashlights (I'm guessing HID isn't the best option for this, though).

 

[jtsmith]

Wow...never thought a thread would grow like this. Not trying to bump an old thread....just got on here to ask on oxygen question in another forum and my mailbox was full with people wanting an update on my light. Just had another baby girl so diving is going to be limited to the swimming pool for quite a while

Here goes:

I am STILL using the same light...although my batteries are about shot from the use. They'll do about a 20 minute dive and that's about it. Everything else is holding up great. I did get a glass lense from a rechargeable mag light rather then the custom one I had made because it sealed better...since then, no problems in the head for leakage.

When I dissassembled my canister at the end of the first season the electrical tape glue had been dissolved by the mineral oil...batteries were flopping around shorting out and the melted tape was a nasty black mess. To remedy the problem I used zip ties around the batteries....makes for a really really tight fit though. Probably need smaller dowel.

I also had a couple of drops of water get on the battery terminal and rested there in between dives and corroded it up pretty bad. No big deal, but when I plan on replacing the batteries I am going to coat them with liquid electrical tape or maybe hot glue. I'll probably soak the liquid electrical tape in mineral oil first to make sure it won't dissolve.

Other then that I am still rocking and rolling with the good old mineral oil canister light....still gets about a teaspoon of water in it and have to suck it out with a syringe every dozen dives or so...but it still works awesome with almost 100 dives on it....NO PARTS HAVE FAILED!!!!!

I have it taken apart now since I won't be able to dive much the next few years (kids and all). Upon inspection all of the parts look great. I'll probably replace the switch boot and the light but that's it!

I updated my E-mail so PM me if you have any questions and I should get them.

Thanks and great luck with your lights and diving!!!

~JT

 

[jtsmith]

Just another note on future plans...I bought a pelican 1 watt LED light the other day that is insanely bright....beam is very tight so it will need more LED's for a wider beam....but considering I could use 75 LEDs and still consume the same amount of power as my current light head....I should be able to practically simulate sunlight!

It will be a while before I try this...but just looking they have LED's that put out 120 Lumens now. Meased light on those MR bulbs is about 800 Lumens. 8 LEDS at 8 watts would burn for weeks! You could probably scale the canister down to nothing or even go with a single small unit to get this done.

One day when I get the time.......

 

[PaulSmithTek]

I am have been intreasted in building a light. I am wondering where you can get the part that the cord goes through into the mag light. The corigated looking sleave.

Thanks,

 

[PaulSmithTek]

Nevermind I found it.

 

[neo881]

And something else.....

You guys have any formula's that I can use to get a rough idea of the battery capacity I need for a 2 hour burn time on the 50w bulb? I'm looking in to getting a custom made battery-pack for the PVC pipe (believe it or not there's an affordable shop just around the corner that will do this for me - it's like a cosmic hint) and I need to have an idea of the capacity beforehand.

R..

This is a fairly straight forward caclulation. It goes like this :
Watts of the lamp (X) hours of burntime (/) the volts used = Ah Required
So: 50 watts x 2hrs / 12 volts = 8.3Ah
or : 50 watts x 2hrs / 16.8 volts = 5.95Ah (This is over driving your light)
The second shortened lamp life a little but imho is worth it.

Try looking here: http://www.batteryspace.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=988

 

[airsix]

I'm doing a DIY canister with the trailtech 30w HID. I just got the atv light tonight. I was exepecting the ballast to be a slip-in module like the 10w units, but it appears to be potted into the trailtech lighthead. For those of you who've worked with these how did you get the potted ballast out of the atv lighthead without destroying it? I'll try loosening it up with a hairdryer, but it looks like it's glued in there solid. Any advice is appreciated. I would prefer gentle persuasion vs. taking a die-grinder to the stainless steel housing.

-Ben