Single cell white LED flashlight

flashlight_schem
Originally uploaded by hithisishal

I have been quite busy with classes and trying to figure out what to do next year, so I still haven't had a chance to finish up the weather station. Anyway, Here's a little project that I am working on (well, waiting for switches to arrive from DX) for a class under Professor Mark Yim . As I have mentioned before, I am very inexperienced (and frankly, just bad) at mechanical design, but for this project we used a 3D Printer to make the case. The assignment was to make an LED flashlight, just as an intro to the course - expect cooler stuff in the future. I chose to make a small light that will run for a long time (~15 hours off AAA, 35 with a AA).

The circuit is basically straight out of an app note, but I don't think the IC is well embraced by the hobbyist community - I didn't see any designs out there at all, so I figured I would share. Anyway, it's very small, and I was able to keep the entire circuit small with some careful soldering. I also had tons of fun using the 3D printer. The knurling and threads came out so much better than I expected! Although i barely have time to hack, it's really nice to be at a university with all of these resources.

Click on the image to see the rest of the pictures from this project on flickr.