Skip to main content

Dollar Store Automated Shadowboxes



 I have to come clean, I have an addiction that absolutely runs my life. Its Dollar Tree. There's just something about Chinese Meals-for-One sized art supplies and e-waste that I simply cant resist. Its as if something inside of me is awoken that makes me lose all control the minute I pass through those green, gliding doors. 

Two of my Dollar store favorites are mini picture frames and hot glue. I love getting hot glue from the dollar store because they always have it and the packages they give run out quickly, so I always have an excuse to visit the dollar store again. However, on one journey to the store something by the checkout lane piqued my interest. 

For some reason, around summertime every dollar store is absolutely infested with solar lawn lamps. For some reason they are seemingly dropped off by the pallet load at every store. Right by the checkout lane there's always at least 50 in stock. I decided to grab a few with on my way out to rip apart and try to utilize somehow. 

After I got home, I realized that there are many different variations of the lamp, but all with pretty similar construction. They mostly have a lamp, a light and a cheap 1.2v rechargeable battery.

I did some experimenting and found that you can implement a disposable e-cig battery in place of the stock 1.2v battery. This way, you get a brighter glow from the LED, the ability to power lamps with a higher draw, and more importantly a more stable power supply. Another upside is a free plastic battery holder to use for future projects. (I intend to create a more detailed write up of the circut boards in the lawn lamps, however for the purposes of this post I will just stick to the basic construction of the shadowboxes.)

I decided to combine the frames and the lights to create a DIY LED shadowbox. The construction depicted in this post is pretty crude, but it shows the basic idea behind this project. Solar cell on top of a shadowbox connected to the battery and circut board and the LED is mounted on the top. I decided to make a diorama for an Alien figure I found in the trainyard, and I thought it looked pretty cool. 

Ultimately, this blog post is kind of just a rough documentation of this idea, and I plan on fleshing it out a bit further. I plan on redesigning the shell to more elegantly house the solar panel and batteries, and hopefully I can sell kits or at least release the STL files for the masses. Even as a proof of concept, I still think that it's pretty cool.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

New Croc Mods - Paint, Netting, and More

My newest pair has been inspired by my latest YouTube slop addiction topic: mass extinction. I sought to replicate a fossilized texture to the shoe by utilizing walnut, peony, flat whites, semi-gloss white, and Navajo white. This is my second pair of men’s shoes and I am quite pleased with them.  The main eye-grabber of the shoes is the netting in my opinion. By adding netting, insoles, and clipped straps the docile foam shoe is furnished into nearly a fully fledged sneaker. On foot, the comfort is improved and the walk ability is night and day. There is a little to be done with fitment, but I think the insoles are a grand addition I’m still working on finding the best paint for painting foam shoes. This application is novel and demanding, requiring an enamel with high compliance, flexibility and mechanical adhesion to the foam. I find that the Zinisser primer I used sometimes chips or peels if the shoe is manipulated before it is completely dry. However, I found using libera...
Post a Comment
Read more

HUF x SatYourDay Radio - Graphic Submission

  This was a fun one to cook up! Anthony from Satyourday called me to help out with some graphics for a tentative HUF collab and i had just the idea . Anthony is a good friend of mine and one of our favorite pastimes is smoking pot and listening to music in his Garage after work. I thought this would be a great theme to include with the weed sock company and decided to combine retro radio shirts, DJing, and fun times getting fried in this one graphic. Another special thanks to Anthony from Satyourday for the opportunity.
Post a Comment
Read more