Brainstorming:

Times when I needed a flashlight...

• Camping: I have this great lantern that is a flashlight, and when stretched out it is a lantern. I can also hook it up on the top of my tent when I'm inside. Small, versatile, affordable, and solar-powered!
• Looking through small spaces: I hate using my iPhone when looking through my backpack and cabinets, so I lose a hand and I'm a very weak, clumsy person.
• What I need: Something small and direct, can stand on it's own?

Ideating/Sketching

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Magic wand with a magnet switch, headlamps against a milk jug for camping, vellum/plastic lanterns?

Possible idea: LED lantern that has a magnet switch? That you can take down and flatten out.

I wanted to create a repeatable pattern so when taken apart it can be stacked on top of each other.

Shopping for materials

Vellum + LED, affordable but can get easily ruined. Clear plastic board? Could not find ANYTHING. This is where I had to turn around my project and start with material on the floor and start thinking from there.

Prototyping

With starting this project late, I was in a rush to find ANYTHING. I got acrylic for future project's and decided to use a piece of scrap wood I found on the floor. I initially wanted to use a reed switch to have a magnetic switch but with time I resorted to a battery holder that Mai had an extra of on the floor (thanks!).

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Because I was in a rush, I DID NOT think of the details of measurements and sizing of the piece as a whole. I also learned spots pop up when I laser cut, and I may need to laser cut twice to actually cut through. With the shop closing, I played with what I had.

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I wanted to see which works best with the acrylic - wood glue or a hot glue gun. The wood glue was easier to flatten out but the residue did not dry as clear. However the hot glue gun dried faster and clearer, but did not dry flat and extremely quickly.

As I was working - I dropped GLUE on my flashlight bulb. I thought it would be fine but it did not work anymore. So I improvised to a simple LED bulb. After soldering my current system, as I put the wood box together, I realized my battery casing was the tiniest bit too big where it couldn't close.

Lessons Learned

• Plans always fall through - have back ups - actually just do things earlier (rough start just quit my full time job today so I can finally focus on school with all attention 🙂 !)
• Order things online early, I wasted a lot of time commuting around trying to find something when I could've ordered or found something else on the floor
• Draw out measurements, I definitely would have thought about the measurements more if I did not rush. But I also thought I could grind things down to a 45 degree angle and it did not happen.
• I love acrylic, be more thoughtful because $$$
• Be less clumsy - that bulb was $5 🙁