briand
Well Known Member
Well I decided $50+ was too much to pay for a fancy map light so I decided to fab. my own [mostly] out of scrap. Total cost was about $2.00, not including the gas to drive to home depot for the aluminum screw and nuts.
I used a pc. of tube left over from my aileron push tubes (if you want to build one with more lights you could use the scrap from your elevator push tubes. Then I cut out the 3 discs using a fly cutter. 2 discs are the same as the O/D of the push tubes and one is the same as the I/D (this is the one that the diodes are mounted to.
The mount is simply a pc. of scrap 5/16 x.058 fab'd in the fashion of your aileron trim push tube (at least in the 8) or your forward baggage door latch tubes. I tapped the other end to 1/4-28 so all you need to do to mount it is drill a 1/4" hole and use an AN4 bolt. I ground two sides in the bolt to slip in-between the prongs of the 5/16 x .058 tube. After I decide where to mount the light I may cut the length of the tube down a little, all depends where I put it.
I drilled the tube and the alum. screw to #27 and used a truss head screw with a nylock nut. Tension the screw enough to make it so you can adjust the light but it still holds its setting.
For the lights I used 4 - $0.09 red LED's and a 100 ohm 1/4 watt resistor wired in series glued and potted to the inner disc.
I'm not sure how it will adjust at the mount/bolt location. I plan to drill the tube so I can fit a cotter pin through the tube and into the drilled bolt shaft. My other option will be to use a nylon washer between the mounting surface and the light mount then torque the bolt using loctite on the threads.
I'll either anodize the parts, including the screw and nuts, or just paint them the same color as the interior.
The cost breakdown:
4-Diodes $0.36
1-Resistor $0.20
1-Screw $0.75
2-nuts $0.45
total = $1.76
Pictures:
http://img194.imageshack.us/i/picture03h.jpg/
I used a pc. of tube left over from my aileron push tubes (if you want to build one with more lights you could use the scrap from your elevator push tubes. Then I cut out the 3 discs using a fly cutter. 2 discs are the same as the O/D of the push tubes and one is the same as the I/D (this is the one that the diodes are mounted to.
The mount is simply a pc. of scrap 5/16 x.058 fab'd in the fashion of your aileron trim push tube (at least in the 8) or your forward baggage door latch tubes. I tapped the other end to 1/4-28 so all you need to do to mount it is drill a 1/4" hole and use an AN4 bolt. I ground two sides in the bolt to slip in-between the prongs of the 5/16 x .058 tube. After I decide where to mount the light I may cut the length of the tube down a little, all depends where I put it.
I drilled the tube and the alum. screw to #27 and used a truss head screw with a nylock nut. Tension the screw enough to make it so you can adjust the light but it still holds its setting.
For the lights I used 4 - $0.09 red LED's and a 100 ohm 1/4 watt resistor wired in series glued and potted to the inner disc.
I'm not sure how it will adjust at the mount/bolt location. I plan to drill the tube so I can fit a cotter pin through the tube and into the drilled bolt shaft. My other option will be to use a nylon washer between the mounting surface and the light mount then torque the bolt using loctite on the threads.
I'll either anodize the parts, including the screw and nuts, or just paint them the same color as the interior.
The cost breakdown:
4-Diodes $0.36
1-Resistor $0.20
1-Screw $0.75
2-nuts $0.45
total = $1.76
Pictures:
http://img194.imageshack.us/i/picture03h.jpg/
Last edited:
