The base for this project was in a box of old boat stuff and was the inspiration for this light. You could make a similar base using .060 copper sheet, notching the corners, forming the copper over a piece of wood and soldering the corners. It might even look cool to just make a 1" cut at each corner then form the base and lap the "flap" over the corner and then solder it up.
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Signing UpStep 1: Whatcha gonna need
50 pcs. .250" thick X 3" square.
One (1) copper base 3.625" square X 1" deep.
One (1) 110V AC to 12V DC generic power supply.
One (1) female 12V plug to match above male plug
One (1) Ultra-bright cyn (color) Luxeon star LED
One (1) High Power LED driver (Velleman K8078)
Some 16ga. copper wire
Silicone glue
One (1) copper base 3.625" square X 1" deep.
One (1) 110V AC to 12V DC generic power supply.
One (1) female 12V plug to match above male plug
One (1) Ultra-bright cyn (color) Luxeon star LED
One (1) High Power LED driver (Velleman K8078)
Some 16ga. copper wire
Silicone glue
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Imagine there's no children or unhelpful commentators,
It's easy if you try,
No troublesome grabbing hands or knit-picking,
Around us potentially unsafe and fun Instructibles,
Imagine all the people,
Living life in peace and building interesting Stacked Glass LED Lamps.
You may say that I'm a dreamer,
But I'm not the only one
Personally I'd build a cage around the glass - perhaps out of copper like the base - or maybe steel and then copper plate the steel. Copper plating is ludicrously easy with copper sulphate, though it won't be shiny or flat
there's glue, that would keep it stuck together, even if it were beaten on with an iron pipe, heck, even plain silicone caulking would do that. like someone said, the edges of non-tempered glass could be heat ablated(blowtorch on the edges), but it wouldn't look as nice, or be that much safer.
what i would go for, is different shapes... maybe spacers of different materials or sizes, a small blowtorch and vacuum vessel could be used to holes for an led stick to go through, for brighter light. with a hole through, a rod could be put through to make it a hanging lamp.
then there's the possibility of using a glass cutting hole saw, use an abrasive circular saw to cut squares with curved L shaped cuts inside, add wedge shaped spacers, a pot lid with a hole, perhaps a glass one. make two round ones, fit them together, face to face, put a circular fluorescent tube inside, rough the glass lid for frosting.
(... is this proper english?)
when you burn the edges the whole thing could stick together
but you have to consider the tension of the glass when it's cooling down
my first thought was to glue the glass together and use it to cast a mould, then use resin to create the actual lamp design. perhaps the center could be hollowed out by inserting a tube 3/4 of the way through the mould, which would decrease the overall weight as well. however, casting resin is pretty expensive which makes my idea sort of unrealistic... some nice ideas here in the comments, and the original is wonderful, of course.
could somebody try it? i dont have enough glass tiles at home and I dont want to break a window ^^
I'm fairly certain the driver for these kind of LED Pulse Width Modulate the current sent to the LED. A quick use of google leads to circuit example. Even one here at instructables, but why would anybody be surprised yo learn that? :)
In the event one could fie polish the cut edges, and maintain tight 90 decree corners. brass angle iron or wood corner trim could be used to keep the stacked plates in place. An original idea AFIK, I agree with the other commenter a nighttime photo of the lamp lit would be a nice addition the instructable.
with that but was a fountain with running water.
1) its really pretty easy and safe to drill through glass - you get a glass bit and set the glass in a shallow pan and drill under water- just takes a lot of time
2) to smooth the edges of broken glass: There are many ways to do this - it will also look nicely frosted! a) Go to a stained glass supply store and buy a glass file ( again I like to use this under water as it makes little flakes that can flyyyyy). b) plain old carbide sand paper works well but PLEASE WEAR GLOVES c) plain old sand - just rub the edges through sand over and over and over and over, repeat, again.
FWIW my suggestion is go to a stained glass store and do this with "chunk" stained glass, also drill the hole offset and that way the rod will hold the pieces in place but they can be "fanned" to change the appearance.
Good luck
. With regards to the light I would use a tube light.to go up the middle. These are flexible and can be bought in metre lengths.
Another adhesive someone suggested to me was egg white but as I had the uv and uv light I never tried it.
Good luck with your project from nikki at rathart.com
I would never consider putting this on a ceiling unless you had the ceiling re-inforced. Safer on the floor unstuck than having a shower of glass on top of your head.
The only other way I can think of securing your glass light would be to put four thin metal poles on each corner of your base and drill four little holes on each corner of the glass and slot the glass down onto the poles. Drilling glass especially the thickness of your glass could be tricky as you would need to use water to cool down the drill so the glass does not shatter.but not being an expert on the matter I can not give you specific details on how to do this.
This wouldn't take from the beauty of the outside of the structure but would at least hold the structure together.
Good luck with your venture.
At any rate, cool Instructable. This is definitely on my "to-do one day" list.
Boblelon, you are seventy_xxx... you use computers, you make cool things and then publish it as instructables... you don`t know the word impossible!
I want a video! :D
Anyway, I'm curious, even though it doesn't get moved, how much does this thing weigh? It sounds very heavy.
Probably more expensive is the glue that's used to glue car rear-view mirrors to the glass - its bond strength is quite extreme.
I really like this project. Making a few of these as garden lights would create a striking feature.
Bring the pieces to a Stained Glass / Glass slumping store that rents kiln time and have your pieces fused (tacked, not heavily melted together) together. Those types of Kilns are electronically controlled and the proprietor will likely put yours in with other projects that need to be 'fused' so that all projects can be 'soaked' at the same settings. Since you are sharing the kiln with others, this makes for VERY inexpensive Kiln time. Once your piece is finished and has cooled, it will look even better than before and all the sharp edges will be gone (Fusing temps will do that...). No Glue, no mess, just one nice solid piece of glass!
Cheers,
Most Glass and Glass Craft stores will rent out Kiln space for a few bucks an hour. If you can find someone who is doing some 'fusing', you could easily add your project to a couple of existing ones and have them do it for you. The process is quite simple (most kilns have electronic controls for this purpose..) and takes a good 6 to 8 hours hours. Once finished, the glass will be fused (not melted) and you'll have one perfectly 'welded' tower of glass with the added bonus of edges that are no longer sharp!
Cheers,
But, if you have all of those, then you can cast your own blocks pretty easily. Preheat the graphite table with some glass, then put the mold on the table, coat it with graphite, and ladle hot glass into the mold (you need a kevlar glove on the hand closest to the furnace and a leather glove on the back of the ladle for control). When it's cool enough you can remove the mold, but you'll need to torch the piece (with a lower heat torch like oxygen, oxy-acetylene would be too hot) to get the whole thing to the same temperature. Then put it in a kiln and wait for it to come down slowly to room temperature.
You can cut corners but it affects the quality of the final piece. If you don't torch it, you risk the piece cooling too fast (a metal mold will suck the heat of the glass on the sides) and having it crack. If you don't have a kiln it will definitely crack. If you don't preheat the table the piece might cool too quickly on the bottom and crack. If you use steel instead of graphite, you won't have as nice a face on the bottom of the piece, and there's a greater chance it will crack (the metal sucks a lot more heat than the graphite). If you don't coat the mold with oil/graphite, you risk the piece sticking in the mold. If you use too much oil, the piece will have streaks that are difficult to remove. You can't really compromise on the protective gear though. If you do you will get burned, and you'll get burned badly.
This is obviously not accessible to many people. But a lot of cities do have glass studios that rent out time slots. (and offer classes to people without glass experience)
now have now gotten my attention seriously and I want to make something like this!!
I get these nice warm .9 watt LED bulbs from walmart and have been trying to figure out how to make a FIXTURE to wrap around them. THIS would be killer cool!!
A 3" square 1/4" title of glass is very thick. That's about the size of a pad of Post-it notes. Will the glass tiles even crack if you drop them two feet onto a wooden desktop? Have you tried dropping a few test pieces onto concrete, wood, and carpet to see how durable they are? Chips flying off corners would be my biggest concern.
You could also glue all but a few of the top tiles. That should be enough to stabilize the structure without showing the glue. Glue two tiles and then see how deep in the stack they need to be before you don't notice the cement... On the other hand, now if this heavy structure is tipped over then all the energy will be concentrated on the edge that first hits the floor or a toddler or kitty.
I'd be more worried about the razor sharp edges of the squares. You could knock off the razor edges by dragging the edges over a sheet of 400 or 800 grit sand paper. If you do it right your eye would likely not be able to see the difference, yet this could mean the difference between having merely sharp edges and having a drunken dinner guests slice open a finger as one glides it along an edge to see how sharp it is.
It seems that the hardest part is breaking the glass! This comes from a stained glass artist.
This glass lamp was sitting on that wood.
Your hand is now taking a shower of glass.
The lab technique requires the use of a clean-room because the technology incorporates microscopic features etched in the glass. I wonder if you could make this work to both bond the glass and preserve the transparency which is the main attractive feature of this lamp? It's pretty simple to try.
If you can get a hold of a few liters of *very high purity* water, you can get the glass to stick to itself. Distilled water from the grocery store might work, but if you've got a friend who works in a chemistry or biology lab, ask them to get you a container of ultra pure de-mineralized water. Of course, the container itself should be ultra-clean.
Clean the glass very well first by washing and rinsing very well with tap water, then soaking in isopropyl alcohol (absolute ethanol is you can get it) for a couple of hours. Then soak it for a full 24 hours or more in the de-mineralized water.
Use very clean gloves for the next step. No finger prints allowed.
Build a stack of wet plates without bubbles by just stacking them under fresh ultra-clean water. Press them firmly together. Once you remove the stack from the clean water, dry it with a hair dryer for a few minutes to get rid of most moisture. The bond will strengthen over time as the residual moisture evaporates.
IF the glass surfaces are very flat and very clean, they will bond and be nearly transparent. IF they are not, this may produce a weird looking interference pattern that may spoil the look. Just a suggestion.
Anyone else out there have more experience with the technique than me? It's not my field, I'm just aware of the general techniques.
I really really dig this. GREAT JOB!!!!!!!
I'm reminded of a jewish artist that does these huge stacked glass sculptures. I'm an architect. This artist was going to do a sculpture for a building I was involved with but when the economy tanked so did the project so I never got to meet him.
http://www.slideshare.net/Glassnerf/jeremy-langfords-glass-sculptures-at-the-western-wall
as a question, how do you turn it on of off?
Here I was enjoying a perfectly good Instructable and happened across this comment with the word Nazi in it which is very stressful and hurtful to me because...
Everything is offensive to somebody. If you see something you don't like, move on and ignore it.
Sheesh.
First They came... - Pastor Martin Niemoller
First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.
I have a rescue cat and she was very abused before I got her. I love her to death, like abreuma below, I also have times when she drives me to exasperation and I threaten to turn her into "kitty sausage." I've yet to discover her surreptitiously attempting to report me to the SPCA.
So, I have and love cats, but I got the joke and the sentiment and didn't consider it violent.
You seem to be the sort of person who would suspend a first grader for drawing a soldier holding a gun, and that is sad and why our society is getting so weird and litigious.
I think you could glue the plates together and prevent bubbles by applying a drop of superglue or clear epoxy and then put the two plates being glued into a vacuum food sealer bag and pump out the air.
Chemically or mechanically etching the surface of the plates in random patterns would ensure that some of the light gets scattered through the sides of the plates and might add a nice effect.
There are so many ways to make variations on this it boggles the mind!
Could you also clamp all the glass together in a stack and use a dremel to cut some shapes into the edges of the glass? Or is it too brittle?
Great instructable, can't wait for some photos of this lamp in the dark.
or use polycarbonate that you "thread" (or acrylic) and now its also "clear"
Most glass stores in the US do not recycle their glass, because in general float glass is not reusable. So you can get free glass from your local glass store. You'd have to cut it all into squares, but it's free.
I think the safety element is a matter of common sense. I can think of a number of interesting ways to support this lamp including just a plexi sheath with a bottom cap, that could sit in a nearby cupboard and just slip down over it in case children (or cats or dogs) were to visit.
Taking off the sharp edges would probably also change the beauty of the lamp.
unglued = coasters!
It is a sharp { parden the pun} looking light though !
as for a cheaper driver, other instructables cover it. this one covers different DIY (translate to cheap) low and highpower LED drivers and is really informative
also, im not really familiar with glass working, but could you somehow (torch, oven, get creative) heat it up so that they fuse together without losing the stacked effect?
or perhaps just melt/fuse the back of the light together, the side u dont watch