Rusty Candle Lamp

by chienline

1.2K173

Intro: Rusty Candle Lamp

Halloween is coming. Although we never celebrate it in Indonesia, I decided to join the party in Instructables this year ^_^

Grim Reaper is the first thing crossed my mind when thinking of something scary, something bad. Death. He and his unique scythe. Then I noticed that he always carry an old candle lamp at the other hand, another unique prop.

This time I am making an Old Rusty Candle Lamp with my own version. Modern technology blends into old ancient art. What an art ...

STEP 1: Materials

  • Old rusty fluorescent lamp fixture.
  • Plastic bottle.
  • Old rusty dog chain.
  • An Arduino Uno or make your own at cheap.
  • 2 yellow LEDs.
  • 1 red LED.
  • LiPo battery or make your own at cheap.
  • 2 jumper wires for battery.
  • A piece of paper.

STEP 2: The Base

  • Cut the fixture at half your bottle circumference.
  • Split the fixture into half, lengthwise.
  • Cut the base of the fixture and fold the wall at bottle's corner. So we get two "L" shape base forming a rectangle surrounding the bottle.

STEP 3: The Cap

  • Cut the fixture a little bit wider than the bottle.
  • Flatten the fixture.
  • Cut from every corner toward the center, but do not cut them off.
  • Fold the left and right triangles down and curve the front and back triangles to shape a rooftop.
  • Fold and clip the corners as necessary.

STEP 4: The Candle

As I mentioned before, a new technology blends into ancient art. I pick a digital candle, powered by a lipo battery, which is much safer than a real candle which can cause fire when the wind blows.

  • Put a piece of board to cover the hole at the base.
  • Put in your Arduino Uno.
  • Plug a yellow LED. Anode goes to D11. Cathode goes to GND.
  • Plug a red LED. Anode goes to D10. Cathode goes to D8.
  • Plug a yellow LED. Anode goes to D9. Cathode goes to D7.
  • Make sure no contact on every legs of the LEDs.
  • Plug a jumper wire on VIN (preferably red).
  • Plug a jumper wire on GND (preferably black).
  • Route both jumper wires (black and red) below the base board.
  • Put in your battery.
  • Route the battery wire below the base board.
  • Connect black wire to battery negative pin.
  • Cut a piece of paper and shape like a candle (cylinder).
  • Stick it on your Arduino or base board circling the LEDs.

STEP 5: The Code 

// 3 LEDs Candle Effect

int Ground1 = 7;
int Ground2 = 8;
int YellowLED1 = 9;
int RedLED = 10;
int YellowLED2 = 11;

void setup()
{
  pinMode(Ground1, OUTPUT);
  pinMode(Ground2, OUTPUT);
  pinMode(YellowLED1, OUTPUT);
  pinMode(RedLED, OUTPUT);
  pinMode(YellowLED2, OUTPUT);
  digitalWrite(Ground1, LOW);
  digitalWrite(Ground2, LOW);
}

void loop() {
  analogWrite(YellowLED1, random(135)+120);
  analogWrite(RedLED, random(175)+80);
  analogWrite(YellowLED2, random(175)+80);
  delay(random(100));
}

What a simple code playing random brightness of the LEDs.

  • Load the code into your Arduino.
  • Unplug your cable to PC.
  • Connect the red jumper wire to battery positive pin. Check if your "candle" is working good or not.

STEP 6: Finishing

  • Put the bottle in. Here I cut only the top side of the plastic bottle, then I placed it upside down so that the top side can help spreading the light. But I guess it has no effect at all :D
  • Put the cap (rooftop) on.
  • At this point the lamp looks funny rather than spooky.
  • Then I use this old rusty dog chain circling the lamp.

STEP 7: Your Time Has Come

Now it is no more funny. Hang it on a huge wrinkled tree in front of your house to gain the effect. Then I added a piece of board hung underneath : "Your Time Has Come." That is when the Grim Reaper is coming to fetch you.

Here is the video of the candle in the dark.

2 Comments

chienline 6 months ago

That was cooking oil container. You can use mineral water bottle or any thick transparent material for this purpose.

Happy making :)