The original idea was to make a wide angle flashlight that my mother would use when she was out walking the dog. There are a lot of black aluminum tube flashlights out there that are very good but, most of them deal with a narrow beam.  I wanted something that was neither black nor aluminum nor a tube.  I was originally inspired by a youtube video:  How to make a 10W light at 12V from cheap parts Lots of experimenting happened from this starting point and it wasn’t that cheap by the time we got to the end.

Which lens to use and how to mount i t and what portable power system, where all questions that needed multiple attempts to arrive at a solution. In some ways this is an incomplete project, it still needs a better battery charging system than the one I

worked out. The wood case itself was CNC cut on the big router and then I manually rounded over the edges on the router table. I went with smaller finger joints and they came out well.  The cabinet pull for a handle gives it a sense of presense and mass that I try for in most of my designs.  I had hoped to get the flashlight ready for Christmas one year but it was pushed over five months until Mother’s Day the next. She does love it and all reports are that Dad “borrows” it often.