DIY 3D Printed Mini Flashlight With Wireless Charging

Hello fellow DIY enthusiasts in this project i will show you how i made this 3d printed flashlight that has wireless charging support feature

The aim was to make a small but powerful flashlight that can be carried without any hassle when you are wandering around

This is soo small that even if you keep a coin infront of it the flashlight will still look small! The overall body of flashlight is under 2cm can you believe that?

To charge this i have made a small wireless charging station and if you just keep this flashlight over the panel the light will start charging automatically

It gives a decent backup compared to its size, the light is sealed from all the directions and i haven't tested it for being water proof, i will test it and will update how it went

The best part here is all the parts for the frame of this light is 3d printed so that you don't need to worry about marking or missing the measurements this will save a lot of time

You can also add it as a keychain by adding a small hole and making it as a keyring! i personally didn't1W want to do so since if i did that this flashlight is soo cute to see that many may steal it! Lol sorry if this was a bad joke!

How cool are these features? i tried my level best to make it waterproof since we are using wireless charging here to recharge the light

These being said now let us jump into making this flashlight, Note that this project will need patience since we are handling small electronics!

Few are prone to working in such challenging project and i will be happy if you will also be the one! Im eagerly waiting to see your projects in the i made it section.

Out of all the supplies few electronics were recycled from used electronics and you can do the same, If not you can get them online

1W Led

Push Button(I found this most suitable for this project)

Small Lipo battery(recycled from old earphone)

2N222A transistor

Diode(recycled)

Insulated copper wire

3D Printer

Slicing Software

Super Glue

PLA Filament

Soldering Iron

TP5056 Charging Module

USB cable

I used Tinkercad application to design the body of this flashlight, It was easy for me to make the custom design considering the standard size of the electronics

The first step before building this mini flashlight was to make a design that looks small but also have good strength to handle all the small shocks

Additionally it should also be able to hold all the electronics inside it, I made many designs and finally after calculating many factors i decided to stick with this design

After i designed the model i exported the STL to cura slicer to slice the model, you can check for the settings that i have used in the pictures above, There is no need of using any rafts or supports at the time of printing the model

The design is simple yet has lots of space to hold all the small components, I printed in different color combinations and you can choose your favorite color

There are total 3 parts, out of which the base frame and the top lid i printed at one go and the charging board holder was printed in the second time

PLA filament i used and the colors were black, blue, orange and black and instead of printing in one single color i tried color combinations and the results were far beyond what i expected

After we have designed and have the 3d printed part ready we can now prepare the circuit for this flash lamp

Before building the circuit i scavenged the batteries and diode, i used body of pen to roll the copper wires and make it as a coil, tie the coil with thread to avoid opening up

Follow the circuit diagram and wherever the soldering part needs to be done, gently scratch the top layer of coil and now you can solder the wires here

For the batteries i scavenged the lipo battery from my old Bluetooth speaker whos speaker stopped working, the batteries needed a second life so i will be using here

Just remove the case of earphone and desolder the pins of battery from the board and now you are good to go

Later we can build the wireless power transmission circuit that we usually see in wireless charging devices, we will follow the same principle but with alternative components

Insulated copper wires will be used to make the transmitter and receiver parts, The receiver part is simple and we are using LED to the end of rolled(coils) copper wire

Like shown in the circuit diagram we are uisng the receiver part but with some additional components

Since we are uisng the flashlight on the go it needs a battery so we are making a general battery and light circuit but with the use of switch and diode

Diodes help in stopping reverse current flow and the transistor for amplifying the low power to steady power so that the battery can be charged with low power conditions also

After you build the circuit following this circuit diagram you can test the circuit for its working

Connect multimeter to the ends of receiver coils and power on the tranmsitter circuit using TP4056 charging module

The output from transmitter is 5v and at the receiving end it will be around 3v only because of losses

This power output will be fluctuating a lot and is unsuable to charge the battery, so i will use transistor to give a steady and amplified power flow

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Once the testing is completed and the multimeter shows reading connect the battery, diode and switch to the receiver circuit and test the light

Also i would recommend to test the backup time of your battery by continuously keeping the light to glow first and draining the battery

Now the choice of cables or wire that you use while soldering plays an very important role since this contributes to the flexibility of the circuit to fit inside the frame

The toggle switch has 4 terminals out of which they are connected in parallel, so in short we have 2 pins only, find out the parallel connection part and trim of the excess pin from each parallel joins

I recommend to use gel type superglue to connect the switch to top part of 3d printed lid

Allow to dry completely and now place the button, solder from the base and test for its working

It will work fine, Now the most important part of this light is to insert the components inside 3d printed frame, Start by applying gel based glue to the base of the frame and gently place the copper coil(receiver part)

Now insert the battery and then the LED, adjust the LED to be at the center of the hole on the frame and seal the sides with a layer of gel glue

Finally adjust the wires so to fit the top lid without any hassle, in each step check for the working of LED, because after we close the lid it is difficult to open and check again

Repeat the same placement step for the transmitter part also, Now in the end we have both the circuits ready to be tested

Using this is not as complex as making the circuit for this flashlight! I recommend to carry this tiny little flashlight wherever you go because we never know when your car breaks down or when you might need an additonal flashlamp whenever you are on your trekking.

To turn on this light all you have to do is press on the toggle switch and the lamp turns on only untill you keep on pressing the button

After you release the button the light stops glowing, Now you may wonder why didnt you add a simple on and off switch?

The answer is simple, if i added that the wastage of energy would be more, Using this toggle switch will add more backup time to this light

To charge this lamp connect the charging base(transmitter) to the USB and then to 5v adapter or any USB power source

Place the light on top of this and you are good to go, The light takes a lot of time to charge and the power loss is more here

But no worries, i will improve the circuit further to make the least power loss and achieve greater efficiency

Have a look at the bottom of the charger i didnt seal the base since we have parts that might heat sometimes upon continuous usage

This is all for now, Thank you for showing interest in this project, Let me know how this project came up in your build

If you missed to follow any step and dont want to follow up from the very beginning consider watching this video

This video has all the above said steps, If you still need more details on the soldering part i recommend to watch the video once, Even after that if you have any questions we have a comment section to connect us

This is all about this mini 3d printed torchlight, See you soon in another great instructables, Thanks for reading