Foil Conducting Lamp

This Instructable is about a lamp that turns ON when placed on the metal foil.

The circuit is very simple. I attached two conductors at the bottom of the plate that complete the circuit when the plate is placed on the metal foil.

The LED circuit is made from 100 ohm resistor connected in series with the LED. You will need to use a 47 ohm resistor if you buy 10 mm thickness LED or 180 ohm resistor if you are using a 3 mm thickness LED.

Parts: foil, cardboard, sticky tape (masking, scotch, gaffer), 47 ohm/100 ohm/180 ohm resistor - low power, colour changing LED (3 mm to 10 mm thickness), metal wire (1 mm or 2 mm), AA or AAA battery harness.

Tools: scissors, hole puncher, pliers.

Optional parts: solder, matrix board, blue tack, insulated wires.

Optional tools: soldering iron, wire stripper.

I cut out a square plate from brown cardboard and used shiny white sticky tape to improve the image. I wanted the colour of the plate match the colour of the plastic light cover.

The centre metal wire will be used to hold the battery and the other two terminals (on each side) are the foil conductors.

I attached the battery with the with metal wire at the centre of the plate. I connected the positive end of the battery to the LED circuit. The negative end of battery and the negative terminal of the LED circuit are connected to the two conductors that will touch the foil.

I attached the LED circuit with white blue tack. You can use sticky tape.

I placed the plastic light cover on top for testing.

I smudged the foil to improve conduction.