This lantern looks really cool so I just had to build it.
I've bought the electronics directly at Adafruit in the US because unfortunately I couldn't find a store in the EU which had them available. With tax and customs that made it quite expensive.
The 3D design has some flaws. For example: there is a hole in the bottom cap although the cap should be closed! I changed the design and closed the hole. And connecting the bottom cap with 4 horizontal screws to rest of the lantern doesn't seem smart - although it works.
The building tutorial at Adafruit is crap. First you have to screw the central two columns to the bottom mount plate which holds this whole thing together. After the assembly is almost finished, you have to UNSCREW the bottom mount plate and install the battery holder. At this point, the assembly literally falls apart into its single pieces! I strongly recommend installing the battery holder before bolting the columns to the bottom mount plate. Further, the pictures in the building guide are contradictory. The first pictures of the RP2040 show it soldered to the "right" side of the breadboard, later pictures show it soldered to the "left" side. I recommend using the later pictures because it will make bolting the breadboard to the mount plate easier later.
I've used the middle section of a plexiglass bottle instead of transparent foil. The diameter of the bottle was a little bit too big (66 mm instead of 63 mm) so I had to change the top and bottom coupler parts. But that was no big deal. By the way, the given length of 114 mm is 5 mm too short. Again: don't trust the building guide! However, this is hidden behind the bottom und top couplers so noone will notice.
That being said, the finished lantern looks awesome and I like it very much. I've given it the appearance of a Starfleet device and it will serve as a subspace field generator. Bringing the pre-programmed software to the QT Py was super easy and I think about using it in my own future projects.
This lantern looks really cool so I just had to build it.
I've bought the electronics directly at Adafruit in the US because unfortunately I couldn't find a store in the EU which had them available. With tax and customs that made it quite expensive.
The 3D design has some flaws. For example: there is a hole in the bottom cap although the cap should be closed! I changed the design and closed the hole. And connecting the bottom cap with 4 horizontal screws to rest of the lantern doesn't seem smart - although it works.
The building tutorial at Adafruit is crap. First you have to screw the central two columns to the bottom mount plate which holds this whole thing together. After the assembly is almost finished, you have to UNSCREW the bottom mount plate and install the battery holder. At this point, the assembly literally falls apart into its single pieces! I strongly recommend installing the battery holder before bolting the columns to the bottom mount plate. Further, the pictures in the building guide are contradictory. The first pictures of the RP2040 show it soldered to the "right" side of the breadboard, later pictures show it soldered to the "left" side. I recommend using the later pictures because it will make bolting the breadboard to the mount plate easier later.
I've used the middle section of a plexiglass bottle instead of transparent foil. The diameter of the bottle was a little bit too big (66 mm instead of 63 mm) so I had to change the top and bottom coupler parts. But that was no big deal. By the way, the given length of 114 mm is 5 mm too short. Again: don't trust the building guide! However, this is hidden behind the bottom und top couplers so noone will notice.
That being said, the finished lantern looks awesome and I like it very much. I've given it the appearance of a Starfleet device and it will serve as a subspace field generator. Bringing the pre-programmed software to the QT Py was super easy and I think about using it in my own future projects.
@Section31_86808 Congrats on your build, it looks great. This is a challenging build indeed