Alchemical Hazard Jar Lamp

It's eerie illumination time!

Inspiration is a funny thing, and we really can take some twisty roads to get to a destination. I set out to make another lamp using LED strips, but ended up with a design that can really use any kind of compact light at all, as long as you can wedge it in somewhere and make it point in a useful direction! This lamp didn't end up being designed around the light source, but instead around a light modifier…

Yes, glass jars are where its at! A previous, more LED-strip-oriented version of this design needed something to help it cast interesting shadows and beams, and I'd tried to incorporate drinking glasses into it. The results just weren't that interesting, though, and it occurred to me that having more refraction would be very useful, which, as you can probably guess, led to the thought of glass jars full of water with lids to keep the aforementioned water in.

With glass jars the new hot item, the existing design was cast aside mercilessly, and a new design developed that incorporated this glorious refractive wonder. And it was immediately way cooler and way more light-bendy than any of the previous designs!   

Right, let's look at how it's all constructed, by pulling it apart.

Jar Dimensions 

I tried to pick the most generic glass jar I could! Maybe it had pasta sauce in it? Maybe a satay simmer sauce! It was probably some kind of supermarket sauce. Anyway, as generic as possible because sizing is important.

Jar diameter: 78mm 

Jar height: 150mm (but there's allowance for space on top)

You can of course use a smaller diameter jar instead, but one that's the right size to fit snug into the lamp will give best results.

A note on small threads

Printed threads are a tricky thing! The thing is, there needs to be a certain degree of tolerance to allow parts to move against each other. As threads get smaller, we get to a point where it's possible for that tolerance to cause the thread to just slip out! So, these connectors are relatively tight!

Construction - The Lid 

The lid, or Segment - Top as the filename reads, is held in place by three threaded connector caps. You'll need 18 of those, assuming you are using the same components as I did.

The jar can just pop down into the lamp once the lid is off.

Construction - Channels for Lights

With the lid off, and after taking out the LED strip and the jar, we can look down into the lamp and see that there's a central space for the jar, and two enclosed voids down the side. These are intended for lights, whether LED strip or otherwise. You can also see the jar support beams that run across the base segment - that's intended for providing a channel for LED strips to wrap around, should you be so inclined!

Construction - Middle Segments

The middle segments are the interesting bits! They are all variations on a theme, and only really vary in whether they form part of the porthole opening. But what's common to all of them is that they're formed from a central piece, then two LED Housing element that slot into place, and that the segment connects to the ones above and below it using the same threaded connector caps mentioned above.

Construction - The Base

The Base Underside connects to the Base Segment via two much larger threaded connector caps, fittingly called Base Connectors.

With the Base Underside removed we can see the channels in the base intended for routing LED strips so that they can shine up through the base of the jar.

Construction - Porthole Plates

The porthole opening needs some decoration, as I'm sure you'll agree. The decorative plates bolt in place with one bolt each.

As mentioned above, though, small threads are tricky, so there are two different bolt models provided, one tighter than the other. Use the tighter one by default, and then fall back to the other version if your particular printer, filament, and slicing means that things are too tight.

Construction - Take Careful Note of the Porthole Upper and Lower!

You would be forgiven for thinking that the upper and lower porthole models are exactly the same as each other, but they are not! They are not symmetrical, and as a result the connectors will not line up properly if the upper and lower are switched around. This is easy to check!

The easiest way to work out whether you have the upper or lower porthole segment is to position it on the base segment, and line up the front two connector threads.

If the rear connector lines up, too, then you have the lower porthole segment.

If not, that's the top one!

Okay, but what light should I actually use?

The easy choice is just an LED strip, of which there are a multitude out there! I used a 1 metre strip, but there's plenty of room to add a longer one!

Print Description

This is an assembled print with small threads, to make sure your prints are nice and neat, and be careful of any imprecision in the thread printing itself!

Print Dimensions

The base segment occupies 148mm x 118mm on the print bed and is 31mm tall.

Supports Needed?

Not at all!  Designed for straightforward printing!

Scalability

You should be able to scale this up or down a bit to accommodate different jar diameters, but obviously the tolerances of the connectors will be affected, so you might need to resize those slightly differently to accommodate.

Print Orientation

The segments and base underside all print right-way-up except the upper porthole segment, which prints upside-down.

The LED housings print on the outer flat surface with the two adjacent sides pointing up vertically.

The connector caps and bolts print thread-up and head-down.

And finally, the porthole plates print outside-(being the flat side)-down.

Further Thoughts

So, the thing I didn't get into above is that you can obviously put things in the jar to make further changes to the light! I've ordered a tiny USB-powered aquarium air pump, and will see about putting bubbles in mine!

Oh, there's one more thing about the underside! There's a deeper version provided that provides an extra 30mm of vertical space, which could be used for a power bank to run LEDs, or to hold a light, since the base segment is designed to allow light to shine upwards into the jar!

Happy printing!

xoxo

Sven.

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513 Alchemical Hazard Jar Lamp