February 25, 2022
Description
This mini lightbulb print makes a fun wearable when you wire it up with an LED and connect a coin cell battery. An insert screws into the threaded base of the bulb to hold the LED in place. The insert and the bottom 5mm of the light bulb should be printed at the highest possible resolution to ensure the threads print cleanly. The .gcode file prints the entire lightbulb at 0.05mm resolution (and looks very nice!), but you can change the printer settings to increase the layer height after the first 5mm of the bulb, if you'd like.
For the best aesthetic results when printing the light bulb, change the filament just after 5mm from a metallic looking opaque color to a translucent color that allows the light from the LED to shine through.
To secure the LED inside the bulb, just slide the legs of the LED (5mm diameter or smaller) through the two holes in the insert, screw the insert into the bulb, and attach a coin cell battery to light it up. If you will solder wires to the legs, as shown in the video below, solder the wires to the legs BEFORE sliding the wires through the screw insert, because the heat of the soldering iron could melt the insert. You will want to use thin wires and small diameter shrink tube to be sure they fit through the holes in the screw insert. You may have to use a toothpick to slightly widen the holes at the very bottom of the insert.
Suggested use: wear it as a pendant and turn it on whenever you have a bright idea. Enjoy!
UPDATE Mar. 3, 2022: Added a threaded insert design with 4 holes instead of 2 so you can use an RGB LED with 4 legs easily
License:
Creative Commons — Attribution