Archive for July 14th, 2017

Cylindrical Cell Adapter: 18650 to 3xAAA

Posted by Ed in Electronics Workbench, Machine Shop, Software on 2017-07-14

Anker LC40 flashlights can use either one lithium 18650 cell or an adapter holding three AAA cells. I now prefer 18650 cells, but they’re nigh onto 4 mm smaller than the flashlight ID and rattle around something awful.

I can fix that:

Anker LC40 with 18650 cell adapter

Anker LC40 with 18650 cell adapter

Three new entries appear in the cell dimension table of my OpenSCAD inter-series battery adapter program:

NAME = 0;
ID = 0;       // for non-cell cylinders
OD = 1;
LENGTH = 2;

Cells = [
  ["AAAA",8.3,42.5],
  ["AAA",10.5,44.5],
  ["AA",14.5,50.5],
  ["C",26.2,50],
  ["D",34.2,61.5],
  ["A23",10.3,28.5],
  ["CR123A",17.0,34.5],
  ["18650",18.8,65.2],
  ["3xAAA",21.2,56.0],
  ["AnkerLC40",23.0,55.0]           // Flashlight tube loose-fit for 3xAAA adapter
];

I took the opportunity of adding OpenSCAD Customizer comments, which means this now works:

OpenSCAD Customizer - dropdown selections

OpenSCAD Customizer – dropdown selections

The model looks about the same as before, although with a few more sides just for pretty:

AnkerLC40 vs. 18650 Sleeve - Slic3r

AnkerLC40 vs. 18650 Sleeve – Slic3r

That was easy …

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