OT -- work bench light for van

[Stormin Mormon]

I have been trying to find a way to light my work bench for a few minutes, when I have service calls and need light. A dome light from a camper works fine, but draws a lot of 12 volt. Too much to run on two carbon zinc lantern batteries. Runs for a while on alkaline lantern batteries, but expensive. Used to run it off a battery booster pack, but the internal cell went dead.

Fluorescent lights don't work when it's cold.

Either I need more amps, or a LED set up of some kind. I havn't found the right answer, yet.

Might have to rig it into the starting battery, in the front of the van.

Something will come to mind, I'm sure.

[Joe]

You're on the right track

[Han]

"Stormin Mormon" wrote in news:j7g08d$tr$ [e-mail]:

During the last long time power outage I remembered we had an old propane lantern for camping. Coleman makes them. You have to carefully wrap a strangely woven thing onto it, light it with a match and let it burn completely before turning the gas on. This "thorium mantle" then produces very bright light, but it is rather fragile. This thing worked very nicely, though it hisses somewhat. I'm sure they are still available (watch the wrap, or google coleman gas lantern)

[Dean Hoffman]

A quick look on Ebay turned up these:

[gregz]

Fluorescents work after warm up, and some are made to work faster in the cold.

I would probably wire up some Cree warm white LEDs. The ones with 3 LEDs have over 500 lumens each, and those are about $ 17. A series of the cheaper $7 ones are good to spread out light. One working at 3 watts, with heat sink is very bright at short distance, and you buy different angle lens depending on app. That's over 100 lumens.

Oh my, Coleman lantern. That harsh glaring bluish light. I hate any led like that. The Cree warm whites will please you.

I use led supply.

Greg

[DerbyDad03]

What do you mean by a "few minutes"?

Get an inverter and plug it into your "accessory port". You know, that round 12V outlet that we used to call a "cigarette lighter".

You can run a work light off of that for quite awhile...forever if you keep the van running (and fueled).

If you're worried that you might forget to start the van and end up killing the battery, wire in an auxiliary battery that gets charged when the van is running and run the inverter off of that.

[Malcom "Mal" Reynolds]

LED lamp with headband. cheap, bright and long lasting

[N8N]

Some of the newer vans at work have LED dome lights. I don't know if they are now standard equipment (Ford E-series) or were part of the upfit package with the shelves, drawers, etc. Next time one of the guys with a full sized van has to come in to do inventory, I will see if I can see a manufacturer's mark on them.

nate

[Frank]

Head lamp would have been my recommendation. There are several types, some with just LED's and some with an incandescent for bright light and a couple of LED's for just close work.

[Jim Yanik]

gregz wrote in news: [e-mail]-september.o rg:

you can get Cree XR-E 3W white LEDs (228 lumens each @1A)at dealextreme.com(Hong Kong,but free shipping.) for around $5.35 each.

I bought two for making my own bicycle headlight.It works great,I used 1" square Aluminum tubing for the housing.I drive them at 325ma each(1 watt each,for longre battery life),get 100 lumens per LED from 4 AA NiMH cells. the housing doesn't even get warm.

they also sell the LED reflectors and driver circuits.

I prefer the colder white light LEDs.

I have no financial connections to this company.

[DerbyDad03]

re: "A few minutes is up to half an hour, sometimes maybe up to an hour."

If you were waiting to talk to someone and they said "I'll be with you in a few minutes" would you expect that to be "up to half an hour, sometimes maybe up to an hour"?

I sure wouldn't.

Anyway, if the dome light is enough for you, why are you looking for a different solution?

[Han]

Red Green wrote in news:Xns9F81CE1ED3B28RedGreen@69.16.185.252:

My propane lantern uses a tiny stream of fuel, so oxygen exhaustion wouldn'tbe a problem at all, unless the vanis hermetically sealed and less than 3 cubic feet in volume. Knocking it over would be bad, since the mantle is fragile, but I don't think it is much of a fire hazard. You'd have to pick up the lantern, perhaps turn it off, possibly replace the damaged mantle and relight it.

[Malcom "Mal" Reynolds]

Just came back from a 99cent store and they have battery powered LED pucks for closets. Could use as-is or probably wire them to your van battery

[mkirsch1]

Just get LED conversions for the RV dome lights... superbrightleds.com

Go for maximum lumens.

[RicodJour]

12 volt LED rope light and install a disco ball.

Nobody said work couldn't be fun.

R

[dpb]

...

...

Haven't read all the rest of the responses; ones I did didn't mention: what about one of the inexpensive solar shed lights? You could even forego the solar panel and simply use the rechargeable batteries and occasionally just charge the sucker.

I've not followed up, at one time I saw some pretty inexpensive ones that I considered for a couple of the outbuildings that weren't more than $30 or so, complete, and not very big panels--certainly nothing that couldn't be handled on a work van if chose to use them.

--

[dpb]

I've seen ones that are LEDs (probably not HF).

[Dean Hoffman]

Ever see the bumper sticker "If this vans a rockin' don't come a knockin' "?

[Malcom "Mal" Reynolds]

the pucks have three LEDs so I'm guessing you are wrong. I'm also guessing that at the exorbitant price of 99cents, one could easily put up at least 6 and pay less than most other solutions offered and you'd get better, long lasting light

[Malcom "Mal" Reynolds]

that's better than my 99cent puck