We play host to a lot of incredibly complex projects here at Hackaday; take a look at some of the entries in the Hackaday Prize for some real world-class engineering. But the hacks you can knock out in an afternoon are often just as compelling as the flagship projects. After all, not everyone is looking to devote years of their lives into building some complex machine.
Case in point, this very slick lamp built by [mytzusky]. Made of nothing more exotic than an old Pringles can and an RGB LED strip, this is something that can potentially be built with what you have laying around right now. All you need to provide is a bit of geometry, a steady hand, and a love for anything that looks like it could pass as a prop in a TRON fan film.
The first step is getting the Pringles can: either find one in the trash or treat yourself to a stack of weird hard potato chip sorta things. Once you’ve got the can, you need to cut out your design. You could print out the template provided by [mytzusky] if you want, but you could put your own spin on it instead. Just remember that the design needs to make sense when you wrap it around the can.
With the lines cut out of the can, the whole thing gets wrapped with a few sheets of standard white paper. This will not only cover the original label but diffuse the light coming from the cuts you’ve just made. [Mytzusky] doesn’t mention it, but some kind of sealer applied to the paper might be a good idea if you’re looking to keep this thing around for the long haul.
Finally, an RGB LED strip goes inside the can. Make sure to flip the can upside down for this part, with the solid end on the top and the clear lid on the bottom. Not only does this let you run the wire out of the bottom, but provides a very cool ring of diffuse light at the bottom of the lamp.
This is another excellent example of an “upcycled” project which uses literal trash as a building material. It might take a little outside the box thinking, but the results can be very impressive.
