I have been working on writing some stuff, which I need to man up and finish off. In the meantime though, I've been doing other productive things! For instance, this year, me and my friends are doing The Avengers for halloween. I called dibs on Iron Man, and obviously, that meant I had to build my own Arc Reactor. So, here we go!
Step 1: The Ingredients
For the main body of the reactor, I took a trip to the Dollar Store and got myself a sink filter, a smaller mesh one, and two rubber washers. A quick trip to the hardware store got me some copper wire. I cut the white plastic stopper into the desired ring shape, and started wrapping the copper around it. It fits pretty snugly on top of the sink filter, which is going to eventually hold all the inner electronics. A little mesh filter sits in the middle.
Step 2: The Body
Here it is with the copper rings all wound up, with the inner mesh filter, black rubber washer and main ring all glued together. The whole thing is maybe 0.5-0.75 inches thick.
Step 3: The Lights
Now on to the fun stuff! I've never made anything electrical before, so I was pretty much starting from scratch. Some research into LEDs and a few basic circuitry lessons later, I figured out what circuit I'd need. I ordered the LEDs online for super-cheap, and for the wire, solder and resistors I found a place on Canal street that was tucked behind a bootleg luggage store and run by a geriatric Chinese man. Who was super-helpful!
I soldered each 'leg' of the parallel circuit together separately, which is what you see above. Turns out soldering millimeter-thick pins to wire is kind of finnicky.
And here they are wired up together and connected to the battery! It's aliiiiiiive! Turning this on was a big 'hold-on-to-your-butts' moment, lemme tell ya.
Step 4: All Together Now
And here it is! I forgot to snap a picture of the inside of the reactor with all the wiring in place, but I basically had the two battery lead wires running through a hole in the bottom, and everything else kind of mashed around in the middle. I tried to get the LEDs spaced out roughly evenly inside, to create an even glow.
Step 5: Put That Camera Away, You're Just Embarrassing Yourself
Obligatory awkward under-the-shirt shot. SELFIES! But as you can see, it shines through nicely even through a t-shirt! My plan is to super-glue this bad boy to a belt and strap it to my chest. My costume is basically going to be 'Tony Stark on his day off', since I'm too lazy to contemplate making/buying an actual Iron Man costume.
Although, now I think of it, I do have an idea how I'd make a pretty sweet glove. And I do have plenty of spare LEDs and wire... watch this space?
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