Final result of my first boxmod

[alex3x]

Hi all,

I just want to show you guy's the final result of my boxmod... ( not because it's exeptionnal, like mister Raidy's mods , but just because I worked hard on it and it's nice to have some comments and feed back from the community)

I didn't bought a boxmod kit from madvapes or so, I started it from a plastic enclosure I bought in a electronic shop...

I integrated a passthru in the mod, It's a wall adapter that convert 120Vac to 12Vdc.

I regulate it with a basic regulation circuit made of an lm350 ship. The female plug of the AC to DC adapter act like a cut out for the battery, when I plug the mod in the wall it disconnect the battery circuit so I don't have to open the mod to take off the battery ( It's the coolest feature of my mod

The wall adapter is 12Volts and 3Amps, I bought it for 14.99$

The downside of this mod is that the battery circuit is not regulated, because there a 1.5V drop at the lm350 (I'm a 4V vaper and I prefer low resistance cartomizer so it don't butter me that much, but for experiments I have my VV passthru. and that I have 4 screws to unscrew to open it ( I plan of finding magnets to hold the cover) and that it's in plastic. ( I have not the right tools to work with a metal box) and ah yeah the freakin lm350 ship become damn hot( plastic and heat are not the best friends lol ) But I managed to put a big enough heat sync that is not in contact with the plastic to cool it. (I think)

Cheers from Québec, Canada!

Feel free to ask or comment

 

[TomCatt]

Looks good!

Just curious, how do you have it disconnect the battery when the AC adapter is plugged in?

 

[harmonic]

and is that a spring loaded momentary switch or a toggle? i like it

 

[northhar]

Very nice and well thought out.
I noticed your battery holder has an screw and nut to secure the battery instead of spring, very well done.
Could you explain what you used for the battery holder?

 

[alex3x]

It's the female connector that do the job, it has 3 pins and when you enter the male it pushes a little metal plate that open the battery circuit... for what I can see...

 

[alex3x]

and is that a spring loaded momentary switch or a toggle? i like it

It's a momentary I found the right spring force, it's not an assle for my thumbs and it can't fire alone in a pocket.

 

[dotma]

Very cool!

 

[Scottinboca]

Cool box mod!

 

[alex3x]

Very nice and well thought out.
I noticed your battery holder has an screw and nut to secure the battery instead of spring, very well done.
Could you explain what you used for the battery holder?

Good observation northhar but there'sc a spring on the negative side of the battery but you can't see it because it is almost compress at his maximum...

It's only two metal bracket that I bought in home depot and I bought a plastic holder for battery in the electronic shop, I took off the spring and I screwed it on the metal bracket with 4-40 screws and nut... those screws hold the negative and positive wire on the back of the brackets too...

 

[alex3x]

thanks all for you comments! hope it can give you some ideas for you next one

 

[P1NkY]

Oooh, nice box!
That rocker switch is just too cool.
Very clever use of brackets for the battery holder, also.
Integrated regulator for 12v input is a great idea; just make one of those cables end in a car lighter plug and you're set to go mobile! Awesome!

 

[bluegrasslover]

Very nice Alex!

 

[alex3x]

Oooh, nice box!
That rocker switch is just too cool.
Very clever use of brackets for the battery holder, also.
Integrated regulator for 12v input is a great idea; just make one of those cables end in a car lighter plug and you're set to go mobile! Awesome!

Mmh I have no car but it should be douable, just have to find the right car adapter that can handle 2-3 amps current...
I don't know if it exist?!
But by the way, I don't know why people are focusing on USB passthru and that they sell usb passthru for mod like the SB, the prodigy from puresmoker, the usb of most computer is rated to max .5 amps and if you go higher than that there's risk to blow your computer motherboard...
The other way is to buy a usb adapter that plugs in the wall that can handle more amperage than the pc... I mean if it's like that just go for a normal ac to dc wall adapter, I saw one in the electronic shop, it was 5 volts and 4 amps for 12.99$. It's so much simple...

Ok thanks

Alex

 

[P1NkY]

I may be wrong (wouldn't be rare, either, so don't take my word for it, lol) but I believe the LM350 does current AND voltage limiting so maybe it can use the 12v straight from the car battery e.g. no adapter needed; just a straight lighter plug...
Again, let's wait until one of our resident techs chimes in first!
* On a side note, I saw a very interesting application for the chip in the datasheet - a “Laboratory” Power Supply with Adjustable Current Limit and Output Voltage
Low parts count and adjustable from 0-25V and 0-1.5A!

 

[WillyB]

Well I have no idea what I'm looking at (just kidding).

So I take it the LM350 is useless when battery driven. Why didn't you use a pair of 18350s to drive it? You got the room. As far as your power supply eBay has many 9V ones available, this would really help with your heat issues. 3 less volts to convert to heat is a good thing.

 

[alex3x]

Well I have no idea what I'm looking at (just kidding).

So I take it the LM350 is useless when battery driven. Why didn't you use a pair of 18350s to drive it? You got the room. As far as your power supply eBay has many 9V ones available, this would really help with your heat issues. 3 less volts to convert to heat is a good thing.

yeah true a 9v power supply would have been great ... in the electronic shop where I bought my pieces there was some 9 volts supply but the amperage rating was too low... could have check on the internet too...

It is battery driven but the battery circuit is not regulated, the lm 350 is for regulating the 12V passthru that I integreted in the mod...

Sure a battery mod would have been way easier, the tricky part was the passthru circuit with his potentimeter, resistor and lm350 with his heatsync...

But 9V supply is defenitly a good idea.. but I didn't know that lm350 heat that much, if you touch it after a hardcore vaping session you litteratly burn your finger...

I'm vaping it for a coples days now only with the pass threw to test it and it's all holding on..

Alex

 

[alex3x]

I may be wrong (wouldn't be rare, either, so don't take my word for it, lol) but I believe the LM350 does current AND voltage limiting so maybe it can use the 12v straight from the car battery e.g. no adapter needed; just a straight lighter plug...
Again, let's wait until one of our resident techs chimes in first!
* On a side note, I saw a very interesting application for the chip in the datasheet - a “Laboratory” Power Supply with Adjustable Current Limit and Output Voltage
Low parts count and adjustable from 0-25V and 0-1.5A!

For what I know your partially right because you can change the control circuit of the lm series to make it a current limiting circuit.

But I think if you use it as a current limiting you have no more voltage regulation, in other word you are stucked with the same voltage at the output of your ship if you want a regulated current at your atomizer coil.

So lets say you have a 6 volts supply and there's 1.5 volts drop at the ship so you have 4.5 volts at the output and you always want 2 amps in your atomizers,if you put a 1.7 or 3 ohms atomizer you'l have 2 amps that will pass in it. If you want to change that values you'l have turn to potentiometer to allow less or more current to pass in the atomizer coil...

For sure those values are restricted to a limited load (atomizer resistance) values... if you put a 1 Kohms atomizer you'l not be able to keep the 2 amps you'l have to raise your input voltage...

It's the samethings for the voltage regulation circuit but your controlling the current in the atomizer by increasing or decreasing the current at the coil...
By ohm's law if you increasing the voltage when the resistance stay the same the current increase too.... V/RXI

So finally that's kind of 2 approaches for the same result...

And for the car adapter you need that the car plug and wiring can tolerate 2-3 amps and I'm pretty sure that the car lighter circuit can handle it but I would verify to be sure...

Todays theres lot of car that have a 120 volts ac output so I could use my normal wall adapter but in case of the lighter 12 dc plug just have to solder a male plug of .5 mm like the one of my wall adapter that fits in the female entry on the mod and that's about it...

Douable for less than 10 bucks....but I have no car... joke

There may be some misconception in what I said so if you find some don't hesitate to correct me...

Thanks for you interest and especially pinky, it's fun

Alex

 

[WillyB]

It is battery driven but the battery circuit is not regulated, the lm 350 is for regulating the 12V passthru that I integreted in the mod...

Sure a battery mod would have been way easier, the tricky part was the passthru circuit with his potentimeter, resistor and lm350 with his heatsync...

That's why I'm confused, you already have the "the tricky part" done and just sitting there, just stack a couple 18350s in there and wire the cells to the reg. Throw a simple inexpensive on/off switch on your positive to take the cells out of the circuit when on AC. The switch doesn't even need to be a big one as you aren't hot switching with it. Or get a jack for your power supply with an integrated switch.

That said you are running at 4V while feeding a linear reg with 12V. So 1/3 or your volts to heat the atty, 2/3 to heat the reg (more or less). Ouch... You could experiment with various 3Ω and up atties/cartos and see how they suit you. Smok has an extensive ohms range in duals and singles, you could hit your watts sweet spot at lower amps/higher volts and cut down the heat considerably. I'd add a few vent holes also, hopefully helping with all that trapped heat inside.

Although not a perfect solution, it's a better choice that a 12V.

NEW 9V 3000mA 3A AC DC Converter Adapter Charger Power Supply Cord | eBay

You should be able to get about 7V vaping with a 9V PS.

Good Luck.

 

[alex3x]

It is battery driven but the battery circuit is not regulated, the lm 350 is for regulating the 12V passthru that I integreted in the mod...

Sure a battery mod would have been way easier, the tricky part was the passthru circuit with his potentimeter, resistor and lm350 with his heatsync...

Hmm interesting Mr Willy B

I think your totally right on the 9V power suply, the 12V is heat production for no reason... totally with you on that and thanks for the ebay link.

And about the vent holes I'm seriously thinking about it... but the look of my box is important to, I don't want it to look like a piece of the space shutle... but well done it could looks good ....

And for regulating the battery circuit... could have (and still could do) done it easily but the thing that is bugging me is the 1.5 volt drop the regulator. Sure I could put two 3.7 in series and regulate the batteries from like 1.2 volts to 6 volts but the 1.5 volt drop is a lost on the battery lifetime, and I want the longest battery lifetime... for that reason I don't regulated the battery circuit.

Throw a simple inexpensive on/off switch on your positive to take the cells out of the circuit when on AC.

I have a way to do it without that second switch, it's a good thing because 2 switch and plus on a mod is beginning to look like a part of the space shuttle lol 3 is outrageous and 4 is fail joke

thanks Willy B for your critic eyes, it makes me rethink the thing

Do you have a mod on this forum that I can critic myself ?

Alex

 

[alex3x]

I just modified my charger so I can charge the battery when it's in the mod... seems to work well. (very simple way to do it)

And I can vape the mod with the passthru when the battery is charging inboard... pretty cool

I'll take new pictures and explain how I did it as soon as possible

Btw does somoene knows if it can damage the charger if I accidently take a drag when the battery is charging... I mean is it dangerous to use the battery when it is charging?

thanks

Alex