Sun Jar

http://lifehacker.com/5315357/create-your-own-sun-jar-lifehacker-edition

Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker Edition

If dashboard cookies got you thinking about other ways to put the sun to work, here's a step-by-step guide to building sun-capturing jars that create outdoor lighting at a fraction of the retail cost.

The inspiration for this tutorial is a combination of the Instructables tutorial we posted about creating your own sun jar and some excellent comments on that Instructables tutorial (specifically from MagiWG, who tipped us off to the cheap and very suitable garden lights at Lowe's.)

Our searches for retail sun jars turned up prices ranging from $30-60 per unit. We were able to create all four sun jars for $44. Our total outlay:

4 jars @ 3.99
4 lamps @ 4.99
1 can frosting spray @ 7.99

We had the following construction supplies on hand:

Pliers
Large flat-head screwdriver
Small Phillips-head screwdriver
Packing tape

The construction of the jars is simple. The first one took about 15 minutes because we were being extra cautious during the disassembling process, but after that we ripped through the remaining three in another 15 minutes. Check out the gallery below for a step by step tutorial. If you'd prefer to see all the steps on a single page instead of a gallery format, just click here.



First, the supplies you'll need. I purchased the items I needed from Lowe's, the big box hardware store, and from Meijer's, a large grocery chain. You could use any solar light if you took it apart carefully enough, but the ones we used were extremely simple to take apart and were the cheapest ones, by far, on the shelf. Look in the lighting section at Lowe's for the "Portfolio Solar Black Pathlight" item#190519. The jars were just generic canning jars. The size of the lid, which is the important part, seemed to be nearly identical on every model so we bought the cheapest kind. You want hermetic, flip-top canning jars both to remain authentic to the original design and because you need the lid to be glass to allow the solar panel to charge. Regular mason jars won't cut it.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionWe experimented frosting the inside and the outside of the jars to see what kind of effect it yielded. Our recommendation would be to frost the outside. Frosting the inside was a horrible pain, the coating was inconsistent, and it took way longer to dry. Frosting the outside was simple, the coat was even and smooth, and it keeps the glass from shining which adds to the glowing effect. One critical element: Do not frost the lid! The lid has to remain clear for the solar panel to work effectively.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionHere is the matte finish of a jar frosted on the outside. As mentioned in the notes on the previous photo, it looks nicer and was ten times easier to apply.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionTaking apart the solar lamps is a simple affair. Use a screw driver or a skinny chisel to gently pry the solar panel loose from the aluminum housing. The wires and important stuff are nearly dead center so as long as you don't shove the screw driver in deep or jerk it up hard, you're very unlikely to damage anything.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionOnce you have the panel pried away from the housing you'll see three glue-like smudges underneath. These smudges are some sort of silicone-like paste used to cover the screw heads. We didn't bother to scrape it away, just push the head of a small Phillips head screw driver into it and start unscrewing. It isn't very thick and scrapes away when you pull up the screw.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionGently wiggle the electronic guts free from the aluminum case. The guts are pretty simple and sturdy, if you need to gently pry with the same screw driver you used to pop off the solar panels, everything should be fine.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionUnless you want to have to resolder everything, you'll need to cut the aluminum housing to keep everything intact without the hassle of repairing all the wires. We used a small pair of snips to snip the aluminum and then two needle nose pliers to pull the metal apart and slip the panel and guts free. If you don't have snips you can use two pairs of pliers to gently flex the metal back and forth until it snaps.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionHere is the assembly free of the housing. Nothing fancy, a plastic case for the battery, a small circuit board, the LED, and of course the solar panel and the light sensor. On three out of the four we took apart the light sensor worked its way free—it's only taped in—just place it back into the hole in the solar panel and secure it with some tape.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionIf you're working outside on a sunny day, by the time you've taken your first lamp apart the frosting spray has most likely already dried. The solar panel is a nearly perfect fit and slips right into the hollow in the lid of the canning jar. The battery and circuit assembly can be pushed gently behind it and secured in place with packing tape.

Why packing tape? Since this was our first run constructing them, we didn't want to deal with the mess or added expense of using silicone or hot glue to secure them in. It has been a week since we constructed them and so far the tape hasn't been an issue. If the heat inside the jar causes any adhesion problems we'll upgrade by caulking them in place with some clear silicone bathroom caulk.

If you want to have colored lights, now is the time to add the "filters". We used the labels off of water bottles and sports drinks to tint the light coming from the white LED. We used Aquafina labels for blue tint and Gatorade labels for the reddish orange tint. As long as the label from your bottle is very translucent you should notice little to no drop in the brightness. We cut a 1" or so square from the label and taped it in place. Make sure to tape the edges down securely or you'll have "hot spots" where the label crinkles and white light escapes.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionThe first jar is completely assembled and ready to charge in the sun. The particular lamp from Lowe's that we selected has a removable rechargeable battery inside rated at 600mAh. We opted to keep the original battery and see how it performed but if you're looking for extended life right off the bat you can upgrade the battery to a higher mAh rating with a better Ni-Cd AA battery.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionAfter charging them for a few hours after construction, we put them out on the desk for a test run. Here you see all four. The white one has no filter, the two blue ones have the tint made from an Aquafina bottle, and the red tint made from a Gatorade bottle. They were much brighter than we anticipated; after all, the lamp was only $5.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionThe sole white lamp, isolated to show what a basic job looks like.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionAll four on table, clustered around the umbrella pole. The dollar was added for scale and to show the amount of light cast off. It's difficult to tell from the picture but at the table we had no problem reading even the tiniest print on the dollar.
Create Your Own Sun Jar: Lifehacker EditionThe sun jars shot from a second story window, throwing enough light to illuminate a circular table with a diameter of six feet.

The project was fun, it took no advanced soldering or technical tricks, and for $44 and about a half hour of time we ended up with some cool DIY garden lighting for around 80% of the retail price. Special thanks again to cre8tor, the author of the original tutorial, and MagiWG for directing us towards the cheapest and easiest to use solar lamps available. As always, if you build one of our DIY projects we'd love to see pictures of the results!