Well here's a poor man's projector When it's finished it should measure 16"x 12"x 7"' - Well hopefully. Right now I'm in the testing phase. Check out my low tech testing board.

Another Angle

One more for the Road!

Just Finished my control board - ghetto Basically, has all my rca and S-video inputs, power switch, and brightness/color control.

Backside:

Did just a bit more work. I should start gluing by tommorrow. Just a few more cuts. I'm going to have to extend my LCD wires to reach across the projector to my LCD controller. It's taking longer than I'd like - lots of other things going on. Enjoy

Another Angle

Another Angle

My Costs so far:

Madcatz screen: $37 Shipped Ebay
FS Mirrors: $7 Walmar Automotive
Various Hardware Parts: $10 Home Depot/Walmart
Wood MDF 1/2": $7 Home Depot
OHP (Triplet, Fresnel,Light Holder): $20 Goodwill
Misc. Electronis (Switch,AC plug): $3 Atex Electronic

OK OK maybe not completely a poor man's projector -

Its looking good so far. Keep it up. Very neat and organized.

Thanks, I was beginning to wonder if I should keep posting results. I thought everyone was getting tired of seeing all these small projectors.

I took some more photos tonight - Letting everything dry.

One More

Just Finished the Power input and Video Input install.

From what I've seen, you can never have too many pictures! I love looking at
all of them myself. As they say, a picture's worth a thousand words... sometimes
even the best description doesn't hold up a candle to the photo.

Just curious where you got that box strap from for holding the sides together? Looks easy to use. I'm still putting together the psone plans you posted a long time ago. Just waiting on time....

vonneuton - absolutly beautiful 5" LCD Projector

manshack_one - $14.99 at Sears - One of the best tools I own!

Well, I had to add some length to my connection cables ( the ones going from the input board to the control board. I had some old 40 pin IDE cable laying around. Instant extension cable. Not pretty but it works.

Cables installed pic

Great stuff mydiaz, I'm working on a small build that will be based off your pdf but I don't understand the angles that the mirrors and lens/lcd are laid out in. How do you determine the angle of the lens/lcd section?

Ok, I'm going to show how ignorant I am, so please refrain from laughing.

Step 1 : First of all, I get a 8.5" by 11" piece of paper. I get a ruler with cm on it. For every cm I calculate it as an inch. Then I draw my Fresnel LCD Box and measure the appropiate distance on both sides and draw my angles. Then I cut out my angle prop.

Step 2: I Fold my paper until I'm happy with my angle design.

Step 3: I get my protractor and determine my angles and the size box I will need.

Pretty simple and it has worked for me. I know it's not scientifically sophisticated, but it's how I do it.

I hope my dumb drawing helps.

Well I made some progress tonight. Not the best resolution, as I suspected, but should play games well. The contrast on this screen is dreadful - no lying about that. Let me know what you think.

Well I made some progress tonight. Not the best resolution, as I suspected, but should play games well. The contrast on this screen is dreadful - no lying about that. Let me know what you think.

more

more

more

Bad Camera Bad Screen Shots

One More

It looks acceptable to me.

Yep, like you said the contrast does suffer a bit. But I'm sure it's about the same
as my 5" LCD, and very watchable from a decent distance. Glad it's up and running!

Looks good to me... How big is the screen??

As for the contrast, from what I understand, painting the interior black to keep stray light from the LCD and the lenses will improve that significantly.

Nice build.

Dave

Yeah, I'm definately not done. It was about 12am when I finished putting it together, so I haven't had a chance to paint the inside black. Your right, painting the interior black will definately help. I know I didn't mention this, but I "accidently" removed the polarizing lens. I replaced it and didn't do a very good job doing it, but it works, oh well.

Oh, by the way, I went with a 250w 120v projection bulb with an average of 135 hr life use. No special wiring.
Pros - Bright enough for this project, no special wiring, easy to buy
Cons - Short bulb life

Thanks for the diagram mydiaz. I get it now - I'm actually happy that it's a somewhat simple/stupid method because that's the skill level .

Nice results with this one so far too. I got my OHP bulb the other day - 360w 86v 125hrs. I'll be using this small PJ for friendly excursions so I doubt I'll need too long a bulb life.

The no wiring thing is great too, but I'd love to see someone use elken's ceramic bulb in a small PJ.

I won't lie, I wish everyday I had paid more attention in math class.

Mohanned, I can't wait to see what you got planned for your rebuild.

Just wanted to ask, where did you get your bulb and bulb socket from?

Could you post where to order it from?

I purchased your z-fold plans a while back from one of your original posts.

Still working on mine. Will post my results & build design when it's finished.

So far I've got my distances figured out, did exaclty the same thing you did with the piece of paper and folding to figure out angles.

I've purchased a couple of 6" fcl fresnels and they work great. Just exparimenting with different light sources.

How hot does the 250w get in your projector at the moment with cooling fans?

I've been building a lamp using a 300w halogen bulb I bought at HomeDepot, but this looks a lot easier.

Again, great build.

MovieFreak

MovieFreak, I purchased both the bulb and bulb holder off Ebay. The bulbs are ENH 250W 120V bulbs and the socket is your standard OHP holder. It still gets pretty hot, but easy to cool. If nothing else it makes a good testing light source.

I agree.

What's the stated resolution of the panel? It has some nice inputs for a portable PJ.

mydiazclan nice work ... !

What size are the mirrors ? and how do you calculate the size.

BTW: I read somewhere someone close was not well... ?? I am not sure if it was you.

I am using 7" xenerac

Cheers
Mastero