This is my first project finished, so please be gentle.
Also, I don't speak or write good English, so don't mock me please or try to learn Greek first to do so.

After gathering enough precious information from this wonderful forum, me and a friend of mine started constructing a projector each.
We acquired every material needed that you can see below:

(1) 15" LCD monitor, (2) Lumenlab's Fresnels, (3) Lumenlab's triplet, (4) Lumenlab's reflector, (5) Complete spotlight and (6) Fabric bellows made by my friend's mother.

Here's the monitor. LG FLATRON L1510S:

We got two of these on ebay. One each.

I also bought four PC fans 9cm diameter and a simple and cheap power supply with 500mA tolerance for them.


One other part is the mechanical thermostat that keeps the lamp lit only while the temperature red by it's probe near the monitor is bellow 40 Celsius.


These are the "guts" of the lamp (ballast etc) and the power supply for the PC fans. Later on I moved the supply to another place to avoid overheating.


STARTING THE WORKS

Bellow you can see most of the tools I've used.
I don't know the English names of each of them but I think you can find out which one is what.


My friend Johnny gets to work by cutting some slots with his router to the side wooden parts of a box where the LCD, lexan sheet and fresnels will be attached.


Here's the one side cut and painted black. The triangle area will be later covered to stop airflow to the swinging fresnel.


The forth-called "image box" begins to take shape


[continued...]

Here's the LCD panel placed in the appropriate slots in the image box.


Screwing the panel's PWB to the bottom of the image box.


At the same time we cut some slots to the side boards of the projector's casing that will hold the glass from the spotlight.


My friend making the casing for his projector. For mine, I used a little bit thicker boards that I found for free. You'll see them later.


While making all the boxes and casings, I started making the controls for my projector. I used a small piece of lexan (polycarbonate) and placed on it the following:

1) Main switch - Gives power to al electrical and electronic components and also to the Secondary switch.
2) Secondary switch or Lamp switch - Gives power to the thermostat and from there to the lamp.
3) VGA input.
4) Fuse.
5) Power supply input.
6) Overheat lamp (220V).
At the top of them I screwed the monitor controls, taken as is from the front of the LG.

The connections at the back of the controls are shown bellow:

Line 1 gives power through the thermostat to the lamp and Line 2 to all other components.

The control panel painted and ready:

And now, with the image box almost ready, we add the swinging front fresnel

This way the keystone effect is automatically eliminated.
There's also a slot for putting the fresnel there and keep him stable. I use this one right now but I can always switch to the previous place.

We also need to cut openings for the airflow on the sides of the outer casing of the projector.


The image box is ready now!

You can see the thermostat (1) and the fan's power supply (2) stripped. The rest of the electronics are covered with cardboard.

You can also see the monitor's power supply (left) and input PWB (right) also placed in the lower part of the image box.


Testing the LCD with the use of a simple halogen lamp.


...and from another viewing angle:

Now that the image box is complete, the casing is taking shape and the controls are attached and tested...


...we can remove them all (!) and start making the place where the lamp will be in (A.K.A: light box).


I simply used a power cord just to try the lamp and it works!


Then, I painted the casing black from inside.


Ballast and condensers as will be placed without their metal cover.

You can see a square hole in the back. That was originally cut for placing a 220V fan to cool the area under the lamp where the electrical components lie.
The opening was later shielded as you will see.

Here are the two new rectangular holes for two 220V fans. One blowing and the other one sucking air.

The old hole is now closed.

Now it's time to try and attach the bellows.
This feature is used partially for aesthetic reasons but mostly to decrease the size of the whole projector.
As bellows can be retracted, the projector never exceeds 65-70 centimetres in length when not in use.
We can also use the bellows in order to move the triplet back and forth and thus focus better in different conditions.

That's a frame where the bellows are going to be screwed on.


And the bellows attached on the projector.


By the way, I bought some self-adherent decorating sheets, replicating wooden surface. I cut them and they are ready to be glued on.


Then I made the top cover for the projector. It will be screwed permanently.

A sheet of metal is screwed on the inner side of the cover in order to protect the wood from the direct heat of the lamp.

The next step was to prepare the triplet. I've cut a hole to a piece of MDF, glued on some decorative paper and screwed the triplet in.


Then I attached a base for the triplet on the bellows. There are two rods expanding from each side to keep the triplet in horizontal movement.

All going well, so now it's time to attach the triplet to it's base, the base rods to the drawer rails and the rails on the casing.
I also screwed on the handles and the six grills that cover the fans. Each grill has a protecting net underneath that is not shown.


The triplet needs a protective lid, so I made one of wood, decorated it too and voila:


The bellows extended and the triplet lid open. You can see four screws that are used to adjust the position of the triplet.

You may also noticed the aluminum covers for the corners of the projector.

Now it's time to finish the light box. At first I placed in the two fans. Air flow represented by the arrow.


Then I added the electrical components, the lamp base, the reflector and the metal sheets to cover and protect the surrounding wood box, all painted black.


All ready and it's time to screw the lamp and put the protective glass in place.

Here's the projector, almost ready as viewed from the side of the controls.


IMAGICON! With bellows and triplet lid closed.


...and all open!


A picture of a knob made for stabilising the swinging fresnel.

For my current use, I've put the fresnel in a slot to keep him steady all the time.
For using the anti-keystone feature, the image box should be opened and the fresnel must be placed to it's swinging position.
When that happens, there's a danger to harm the fresnel or the LCD when we move the projector from place to place.
So, to secure the position of the fresnel, I added this knob that holds him always parallel to the LCD. It can be removed at any time and leave the fresnel to swing freely.

One last addition I made was to put an extra couple of rods to the triplet's base in order to keep the whole system steady.

WORKING!!!

Laptop connected, room lights off, fire extinguisher nearby (kidding! no need for this with six fans working) and ready for the show!


The results are very satisfying, keeping in mind that this is my first project and it worked with the first trial.
This is me and my baby lovebird! Aren't we gorgeous?

The image was projected to a light grey wall and the camera has not been very well adjusted for shooting in the dark. It's a very simple digital camera anyway...

The projection diagonal was 120 inches and it's very adjustable thanks to the bellows.

THE END


Thank you for reading!

that is one of the most unique pjs i have ever seen .
good job

when you said you plugged the lamp in with a power cord just to see if it worked
do you mean it fired on 120v ac ??

How kind of you! Thanks!

It's impossible to connect the lamp directly to the AC line. What I meant was that I connected the lamp electrical and lit it.

I'm now looking for a cheap solution for the screen. There will be updates to this topic when I make something worthy.

Wow, very impressive. Do you have pics of how you made the bellows?

Victor

Thanks!
The construction of the bellows was made by my friend's mother who has a sewing machine.
She used frames of thick black fabric.
To get an idea, take a look at the following schematic:

We make couples of frames. Each couple is 2cm shorter and narrower than the previous.
For the couple of frames with the same outer dimensions, the inside openings are of different sizes.
The frames facing towards the LCD (dark grey) have a wider and taller opening than the frames facing the triplet (light grey), by 2cm at each side.
Each part of the couple of frames is sewed where the light cyan lines indicate.
Each couple of frames is sewed to the next, smaller couples where the yellow lines indicate.

You can try it by cutting some paper frames and stitch them the same way.
By stitching together 7 to 8 couples of frames, you can have easily made bellows.

I hope I helped.

Hello all, this is Johnny, the other team member...

The bellows was constructed on a set of plans I made specifically for this project and was put together by my (professional) sewist mother. It seems quite easy to do, but believe me it has difficulties of its own. The end result is wonderful, though and makes the projector look very vintage.

Other than that, I myself haven't finished my projector yet due to lack of time. Soon, though...

Nice build. It looks like it went together very nicely. I like the collapsible nature of the bellows.

Babtua, I look forward to your build also.

Let's mention that Johnny (Babtua) also works in constructing a full-sized, fully functional Falcon cockpit and rehearsing with TWO music bands!!!
The bellows were his idea and -with some carefully made adjustments- they work miracles!
This way we made it to reduce the size of projector when not in use, have the ability to freely adjust it's focusing and -finally- give this vintage style to our projectors.
I think that -by observing my mistakes- Johnny will make his projector a little bit better than mine

That goes without saying, the second try is always better than the first... but the improvements will be merely eye-candy, the main function will be just the same: a 120" (at least ) image on the wall... and that's what counts!

My main problem, though, is find some time to progress with my pj construction. And, there are more than just a cockpit building and two bands that require my time... much more...

Update:

I wanted to have a stand for the Imagicon in order to keep it at a standard height wherever I move it to.
It had to be somehow portable, so I tried to make it foldable.
So, I got some iron bars and welded them in the shape of two "pi" frames.
These two frames are connected with screws to each other in a way that they open like an "X".


On top of that "X" stand I screwed a wooden case with hinges that can also be folded.


The Imagicon will sit on top of this case and inside there will be the place of the DVD-player or laptop.
I haven't finished the painting yet but here you can see it almost ready at a folded position.


I'm also planning to make my own 130" screen (motorized if possible) provided that my friend's mother can find some suitable fabric.