Lamprojector

I had a projector on a home made wooden stand. But it was not really stable. And i also had a non used Ikea Lamp (Hektar model). So i decided to combine them to "hide" the projector in it, AND if possible reduce the noise of the projector.

Important note : This is a highly specific project tailored to my own hardware, so I don't pretend to offer a universal tutorial. Instead, I'm here to share my story, the mistakes I made along the way. Thank you.

1. Epson EB-FH06
2. Lamp IKEA HEKTAR
3. Noctua Nf-A4x10 Flx
4. some wires
5. 3D printer

In my mind, the idea was just to put the optic of the projector in the Lamp and relocate the rest outside.

BUT when i opened the projector i quickly understood, it was not possible.

Because all this part must stay together (i guess it's technially possible to open it and change the design but way to risky for me) and it was still passing in my lamp, so i kept it like that.

My plan was to move the motherboard outside of the lamp. BUT i didn't know, but the 3 LCDs of the projector are connecter with those "cables" and according to Gemini if i make it longer (in my case longer = maybe 1 or 2m lol) that would put some interferences and it's not good at all. SO i have no other choise to keep the motherboard where it initially was...

I just wanted to have just the optic in the lamp and now i have almost the full projector lol.

So now i know i have to keep the Optical engine and the motherboard, I can easily move the 3rd big part which is the PowerSupply ! This one i can move it where i want, just come normal cables.

And i decided to put it in this "back part of the lamp".

Now i know all that, i can start to investigate the fans and the current airflow.

The INT fan blow air for the LCDs, power supply and the screens between the lamp and the LCDs.

The airflow is only the black part surrounded in red in my picture. And the blue is the airflow.

When i looked at it, i noticed in fact maybe 80% of the air is going in the direction of the LCDs and like 10 and 10% for the power supply and the screens between lamp and lcd.

In the 80% for the lcd, i really doubt it was equally diffused for each LCD. Because it's just a plate with some hole at the top. but the air arrive on a side. if nothing guide the air to go up, i don't undestand why that would go up... But anyway looks like it was working :D

My original plan was to change the fans for bigger ones (bigger = slower for same air moved = quieter (in my mind))

So to be safe i took the same V, and A of the original one. But bigger

So i bought 2 Delta Electronics-Ventilateur de refroidissement pour serveur, BFB1012L, 8N41 DC, 12V, 0,48 A, 97x95x32mm (for LCD and for the extraction)

and one Original New CPU Cooler Cooling Fan for LBH8020S 12V 0.2A 8020 8cm (for the lamp)

After discussion with Gemini, i didn't installed it (for the moment at least, i should do some test). But the reason is, the fans have 4 cables. one of them indicate the RPM of the fan. And i don't know how the motherboard is working with the fans. But there is a change because the fans are bigger (the motherboard will not know that) they need to turn slower BUT the MB will either ask them to turn faster (same speed as the original ones) OR don't ask them to turn faster, but be in error because the MB will notice they turn not fast enough (and thinks there is an issue something blocking or whatever)

So for the first test i put the original ones.

My first plan was to not change anything (was too afraid to break it) so i did just a plate to reproduce the current airflow.

But I was not satisfied at all, so i decided to create create a full airflow optimised, and because i have space in the lamp i could do that.

And this is the first version of the airflow.

The holes were matching the LCDs, so it was a good starting point. Now i had to find a way to fix it.

So i redesigned the pipes (i don't know if it's more efficient, just prettier lol) and added some holes to match with some existing hole in the optical engine.

After some adjustments, i presented the optic engine with the airflow in the lamp to see if it was passing first and then how to fix it.

I decided to re-use the original system to keep the lamp in one piece. And i printed this piece.

(Due to wrong 3D model of the lamp, this was not fitting at all, so i did the second one.

Now the optical engine, airflow for LCD and the support to keep this big block in the lamp.

I wanted to be sure the motherboard was good.

And guess what ? it was not good of course. If i kept the motherboard at the same place as original, it was touching the lamp and i was able to push the whole block at the bottom of the lamp...

So i noticed when the cables of the lcd are pluged, the motherboard can move, enough for me to fit everything.

My initial plan was to incline it because there was a board connected to the motherboard.

As we can see on the picture, that doens't fit at all. AND while i was manipulating the motherboard, i damaged the cables of the LCD... but lucky that didn't cut any cables in the flex cable. So at this moment i was doing very care full and not trying to move the MB from too far away from the oginial place.

After several print, i found my desgin to support the motherboard.

Then i pass on the fan for the lamp.

Same for this fan, i really don't get it how it was efficient, the fan was stuck behind, no fresh air was coming to this. On both side there were something blocking the air. and the fan is very small.

So i just droped it down of few centimeter to have a nice air income.

Next big part, the extraction of the warm air.

I started with a straight forward design. This + the fan, that was too big. So I did redesign the airflow to be able to put the fan underneath.

Now that the bigger part are "done" for a first test, i had to do the powersupply part.

For that the plan was to put the power supply (2 part) in the "back part" of the lamp.

And designed this piece. (Also did 2 holes in the back part for air.

Now it to assemble everything !

First test, with the temperatures sensor just hanging there, and the board for buttons as well.

But it worked (at least i didn't broke anything) and for some minutes.

Next step was to re 3d print everything in ASA.

Then re assemble everything.

As we can see, the board with button is just glued on the side. and also the temp sensor glued/taped.

Also we can see the whole lamp is resting on a white stick (otherwise with his own weight that bend down).

But the most important it still working, and this time even for several hours.

Now trying to hide the mess with some mesh.

Because of the weight, i had find a way to support the weight on the lamp. So i came with this design.

After that it was all good. I still didn't have well placed the buttons and the temp sensor, but can do that later.

BUT i was still frustrated after that because i have new big fans, but didn't tried it.

So i tried with only one, the extraction one.

I had to redo the design because the fan is way bigger.

But sadly for some reason the mother board didn't like it.

When i start the projector, the fan is runing at 100% (as the other ones for few seconds) But the projecteur has the led "warning high temp" red bliking.... and the light turns off... I don't know why because there is more air so it's not too warm, but probably the motherboard detect it's turning too fast or i don't know... or maybe my cables are not good aswell. I don't know.

So i re install the original one.

Now the next step are to clean all this, and find a way to reduce the noise of all that.

Thank you for reading it, i hope it's not too messy, and you enjoyed this project as much as i did :D

PS : I do have some videos, but i don't really know how to add it to this website to have it clean and nicely displayed.