They told me this was a fire hazard....
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 พ.ค. 2024
- Can you encase a wireless charger in clear epoxy? Let's find out!
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I've been obsessed with electronics that have clear cases since I was a little kid. So it got me thinking, could you encase low-wattage electronics in clear epoxy? So I got my favorite epoxy and poured it over a wireless charger. Will it still work? Will it melt itself down? Will I regret my choices? I don't know let's find out!
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00:00 Introduction
01:37 First Attempt
05:44 Sponsor Read
08:14 First Attempt Results
09:00 Second Attempt
10:52 Second Attempt Results
11:20 Milling Epoxy
12:53 Wood Working
15:51 Finishing
16:28 Sanding Epoxy
18:19 Assembly
19:25 Testing
20:57 Conclusion - แนวปฏิบัติและการใช้ชีวิต
I wonder who came up with that router jig idea?? 😜 keep crushing it man!
Oh it was definitely me. That was a Zac Original.
Only one reply 💀
This's the second !!@@Dj_VRYT
@@E_Waste *3rd
@@ZacBuilds why not put the angle on the epoxy instead of the wood, would that not have been easier?
Just a note, having a bare Qi coil will decrease the efficiency & distance you can power a device. The ferrite material behind the coil in the original charger essentially focuses the magnetic field in one direction to reduce power loss & increase effective range/distance
Thanks for the info
What nonsense is this?
The coil produces an electromagnetic field. That field does not require directioning since you aren't transmitting it over distance.
@@Duck_sideif that were true, why is there a ferrite core in every transformer?
@Duck_side
They are used to conduct the magnetic field, to increase the efficiency of the energy transfer. As it conducts the magnetic field, it will also reduce the magnetic field behind the ferrite sheet, which is quite important on the receiver side (less electromagnetic interference, less eddy current losses, less heat).
removing it will decrease the positive effect of the ferrite sheet. This means the charger will lose efficiency. This could potentially lead to overheating of the charger. Depending on the implementation it could catch fire or burn out the coil.
@@Duck_side this is how it works why do you think satellite dishes have a reflector?
The black disc behind the coil (made of ferrite) is essential and it was not placed there by mistake, i guess a third revision is somewhat necessary :) Keep it up, nice build :)
It looks better without it, but has lower efficiency, so there is a trade-off.
As long as it charges in a reasonable time, who cares?
That was a fun video. I want an update after it's been used more eventually. And maybe follow that with an updated version that is a different shape and design, has more coils so you could have less precise placement, and upgraded everything.
Will do! I definitely enjoy doing follow up builds and second attempts at previous concepts
So how about that update?
@@ZacBuilds?
I definitely wouldve put a usb-C female port on the exterior of the epoxy mold so you could plug in the finished "gem" instead of having a permanent wire that WILL go bad and get a short eventually.
other than that though, this is an awesome project idea and im starting mine RIGHT NOW!. lol. I have wireless pad chargers i can donate, i have usb-c female ports, I have 2 part epoxy... Gotta love the tinkerer lifestyle.. Some people collect cards, some people collect coins, i collect tools and components to small electronics projhects.. I ALWAYS over order so i have extras in case any future project idea needs them.
One suggestion, take a scrap piece of the same epoxy and dip it into acetone after sanding it to 1000 grit. I have heard it will remove the surface defects and smooth them out to where it is crystal clear. But it depends on the epoxy!
Otherwise, it is a nice project!
It depends on the type of epoxy. Urethane in it's cured state is not affected by acetone. It will clean oils off the surface, but not dissolve it.
The build turned out great! I feel like it makes sense to not take things to the ultra fine finish when you don't know if it will even work. There is always opportunity for other iterations.
Thats right and this is definitely something I'd like to play around with more in the future!
Great job and idea. Love this. Now I need to get out and make my own for my phone.
Dope build ! it would have been cool if you left the edges sanded and put some RGB LEDs in the base that light up the unit depending on charge status... idk how to do that but an idea !!
Cool idea!
This is the way.
What a great final product. I was soooo sceptical few minutes in and I was proven wrong when I watched to the end. Amazing work 🔥
Great video Zac! I saw updates if this on your IG stories, and I was really intrigued. I’ve been looking into wireless charging, but I kinda don’t like the look very much. This looks really good, and the way it acts as a phone stand as well is really cool! I’ll probably try this sometime when I can get more familiar with epoxy
Thanks Arpad! And ya you can actually stick wireless charger in just about anything. As long as it's only 1/4" thick or so it should still work. So there are lots of opportunities to hide them. Let me know if you need any help or have any questions!
Nice looking and functional..
For your protection film on your epoxy I keep seeing some two part ceramic coating that others use on epoxy kitchen tables but I have no idea if it will produce the results you are looking for.
I am curious what sort of energy transfer you are getting without the ferrite behind the coil? Have you noticed if it charges at the same speed or slower than the stock charger?
You could have made yourself a cardboard tray almost the size of the space you want to CNC out and put saran wrap over the cardboard so the epoxy doesn't soak into it and use that as a displacement so you don't waste as much epoxy in the beginning.
If the Saran Wrap doesn't have any holes, you should be able to pull the cardboard out afterward and just CNC away the Saran Wrap while squaring it up.
You have to include the ferrite coil backing or else it will ramp power to compensate and over heat.
That looks really cool! Well done. You could just notch the wood a mm so it doesn't slide but all in all this looks great!
Looks great, Zac!
You're asking for ideas, here I've got one:
You kan make matching stands exact the same way you made this stand but with an ESP32 (Microprocessor, Arduino) and a LCD or OLED display (if you're lucky maybe even a transparent one) and then display a clock and / or notifications on it. As an ESP32 has build-in Wifi and Bluetooth, it gives you lots of possibilities. For the ESP you can use one of the Dev Boards (make sure you create external Reset (and, depending on the selected board Prog) buttons. The Chip can be both powered and programmed over USB.
For your convince, you can add more buttons, which you can hookup to the GPIO pins to use for navigation or whatever you would like.
As it is Arduino based, there is a lot of information available on the internet and it is pretty easy to program.
Love this idea! and I've actually got something not too far off this planned for the near future! Cheers man
Instead of buttons, how about capacitive touch pads, either out of bright copper, or clear conductive plastic.
Love the look! An epoxy Mag safe charger would be interesting to see.
This looks really cool; wish I would have thought of this one!
It's not too late, you could always make your own version of it :)
Beautifully executed, thanks for posting this.
Have wanted to re-case that exact charger with a wood base, great to see the guts before i start.
Subscribed! 😊
Before encasing internal circuit in epoxy You should, Check it under IR cam and improve cooling hot parts. Epoxy is worse heat conductor than flowing air.
looks pretty dope! I'd like to try something like that eventually
Thanks Scott! I'd love to see your take on something like this, so I say do it! haha
Thanks for the video, but my concern is when it needs repair or recycling, how would you do that? 😢
Just ran across this video and it reminded me of Commodore. Back in the 80s I had a Commodore 64 computer and the most commonly failed component of that computer was its external power supply. People found them easy to repair early on until Commodore started filling the power supply case full of an opaque epoxy and it was impossible to get to the electronic components to repair them, so you had to buy a new one directly from them until a couple of companies started to produce repairable ones. Which goes to show even components that generate heat like a small PSU can even be encased in epoxy.
Very interesting! I wonder if epoxy is more thermally conductive than air...
My favorite video in a while. Liking this so much.
Honestly, I would just like to see a refined build of this.
I'll add it to my list of potential projects. Thanks for watching!
@@ZacBuilds You da man!
I used to keep a change of clothes handy, as I was accident prone, and was always in need of a clean change. But I used to keep it all in a 'sealed' cardboard box that was easy to open and close, as it does not raise suspicions like a suitcase or other case would.
But now that I am retired, I find I still need to have spare shirts, towels, and hand cleaner in the car...
😮Wow that's definitely a very unique and very cool design for a charger. Always real cool to see your videos Zac. Keep up the great craftsmanship and hard work my friend. Keep Making. God bless.
9:00 How about covering all the plates with red tape so you can make sure the tape is laying REALLY flat, and add some stuff you use to close the hole for the cable where the wood tiles meet so it won't run out? This way you have way more control about the final surface, as the sides of the tape don't either overlap not deviate if you did a great work.
Just a thought.
This is the first video to ever bridge 8 different interest category playlists of mine 😮👍 Subscribed!
I would have cut the channel for the charger back a bit and then created a small groove for the phone to rest in to keep it from falling off the edge of the base when the desk moves. But very nice project, it looks very beautiful, and what an ingenious idea. 👍👍
Great video Zac! One question: what kind of double sided tape did you use to keep the block attached to the melamine board when planing?
Thanks Jordan! honestly I have no idea. It's this roll of double sided tape I just kind of found in the shop. I must've picked it up on a jobsite years ago.
@@ZacBuilds Ok thanks anyway! I have some at home, but I'm worried it'll stick too much and it'll be hard to remove the pieces.
What cnc model is it? Its beautiful
Great video Zac! I got nervous for a second. I figured the charger would be fine (i've kinda experimented with this concept as well) but I almost thought i'd see a Zacbuild's video without Walnut!!? 😂
Perish the thought! I'd never haha. What did you do that was similar to this in the past?
@@ZacBuilds AWHILE back I made a video where I made a floating nightstand out of concrete. I wanted a wireless charger so I casted a small circle of epoxy and to make sure the charger could penetrate through I disassembled it and hot glued it right against the bottom of the epoxy. So similar but not the same.
This is amazing. Can you make a clear circuit board so the chips and traces appear to be floating too?
I worked on the wireless charging bowl, back when I had a job.
It was abandoned because if you put, say, your keys with the key fob on it to charge up (actually part of the listed products features) you'd cook your hands taking it out because your keys would be hot af (prototypes nearly started several fires lol).
Great idea; more complex in implementation than initially thought ;-)
giving you the ol spicy keychain
17:40 that voice in the background tripped me off 😂🤣
A coffee table with multiple of these paralleled together could be pretty cool for a quick charger for everyone at the party!
Electronics are quite often encased in epoxy. Silicone is also used. Additives can improve heat dissipation and UV resistance.
It's called encapsulation or potting when the polymer fully encases the circuitry, and conformal coating when it's applied as a thin layer. Unfortunately most manufacturers choose opaque encapsulation because that makes repairing the product harder; but in military and commercial products the epoxy is often clear so that technicians are able to drill through it to test points or components in need of replacement.
Hey Zac. Great build. 👍 UV light, not heat will be your enemy for turning it yellow. Keep it in the drawer and not under the window when not in use and you should be good for a while :)
Also, dont think the Osmo will make a difference......... Generally, that's why Osmo, Rubio, Odies etc all suggest not sanding beyond a certain grit, as there are ever decreasing molecules for oil to 'adhere' to. If you're worried about scratches, maybe a dedicated 'top-coat' resin as they're a little more hard wearing. Hope it helps :)
Great video. Wouldn't it be more cost effective to cast around a circular piece to make the opening so you don't use so much resin?
I'm not sure I understand Patrick. I made it a bit big because I knew I'd have to machine it down to the size I wanted. I also wanted to have some flexibility in terms of where to locate the coil because it needed to line up pretty specifically with my phone.
@@ZacBuilds I agree with how and why you made it the way you did. My only thought was if you took a disk of wood, covered it in tuck tape then cast over it, you would have had the shape without having to cut out the hole on your first attempt. With the price of resin, I thought it would save a few dollars and a lot of dust :)
Just found this and it looks awesome, I was wondering however if there was a 1 year later update :)
That looks fantastic!!!❤
How about making a small wireless speaker it would look staggering with neat zip tied wiring. 🤤
Very nice build. Next, try something more powerful, but put cooling channels into the epoxy. Or maybe something like oil cooling or some other liquid you can directly immerse electronics into. That way you can skip the water cooling block and the thermal compound and all that. For 3D printing, there's filament that dissolves in water. I'm sure there's some resin like that. You could build the negatives of the cooling channels out of that, cast them in epoxy and then dissolve them away.
TH-camrs: I will create a complete new stand for my phone
Me: wireless charger+ duct tape+ simple stand= fix it
Internet DYI on "How to lose your residential Insurance Policy". Glad I live in a detached and single unit residence, just imagine living in an apartment building with youtubers as your neighbors doing electronics with flammable composites & solvents.
I did this with a coil for wireless hobby LEDs. I encased the coil and little driver board in a coaster mold and it turned out nicely. It lasted a couple weeks but one day I noticed it had burned out the little driver board. I could see in the resin where the little IC overheated and cracked. I am going to try this again but this time I am only going to encase the coil and I am going to leave the driver board out.
I should note; I don't know if encasing the driver board in the resin was why the thing overheated. it could be for other reasons like the power adapter or maybe I used to many LEDs and drew to much power...
So I am still experimenting. my next idea is to 3d print a tray with a cutout in the bottom for the electronics.
I was just thinking about doing this to my wireless charger. Minus tearing down the charger first 🤣
Very cool. project! Great idea and great execution :)
if you are thinking of doing mr 3 you can add silicon to epoxy resin to dissipate heat lot faster
Try a 3D printing finishing product like XTC (or acetone vapor polish but that's a bit more gear to manage it) or even maybe just thin the original epoxy WAY down so it fills the gaps and put VERY LITTLE ON (after degassing it, since you have a vac pot may as well). Maybe blowtorch the coating to get bubbles out/smooth surface like the tablemaking channels?
Cool and all, but that ferrous material under the coil was there for a reason. It is to direct the magnetic field to the topside of the coil.
Nice project, pretty interesting. To apply the Osmo, you should use a white Scotch Brite pad. Osmo makes them as well.
Great suggestion! I'll keep that in mind for the future
Thought you would paint some epoxy after the sanding to make the surface a lil clearer
Would be nice for an update of after you have been using it with your stream chat on it because one of the largest heat generation is when a phone is in use, so if you have the phone putting out heat that they try to disapte via the back and then the charger having heat it's dual sources of heat is the epoxy still good after that?
Potting electronics is extremely common. It would be weird if it didn't work. That isn't usually casting epoxy though so I guess melting and discoloration could be a concern.
Thanks, I’ve been wondering if I could epoxy electronics. Thanks for the free research. 👍
I know the video is old, but you can use the Osmo, or better yet Rubio Monocoat to turn cloudy epoxy clear. You just need to sand out any deep scratches.
Drove me crazy to think you didn't add a channel to hold the phone from slipping off, or even a small wooden bump
16:57 at this point someone regrets all of those beautiful bevels...
Cool look
This is amazing. I would have left the edges untouched though. Front and Back crystal clear, but the edges the "matte" finish.
I like that idea! Dually noted for next time.
this thing REALLY needs a strain relief for the cable since the shielding was not embedded into the epoxy, all of the bend radius is in the unshielded wire strands, they will break soon when bent a lot
The thing to watch out for in terms of heat is not really the charger per se. It's more when the phone is being used heavily and so it both heats up plus it drains more power. So then it's needing to charge more and the charger is hotter which can cause a bit of a feedback loop of things heating up
heat its bottom to remove the hotglue ,solder a braided cable or find a braided cable shield .. it will look 10 ties better
.. nice job
The coil needs the ferrite plate on the back and the blue led will damage the resin. Otherwise it's looking great!
The ferrite coil helps with efficiency but it isn't necessary. I wanted the full exposed view of the coil
I think that you should have created to thin sheets of epoxy with a hole in the middle half the thickness of the space needed for the wireless charging thing part(creat that hole with a silicone circle mold), add an indentation half the thickness/overall diameter of the cord for where you want the cord also with some silicone cord/filled tube(the same overall diameter of the cord). Once the mold with all of those things are dry, demold and lie the pieces on top of each other matching the halfed openings to then be full openings. Then drill holes at each corner for very small/thin screws ensuring to go through both sheets. Then one of the thin epoxy sheets just drilled through, flip so the indentations are facing whatever flat surface you are drilling on and get a drill bit perfectly sized for a nut for those small screws to go through. The onelce done put that nut so it's flush or flat and then install all parts and put them all together
After a while, I realized a few things...
There are already standing/angled Wireless charging phone stands for $10. Not sure how much you spent to do this, but I hope you had fun with it.
Secondly: you could have 3D printed parts to make a simple adapter, which holds the Wireless charger puck upright, and saved a ton of time and effort. The clear Epoxy is fun, but I'd reserve it for projects with slightly more impressive tech "guts" to display.
Like, I want to make an SBC (Single Board Computer), cover in Epoxy, and put it in a small fishtank for liquid cooling
Was thinking EXACTLY the same things
Zach fwiw all the chips on the board are already encapsulated in epoxy. Epoxy, acrylic, silicone, polyurethane, paraxylene, wax etc. are all common circuit board conformal coatings. A thick coating of epoxy etc. is known as a potting compound. A slow cure deep pour epoxy would probably impart the least mechanical stress on the solder joints if not using a purpose formulation of potting compound. Don't know if there is a clear one usually it's also used to make it a little harder to reverse engineer or repair a circuit.
that looks really slick! i like the classy touch you bring to electronics...i think a walnut and epoxy ps5 is a viral video waiting to happen : )
Can u fit rfid in a ring?
If you're worried about the phone sliding without a groove to rest in, you could stick a dark color strip of rubber or silicone in that spot as well.
Impressive, I wonder how much difference it would make to machine a corner to take into account for the camera bump so the phone sits even closer to the coil?
coils tend to need very precisely matchup with phones.
a little wedge stripe on the top front of the phone stand should help a lot stabilizing it.
as cables wear out over time and also electronics tend to break up - i would not have molded it for eternity into such a block.
maybe a pair of PVC plates to put the electronics in between and some super-glued support stripes would have been enough to have a similar clear effect while keeping it maintainable.
Did you find best speeds and feeds to use?
For the next project like this, i would've sanded the epoxy with 800 grid and sprayed it with clear, a lot less work, and possibly a better result
Good work. Your ad in the middle of the video was top notch. If you could have spent as much time on the project it would have came out much better.
ETA: Maybe make a wireless motorcycle phone mount next?
Induction cooker test next please!
was there a reason to clean up the tool marks from the initial milling? As long as the new epoxy is the same as the original cast, the refractive index would be the same and would effectively eliminate the tool marks, no dangerous epoxy sandy necessary
How could you wait till after polishing to test if works
Alignment is pretty important. What about some sort of notch or recess in the stand to ensure the phone isn't misaligned?
You want the ferrite graphite pad behind the coil.
Now the effisency dropped from 75% down to 50% or below.
Can't imagine how much that would degrade your battery, especially considering that you said that reading live chat comments drains the battery which also inevitably heats up the phone, and the extra heat from such inefficient charging is a recipe for significant premature degradation in battery health
interestingly the two probably do not heat up that much because the thermal conductivity of the epoxy vs its mass means that the epoxy is working like a heatsink in a way for both the phone and the charger; the sheer surface area of both allows the outside are to dissipate any built up heat relatively quickly I would imagine
Next project: a tv set encased in epoxy??? 😎
Haha that would be fun!
My guy could have bought a hub USB C 100W PD and be happy about it, but still, love these epoxy projects.
That was awesome! But am I crazy or is the right side of the epoxy taller?
I actually made one up 10 years ago. So beat you to it :) It's much more yellow now though.
Damn! Beaten to the punch again haha. Did it go yellow from UV exposure or from heat?
@@ZacBuilds all epoxy yellows with age, and it's faster with a clear epoxy. I made it to go in an old car restro. I wanted the wireless charger to pop up out of the dash to attach my phone to.
Beautiful results!
Thanks Joe!
if the battery had one of those charging circuits that would be the real test of one of those wireless chargers you'll push it to it's limits
Have you thought about putting a pad of cork at the bottom so if doesn't scratch the desk top? And could you make a record player out of epoxy?
Everyone is focused on cnc cutter machines when really what we need are cnc buffer and polisher machines.
Next time use Bluetac for the cable seal, you can reuse it.
Not like the fast-setting-latex-stuff.
Wireless charging is slower than a good wired charger, but I have an upright wireless charger at my desk so my phone screen actually faces me and I can pick up the phone at any time, it's basically just my phone's home. Really convenient not to plug and unplug it all the time, it's always charged more than 80% and charging the battery more slowly makes less heat which is healthy for it's longevity... I never want to go back to pre wireless days lol.
This would be cool built into a desk or nightstand. Like route the wood out, place the charger and epoxy fill it.
Ya I actually had plans to do that in my desk at one point! I think @fixthisbuildthat has a great video on the idea.
@@ZacBuilds he did have one similar. I believe he did the whole charger inset into the bottom and then added a bowtie so you couldn't see the charger. Which is a common video anymore lol. I think the epoxy would be sharp like yours. However I get that it doesn't solve your problem of wanting to be able to see your phone and not have to look down at it
Would like to see a led lightstrip recessed about 1 cm in the back of your desk. From outer left to the outer right of your desk. The epoxy should the be mixed with a little bit of white pigments to difuse the light. That way, the light comming of the ledstrip is soft
Could you use hot melt glue to seal the cable in the mold? (Remember that hot melt glue can be released by the mechanical (not chemical!) action of isopropyl alcohol, so unless the epoxy created a tight bond of its own, it should come right off.)
epoxy a whole phone, a 100% water proof device with wireless charging, touch screen would be the challenge
You can buy a charge circuit minus any housing on Amazon for about $8
Oh that finish is really nice...
Nice project idea. You could use a nameplate to make a stopper for your phone and engrave your channel name in it. just an idea. i was thinking about this the whole video and wasnt sure if you had it planned. look forward to some more videos.
I'd have loved to see the cable get epoxied into the base... but that is something you can go back and do later if you want..