When Eskom cut the lights, you definitely need one of these. It’s called a Maxblaster but we decided to call it a “Little Beam of Sunlight” which in truth, it is.

Handheld sunbeam

Created by a 45-year-old Dutch optics engineer Ralf Ottow, this invention is a lifetime achievement (he’s been working on it since he was eight!). The Maxblaster is more miniature star than flashlight - it can put a bright spot of light on a cloud six and a half kilometers high and illuminate a house from just as far!

The Maxblaster consist of a powerful commercial flashlight that’s been stripped of its innards and then replaced with a mercury arc bulb. This bulb generates light by creating ultra-hot plasma between two closely spaced electrodes inside the gas-filled central chamber of the lamp.

The result is a brighter, more focused beam that also kicks out more ultraviolet light unfortunately. To fix this problem Ottow added a specially coated reflector and designed, ground and coated a new glass window that would trap UV rays while still pumping out light.

Not, in his own words, “a torch you’d walk your dog with.” It would probably cook your dog...

Source: Popular Science