Mini Fume Extractor

 I don't have a lot of money, especially since I have an hour to commute and gas is at a bazillion dollars a gallon. I started building my own equipment. I've a bird and i don't want it dead... wife would come unglued at me if it was my fault. So I started looking at options for the fumes created by the soldering iron. I came across this and decided to build one. I've an old tin I had used for my bus pirate, and an old hard-drive enclosure that had a small 12v fan.

 I picked up the voltage regulator, and some 9v connectors, started putting this thing together. The 9v batteries are wired in parallel to give 18v. The regulator can take 37v, I was tempted not to regulate it. and just let it eat 18v but I figured it's better to stick with directions this time.  The best way to keep things from shorting is a bit of shrink tubing.. I'm not supposed to solder in the dining room anymore... so I used the kitchen.

 The extra wire goes to the fan. I wired the switch into the ground side floating it. really the hardest part was the switch. I used one that I had lying around, it was pretty small. My el-cheapo iron is all clunky it's like tapping in a finishing nail with a cinder-block.

 

 Here it is all wired together 18v on the high side of the regulator, fan on the low side, switch floating the ground. I managed to source a filter by using a sponge type fish filter. It was stopping the fan though. What I did was took some wire and folded it over, going from the middle of each side to compress it down. I forgot a picture of it, but it's figureoutable.

so here is a sideways picture of the finished product. I dremmeled a design on one side, (not in the dining room this time, I went into the kitchen to do it) the other side is just straight-ish lines. You can see the switch on the side (top) I secured it in to place with hot glue. Painted it red... cuz I had red paint. So that is the Altoids mini fume extractor. I call it a success!