Ok, so I've got my lilliput apart.
Looking at it, I see a few things that make me think.
1. Wouldn't it be better to have something reflect the light from the 3 sides of the CCFL that face away from the light guide? Something like reflective tape? I have another backlight out of some old mac thing I got surplus and it seems better designed. The light guide on the spare one is only on the left side but it has a coating to direct all the light into the guide. Also the guide itself seems better. The lilliput just looks like some dingy glass (and it was actually kind of dirty
), the surplus one I have is almost the perfect size and may actually fit under the lilli with a slight amount of surgery.
2. Look like you could fit another two inches of CCFL in the space if you wrapped around the light guide like so. You'd have to polish that side of the guide, but that shouldn't be too hard.
3. I may be off, but it looks like you have a little more than 4mm of space in the assembly, I'm thinking, why not just get two 2mm bulbs and stack them? Has anyone tried this? I dont' care if both run off a seperate inverter.
The last option seems attractive, outside of hunting down a 2.0mm long enough, seems like bending it would be the toughest, which brings me to my next thought.
I was thinking of going to one of the local neon sign shops. They bend glass all day. I would think it wouldn't be too hard for them.
If anyone has any suggestions or has gone down this road before, love to hear it. I did search, but didn't find anything that addressed these specific thoughts.