Good job on the video. We do mods such as this as well. We do take it one step further though, and solder a brass thumbtack (thumbtack pin to wick) on the end of the spring, We keep the tack head slightly loose from the spring, so that when it comes into contact with the battery, it has room to level out, and make for a nice big contact patch area.
8 ปีที่แล้ว +10
cold solder joint. You need to heat the spring and wick not the solder.
nice tutorial and makes sense to lower resistances... i checked resistances on mine and they were over 10 ohms! most of it was the switch itself.. i took switch case apart and cleaned the contacts with 800girit and rebuilt again resistance is 0- .5 ohms...much improved... it would have been cool if you had shown a nite shot of the light output before and after to show differences....I need one of those switches like you have, and the ring that holds it...heck i could use a complete endcap but they want to charge more for these parts than the flashlite costs...do u know a super cheap site that sells replacement sitches and endcaps? ive got a bell and howell tac lite, similiar to atomic beam ect...running with an 18650, these are xml2 cree and quite brite....ive wondered whether these would be safe to run two 3.7v batteries like cr123s? will these fry at 8.4 volts or will they be fine?
Well it might increase brightness a little since it could have a better contact to draw more current, but it will lessen run time also. The last time I ordered a driver that had this mod already done the flashlight I built came back to me a year later, the braid broke and caused a short. It was an easy fix and lucky the driver wasn't damaged. Even worse it came back to me with a fully charged 18650 in it, this could have shorted the battery and caused a fire or worse. I built it and gabe it away as a gift. I won't recommend or do this mod, now when I receive a driver with this I remove the braid. Current draw testing showed no difference if you have a good tail cap switch PCB with a good spring. It would benefit you more if you just solder a few more points on the spring to the tail PCB board. The switch your using is a good switch, I have a few, and the driver your using is also one I have used for several builds. It's a nice constant current driver that I've seen too out with a good Cree LED at 3.2 Amps. No need to go further then that since it's already over driving the LED and if you don't have good heat dissipation it will cause the LED to dim when it gets to hot. Use a thick copper MCPCB like a sinkpad or for the LED and that would benefit you more on the driver side.
Hi John, at the time I posted this I didn't have any lights capable of pulling more then 3 amps. I build a driver to do 4.2 amps and did some testing. My finding s are if the switch and spring are good one then it doesn't need this at all. It didn't make a difference, it didn't increase the power. Now if your using a cheap switch, or a spring that is thin, or maybe a thick spring but not soldered on good then this might help. But when I did it with the cheaper switch what happened was to much current ran through the switch carried by the wire mod add on and the switch melted. A cheaper spring from a generic flashlight acted like a heat sync and glowed red, then I pulled the power. So adding a extra ground may have worse effects. The switch is still the weak point on a cheap tail cap PCB. My personal suggestion is just make sure you have a good tail cap switch and spring PCB board, maybe add a little extra solder on the spring if it's just tacked with one or two small beads. Yes, if the spring doesn't carry the current good like a correctly rated gold plated one then it might act like a shunt and reduce the current a little. But then again if the switch isn't rated correct and you bypass this by putting a better spring on it or adding a wire then you could have switch issues melting. So make sure the switch is rated for the power and can handle the power your driving.
Gadget Review Videos How is it possible that this mod could causes a dead short? I mean the whole back part of the flashlight is on minus polarity. If the solder wick breaks it could just bypass the switch and turn the light on. Or am I missing something?
LEDs pull a lot of current, most flashlights are at 3-4A at turbo, higher end ones even more. At 5A, 0.1R is gonna produce 0.5V drop, that's a huge drawback.
The problem is not resistance in the spring. The spring is a dead short. Problems with resistance in flashlight circuits as with any circuits are the contact points of which there are many. These contact points need to be very clean and of course the more surface area in contact the better. Points where the spring contacts the base as well as positive end of batteries contacting the terminal and even battery to battery contact if you have multiple batteries battery to Spring contact and the switch itself have to be very clean in order to get the best performance. Cheap flashlights used cheap components and are prone to failure overtime much more so then more costly flashlights. Keep your contact points clean maybe even use some conductive grease to prevent build-up of oxide. Check your switch for resistance, a good switch should act as a solid piece of wire to an OHM meter. If your switch has any resistance it needs to either be cleaned or replaced to get best performance. Inferior quality switches can have resistance even when they are brand new.
If he wont do cool solder joints soldering on both side is not needed, with proper soldering resistance will be lower and most of the current will flow trought Cooper wick
Good job on the video. We do mods such as this as well. We do take it one step further though, and solder a brass thumbtack (thumbtack pin to wick) on the end of the spring, We keep the tack head slightly loose from the spring, so that when it comes into contact with the battery, it has room to level out, and make for a nice big contact patch area.
cold solder joint. You need to heat the spring and wick not the solder.
nice tutorial and makes sense to lower resistances... i checked resistances on mine and they were over 10 ohms! most of it was the switch itself.. i took switch case apart and cleaned the contacts with 800girit and rebuilt again resistance is 0- .5 ohms...much improved... it would have been cool if you had shown a nite shot of the light output before and after to show differences....I need one of those switches like you have, and the ring that holds it...heck i could use a complete endcap but they want to charge more for these parts than the flashlite costs...do u know a super cheap site that sells replacement sitches and endcaps? ive got a bell and howell tac lite, similiar to atomic beam ect...running with an 18650, these are xml2 cree and quite brite....ive wondered whether these would be safe to run two 3.7v batteries like cr123s? will these fry at 8.4 volts or will they be fine?
Nice I understand the problem. I have about 16 lights like these problems these all show dim light on full battery. Thank you.
very good work. can i do that with the manker e14 ?? it has adouble spring! thanks pro
"This increases the resistance in the light and allows it to be more efficient" it does not, and your soldering is horrible.
A D *We all started somewhere, and we all make mistakes*
I've never had to hold a piece of hot metal with my fingers while soldering. Ever heard of needle pliers?
Great video very easy to follow
Well it might increase brightness a little since it could have a better contact to draw more current, but it will lessen run time also.
The last time I ordered a driver that had this mod already done the flashlight I built came back to me a year later, the braid broke and caused a short. It was an easy fix and lucky the driver wasn't damaged. Even worse it came back to me with a fully charged 18650 in it, this could have shorted the battery and caused a fire or worse. I built it and gabe it away as a gift. I won't recommend or do this mod, now when I receive a driver with this I remove the braid.
Current draw testing showed no difference if you have a good tail cap switch PCB with a good spring. It would benefit you more if you just solder a few more points on the spring to the tail PCB board. The switch your using is a good switch, I have a few, and the driver your using is also one I have used for several builds. It's a nice constant current driver that I've seen too out with a good Cree LED at 3.2 Amps. No need to go further then that since it's already over driving the LED and if you don't have good heat dissipation it will cause the LED to dim when it gets to hot.
Use a thick copper MCPCB like a sinkpad or for the LED and that would benefit you more on the driver side.
Gadget Review Videos I prefer to use silicone wire for this reason
Hi John, at the time I posted this I didn't have any lights capable of pulling more then 3 amps. I build a driver to do 4.2 amps and did some testing.
My finding s are if the switch and spring are good one then it doesn't need this at all. It didn't make a difference, it didn't increase the power.
Now if your using a cheap switch, or a spring that is thin, or maybe a thick spring but not soldered on good then this might help.
But when I did it with the cheaper switch what happened was to much current ran through the switch carried by the wire mod add on and the switch melted. A cheaper spring from a generic flashlight acted like a heat sync and glowed red, then I pulled the power. So adding a extra ground may have worse effects. The switch is still the weak point on a cheap tail cap PCB.
My personal suggestion is just make sure you have a good tail cap switch and spring PCB board, maybe add a little extra solder on the spring if it's just tacked with one or two small beads. Yes, if the spring doesn't carry the current good like a correctly rated gold plated one then it might act like a shunt and reduce the current a little. But then again if the switch isn't rated correct and you bypass this by putting a better spring on it or adding a wire then you could have switch issues melting.
So make sure the switch is rated for the power and can handle the power your driving.
Gadget Review Videos
How is it possible that this mod could causes a dead short?
I mean the whole back part of the flashlight is on minus polarity. If the solder wick breaks it could just bypass the switch and turn the light on. Or am I missing something?
Does that hack work with Maglite full sized flashlights that have no tail switch?
Any benefit if you do?
This is Bull LEDs don't pull a lot of current especially just one emitter the spring is not a resistor it's a solid piece of wire
LEDs pull a lot of current, most flashlights are at 3-4A at turbo, higher end ones even more.
At 5A, 0.1R is gonna produce 0.5V drop, that's a huge drawback.
I have astrolux eco3 and it has double springs,so do I have to weld like this for a lower resistance?
The problem is not resistance in the spring. The spring is a dead short. Problems with resistance in flashlight circuits as with any circuits are the contact points of which there are many. These contact points need to be very clean and of course the more surface area in contact the better. Points where the spring contacts the base as well as positive end of batteries contacting the terminal and even battery to battery contact if you have multiple batteries battery to Spring contact and the switch itself have to be very clean in order to get the best performance. Cheap flashlights used cheap components and are prone to failure overtime much more so then more costly flashlights. Keep your contact points clean maybe even use some conductive grease to prevent build-up of oxide. Check your switch for resistance, a good switch should act as a solid piece of wire to an OHM meter. If your switch has any resistance it needs to either be cleaned or replaced to get best performance. Inferior quality switches can have resistance even when they are brand new.
Should this be done to both ends if you have springs in both sides/ ends?
If he wont do cool solder joints soldering on both side is not needed, with proper soldering resistance will be lower and most of the current will flow trought Cooper wick
How to solve charging problem ?
It actually decreases the resistance not increases it cause the copper wick will give better/more currant amp flow;)
Thank's
cool i saw another vid talking about this yours showed !
Hot glue works to