What did you mod today?

@khas: would you mind me sending 4 of those XM-L2’s from my stash? No guaranties that they are old enough to be of the right batch but who knows?

At the end of February, I ordered this emitter from them:
http://www.kaidomain.com/p/S026170.Cree-XHP70-N2-5A-Neutral-White-4000K-CRI80-LED-Emitter

When I got my package in the end of March, the emitters I have got, were not XHP70, they sent me XHP70.2. After UV-testing that emitter (comparing it to the NW XHP70.2 i have in my Haikelite MT07S), probably, the CCT is matching, but I am afraid, they sent me a 70CRI variant.

I asked them two times here, and once by email, and 2.5 months was not enough them to answer me, what exact kind of emitter did they sent to me instead of the one, which matches the description on that page. :expressionless:

I spent over $70 for those (bought 6pcs), so I am not happy with this kind of handling things.

I modded a 2S2P bike light battery pack to 4S to use as bilge pump power source in my sea kajak. It’s nice when old obsolete light parts can be used for something else:



@adam7027

I bought the exact same emitter late last year and got this :

There was a lot of e-mail exchange back and forth but I never got a clear answer to what tint and bin they sent me, only that it was not CRI80+,

Kaidomain insisted the emitter they sent was an upgrade and if I wanted a refund I would have to sent it back.

@djozz

Thank you for the generous offer.

I got the standard response from KD today :

Sending something back to China will probably cost more than I get refunded.

Thanks mate, it was a tricky one :+1:

I canged the Driver of the Astrolux MF01 to an Fet + N Driver with Narsil from @Lexel, I have bought month ago.
And I used GITD Tape around the Optics. That looks realy Cool.

Edit: some pics. Click on the Image to see more.

So they changed the LED without any prior communication with you. And they called a CRI70 emitter as an upgrade :person_facepalming:

With me, there was something like ‘ok, please send a picture, and we will check that’, and no communication after I sent a picture with the LED in its original manufacturer packaging.

I also didn’t want to send anything back for the exact same reason.

(Btw, sorry for jacking the thread, just I had to share my experiences)

Ask if KD will pick up the cost of shipping it back. After all, it’s not your fault you got the wrong item, so you shouldn’t have to have it cost you to do so.

Oh, and insist on registered mail with tracking, else they can claim they never got it and you’ll be out the shipping and get no refund.

If they say no, you send it back at your cost, initiate a chargeback via CC or PP, whichever way you paid for it.

I was inspired by djozz and built this C8+ out with sliced Samsung LH351D 4000K 90+CRI. I must say I do like the tint on the led. I’m using a qlite driver w/ added chips at 6a.

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Nice! I’m tempted to use the 351D for the new c8+ but with dome on. I don’t need that much throw as it’s not practical for me.

8 chips stacking fun!

Pocket Rocket Titanium 18650 Triple Nichia 219B
H17F driver
Copper heatsink, soldered
Frosted 10511 carclo optic
Upgraded switch & spring bypass

Convoy Extendable COB Lantern.

Man that is super cool there is so much packed into that thing

Not so much a “mod” as info, if anyone’s interested…

Decided to take the bus to work vs driving, and some bozo sat down next to me practically on my holstered ’502 in a nice Jetbeam holster, ripping it (only saw it when I got home, as lard-ass was pressed against me the whole time).

Wellp, ain’t gonna risk losing the light+holster, and the ’502 is kinda big to have bouncing around in my pocket, and the attached clip would (imo) have it be too easy to squish out of my pocket when sitting down, so decided to bag it and carry a new UT20 instead.

As usual, all the come-with clips from practically every light out there, are the same, letting the light ride waaaaaaay too high, but the deep-carry clip you can get at FT fits absolutely perfectly. Even the gloss matches almost perfectly, not too shiny and not too matte. Booyah…

Now… if only I could transplant the tailcap from a light without thumb-cutouts, I’d be in Hawg Heaven…

It’s time to dust of my modded Roche M170 with XHP70s and do something else with it. Original build thread here, pics dead though: Mod: BMF SRK v2 Roche Edition (Rebuilt into triple XHP 35 HI)

I never liked the XHP70’s tint or donut hole, and never bothered putting MT-G2s in it because the deep reflector makes it a little too throwy to be of use for my underground photography, so I never really used it. As it is rather throwy I thought I’d go with the flow and ordered some XHP35 HIs for it but I didn’t have a 4S driver for it at the time. As I’ve been busy with other drivers it’s just been laying around collecting dust… until now.

Here’s my new SRK style driver:

I made it both 2S2P and 4S compatible. Only battery pads + and - are “live” the other two are isolated and are to be connected by soldering wires. Here I soldered a wire between pad 2 and 3 making is 4S. To make it 2S2P I need a wire between 2 and +, and one between 3 and -. The only hardware difference is a single resistor.

The driver is a fully adjustable constant current without PWM from about 40mA up to about 8.4 amps. For low moonlight modes I use 10 bit PWM so it can go really low. I’m no electronics guy so I need easy use regulators for constant current, so I went with 12 x CAT4104s. One is adjusted with a 256 step digipot from 40mA to 0.7A, the other 11 have fixed resistors at 0.7 amps each and any number of them can be turned on or off. The 4104s may not be the best choice, but they are easy to use for an electronics noob like myself, and are very small considering they can handle 0.7 amps each. They work fine from 2.7V (haven’t tested lower) up to 25V so they are rather flexible too, but they do come with a price tag. It’s all just part of the hobby though, I’ve just wanted to make my own fully adjustable constant current driver for my SRK lights for quite some time now, and the 4104s do the job. I stuck an old re-used FET on it for testing, but won’t be using it for the XHP35 HIs, they have been reported to sometimes die above 3 amps.

I didn’t have any centering rings that work with the reflector holes, so the LEDs aren’t very well centered. The beam looks OK to me on a white wall, but I’m no beam profile snob.

I got rid of that horrible side switch I used in my original build and replaced it with my favorite lighted switch. It was a little too bright at 12V with included resistor, so I added a larger resistor to damped it a bit. I really like the protruding switches but it didn’t fit so I had to drill out the hole a bit. I made a little bit of a mess so I covered the mess up a little with a rubber washer :blush:
Firmware flashing the 1634 is done by my usual acupuncture style method:

So here it is in it’s new configuration… A fully adjustable constant current driven triple XHP 35 HI SRK style light… For a SRK style light it is really thowy now. Not sure I’ll find any use for it, but it was just something I had to do.

Convoy S2+
Optisolis 3200k Rfc00 on XM board
AK-47A 1x7135 flashed with Crescendo (with almost everything removed except for batt check, goodnight(which seems not to work), and turbo, and no memory
LEDiL Boom White


Carved out for the wire, it does sit perfectly flush when compressed


Beautiful! What do you use it for? Isn’t it a bit weak?

I reckon it is around 100 lumens based upon drive current and lumens in the datasheet. It is not overdriven at all. It is a super high CRI midpower violet-pump LED. I just built it for fun and the love of high CRI, I am sure these can be pushed harder with better heatsinking (waiting for a proper PCB)

Another wee pocket rocket today, Tank 007 TK-703.

This light had been sitting empty and dinged up for a while so I installed a new reflector, glass, pill, driver, heatsink and magnetic forward clicky switch. Luminus SST-40 N4 BA emitter
10mm copper Sinkpad
FET 10mm driver
ARC glass
Copper taped reflector
MCPCB, copper heatsink & brass pill soldered
Forward magnetic clicky switch
Stripped ano
10440 compatible
Length - 80mm
Width - 15mm
Weight - 33g
Around 1500lm OTF at startup
1100lm at 30 sec, 957lm at 1minute.