Firstly, Boost drivers don’t just suck as much current as they need. They have voltage limits programed in. If you put a weak battery in, weak as in big voltage sag under load, the boost driver will sense this and not activate it’s higher current modes. Same thing for a high cuurent battery that does not sag as much under load that is partially depleted. The driver will sense the lower voltage and limit it’s current draw by only turning on at lower brightness levels.
Back to the cells heating up…
I think a lot of what your saying is theory, in reality I don’t believe there is a single light on the market capable of heating up the battery due to high current use. Whenever you have high current drain you also have high led temperatures. The poor efficiency of leds and all the heat they generate (roughly 25–30 light and 65–70 heat) will cause the light to overheat well before the battery gets over heated. Even people that let their flashlight heads get up to 70-80°C still have the battery temps at safe temperatures.
So I think your kinda worried about nothing. Just my opinion, no offense meant.
(We do need to keep in mind that all batteries are not perfect. If you have an unprotected cell that gets deeply discharged, like below 2.5v, it’s most likely compromised and dangerous to use. It could vent at lower than normal temps or simply overheat under load or more likely during charging. This happens quite a bit with unknown used cells that people recycle from other devices. This type of situation would be an exception to what I said earlier. I an assuming we are all using good quality cells that are not damaged in our lights.)
Does anyone know of any lights capable of overheating a battery before the head overheats? I don’t know of any, but I’d like to know if it exists. (It’s certainly not the FW3A)
Well those replies are confidence inspiring! I remember the basics of soldering, but I should probably watch a YouTube refresher. I mean I’m relatively handy… Definitely won’t do this anywhere near my woodshop. But at least when I mess up I’ll know some understanding people.
A little birdie told me they paid $1 US extra to have them all cleaned, lubed, inspected, tightened, & pre-tested before theirs shipped.
Not a bad deal… :+1:
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It averages about 1.7 mA on moon, and a 30Q cell has 3000 mAh, so that’s 3000 / 1.7 / 24 = 73.5 days.
The 35E cell is probably a somewhat better choice for this light though, especially if you want to use low modes a lot. It should last about 85.8 days on moon.
Great lights! Many thanks to the team.
3D and 7A came in the same box with VTC6 on Thursday, but got them outside tonight for the first time. It is difficult to believe such small lights perform so well. They look great- no complaints about the clip. Both worked right out of the box. So glad I found BLF for these and for the outrageously bright A6. You guys are the best!
im using hg2 fits fine, but its kinda pointless having a 20A battery in this kind of light, even 30Q is overkill so i will stick with samsung 35E that has like 3400mah or something…
Managed to get the shorting light working after several disassemble, reassemble cycles and careful driver positioning. The second light is still dead with what looks like a bad connection on the driver () side. Driver is free to spin as if only connected at one point, and multimeter reads an open circuit between the () MCPCB and the square head threads.