Kawi’s hands are now made up of more metal shavings than tissue
I believe that Japanese/Chinese hands are smaller, better able to reach inside their miniature engineered wonders.
One reason I had my sinus surgery by a Japanese doctor and my proctologist is Dr No.
This is very concerning. I just checked my spring. The end of the spring is about the 2 o’clock position from the FW3A stamp. The largest gap is about 11 o’clock. I can just barely get a sheet of paper thru the spring at the trace. All three solder pads appear soldered ok. I’ve never soldered before. Do you think it is OK? I have had zilch problems with the light. I have never dropped it though. I do use FT batteries.
I would not be concerned. There doesn’t seem a chance the spring could touch the trace. You have a nice gap and the spring is properly soldered.
Seems a piece of kapton tape over that trace would have been cheap insurance. I may desolder my spring and do just that when mine comes in. I like my lights to be as bulletproof as possible. My Olight S1 has been through a lot and refuses to stop working.
Is the head of this light easily replaceable?
Like, if I want a different led, can I just swap the head content, or do I need to unglue and solder stuff?
Mine had the sharp end of the spring right over the trace. Almost touching. 
The solder job on mine was really bad, too. Just one contact point, and the spring was way off center.
I desoldered it, and did an equally sh*tty solder job putting it back together. But, at least it’s centered, the sharp end is 180 degrees away from the trace, and there’s two contact points (couldn’t get the third for some reason). I also added some more solder so the spring sits up higher. There’s a good millimeter of space between the spring and the board.
I hope I did that correctly. Anyway, the light works fine, and the spring seems solidly in place.
This design flaw is not cool.
Great combined info!
My favorite combo for weight vs ability to handle heat - Aluminum outside and copper inside. I’ll do a copper light very infrequently. I NEVER do brass, bronze or stainless steel. Titanium is rare for me, but has been purchased a few times.
It does not have a pill if that is what you are asking. If you want different emitters you will have to take the MCPCB out & either reflow new ones or install another MCPCB with different emitters.
As far as the head being “easily replaceable” …. yeah, you can just screw one off and screw another one on.
Kawi plays grand piano in a marching band
Nice… :+1:
Cute piano.
Just an update for this thread. I tested to see what happens if the spring shorts to that trace in the tail cap. Nothing big happened. All is fine, so there’s no worry about that specific scenario. Details are HERE and a couple posts below that.
Something else caused the malfunction is DBSAR’S light when it fell.
Could it be that there was a blob of solder etc, that somehow affected the light and melted away / loosened when it shorted?
A blob of solder could be the cause of a short if it touched both a positive point on the driver and a ground point at the same time. I doubt it would melt, though. They tend to blob up when heated like surface tension does a water droplet.
There was a small blob of solder on the oval trace on my switch board. I took it away with a pincer, it loosened very easily. A little bit bigger blob there could possibly touch the batteries negative pole.
All that would happen is it would simulate the button being pressed like in my test.
Same thing if the inner tube gets shorted, it simulates a button press.
Mine melted the solder on the black wire & disconnected itself.
I received my SST-20 light yesterday (which was a nice surprise because the tracking never worked no matter which tracking site I used). I am glad that I got one because the tint is great. Like others mentioned, I don’t see a green tint at all, no matter what level it is on. It’s as warm as I’d like and the colors really pop. Well done.
Mine had no issues. No loose retaining ring, tight tail cap, worked right out of the box with a GA cell I have.
There are a few differences though that some others have mentioned. Brass (?) retaining ring, shiny silver clip, shorter and lighter travel in the switch button and the anodizing is slightly more blue than the HI one I got a while ago. Nothing to be concerned about, except for the switch which seem to be easier to turn on. I’ll keep it locked out or in an Astrolux holster I’ve got. It’s low-profile and a lot less bulky than the Convoy ones I have.
I chose to have Neal send me the light with the new optic and the lens. I swapped the optic for a floody one I’ve got (can’t remember the number but it’s more frosted than the one I received on my HI FW3A). It looks great and I’ll get a lot of use out of it around the house and at work.
I must say that I thought the new optic was going to be junk but it really isn’t. The beam looks good and the material is better than what I envisioned. I thought it was going to be some lousy milk-carton soft plastic, but it’s actually pretty nice. I can see why they went their own way if Lumintop couldn’t find the original optics in sufficient numbers or having to wait for them and keep customers waiting.
Overall, I am very glad I’ve got my two different models. Each will be used a lot. I doubt I’ll get another. No need for alternative materials for me and the colors are cool but not necessary, although I really did like that olive/sand one…