FW3A Troubleshooting / FAQ

The design has been changed. Now the tail caps have retaining rings. They originally wanted to glue the tails, but we forced them not to.

How? It’s all people talk about in any FWXX thread and also there is a note in every box. It’s not a poor design, it’s a modders/enthusiast/flashaholic dream imo.

Gave that a try with a bit of hot air no change unfortunately. I appreciate your taking the time to respond!

I was just talking to Texas_Ace and he agrees that the defect rate on those 7135 chips seems to be getting higher and higher. He has run across so many bad ones that he’s changing his driver designs to either FET plus single 7135 chip or else dual FET with resistor bank. Reliability is way better.

If the defect rate starts to get too bad, BLF may need to start designing similar drivers with 1 or no 7135 chips at all.

My problem is with Neal’s. I had a defective unit a month ago and he said he’d send a new one. I been messaging him for weeks and he finally gets back to me and just says “hello” in the message and ignores my questions on where is the replacement. He finally says today oh sorry I’m too busy, I’ll send tomorrow. checked his FB page and others have the same complaint. Does anyone know is this normal for Neals? Can I get anyone else to warranty this?

Same here, eventually got refunded after PayPal intervened.

OK, so:

I have had 2 of these for a while now. No mentionable issues.

Today I chance to one of them the 2-way clip.

In the process I noticed a clear O-ring under original clip, it cut in pieces while taking it off.

Now, with 2-way clip if I tighten the tailcap gently: flashlight will give me only 1% power momentary strobish-thing. Nothing else.

If I tighten the tailcap FIRMLY, the switch “click” sound disappears and switch feel goes from “clicky” to smushy or something. No feel at all BUT thats not the worst it also likes to Fire up on full beam on the table all by itself.

Threads and surfaces are cleaned, no help, but I think this has something to do with the click itself.

From the rubber plate between SS-tailbutton and clickswitch the plastic “nub” was loose. I took it away -> bad feedback from clicky, put it back -> no help to original issue.

Yep.
Assembled/disassembled a few times more.

I don´t get it…. when I place all the parts inside and press them in tailcap for example with a battery, the “clicky-feel” is correct.
When I assemble the light, it just doesn´t work.

My purple FW3A just ran one of my 18650s down to 1v while turned off. Anybody had this happen? Is there a way to fix it?

Sometimes this happens. :weary:
AFAIK, Neal is still a one man store. He takes all the orders, gets everything that is in stock shipped out, orders new inventory, tries to answer all the PM from here, Facebook, emails from his website, etc…, but he gets overloaded and backed up. I don’t know why he didn’t send a replacement a month ago, it might have slipped through the cracks. He’s an honest guy, though so he will get it sent to you. Even if it goes out today, it might take a week or so for him to get the tracking number. This is the busy season in China and the mail system also gets overloaded.

Warranty is only through the company you bought it from. No one else will do it as it’s basically them sending a new light/part for free, plus paying the shipping costs. This takes a big bite out of the small profit margins.

Ok, cleaned it up, again.

I cut away 50% of the hard plastic stud inside the rubber. Not helping.
I cut away the outer rim from rubber and it helped. I think the rubber could not sit again in the tailcap groove once you take it out one time.

On the other hand, the clicky now does not have much feel and the metal cap tries to stick once and awhile.

Oh wel… at least I can use it now, sort of :expressionless:

Cutting up the rubber was a bad idea seeing as that is very difficult to undo. Did you have solder blobs on the underside of your switch board? If so, I would have tried removing/flattening those out if you have a soldering iron. Would I do that now though? Probably not

Can you tell me about this clip?, I’m not up to date, but I don’t recall there being a 2 way clip for the FW3A.

By “1% power momentary strobish-thing” you mean the double blink you get when power is first connected? That is normal. The threads are not anodized so it easily gets main power when screwing it together.

Your problem is tricky. It sounds like when you tighten the tail cap firmly the nub was already pressing down on the metal dome of the switch, but just barely short of making contact. Then the switch might actually touch and that’s why it ramped up.

Have you tried removing the 2 way clip and seeing if that fixed the problem or if it’s still the same?

Something is going on with your switch. Try assembling it like this. Hold the tail cap threads up, drop the metal button in, make sure it’s centered. Drop the rubber diaphragm in, make sure it’s centered. Make sure the plastic nubbin is held in it’s groove. Then drop the switch circuit board on top, make sure it’s centered then keep holding it threads up and screw on the battery tube. Verify the clicky feel.

Sometimes if the tail cap is turned sideways before threading the battery tube on, the rubber part might shift sideways a little and cause an issue.

You can also verify the switch working by using a DMM in continuity mode. Take the assembled battery tube/tail cap, put one probe on the battery tube threads and one on the end on the black inner tube. Clicking the switch should complete the circuit.

I have a video of how to do it. Switch check starts at 2:07.

If everything is assembled and lined up properly, it kind of sounds like the nub is too long. That seems really unlikely though.

Do your parts look like this?


.

Neal is selling a deep carry clip.

I think your the only person I’ve heard of with this issue for this light. I’ve seen it on other models of lights, though.
This sounds like the driver is pulling too much current when off. Normally parasitic drain is 22 micro amps which will last many years. If you have a DMM you can check the drain like in this video.

If the drain is way high and the leds are not lit, it’s probably something shorted on the driver, maybe a filtering capacitor. You would need to contact the company you bought it from (Lumintop or Neal) and explain your findings and see if they will send a new head or whole light.

If the drain measurement is normal, then something weird is going on. Maybe that battery developed a drain internally or something.

Make sure to dispose of that battery as it’s probably damaged internally and a fire hazzard.

A side note, this light does have low voltage protection, but it is only active when the light is turned on. For example, it’s left on moonlight or turned on by accident. When the light is turned off the MCU goes into a deep sleep to reduce parasitic drain and the LVP is not active. On a proper working light this works fine, with a defective driver it causes a problem. Then again, a defective driver always causes a problem. :confounded:

Oh, cool. It looks a bit thicker than the stock clip, but I don’t think that would cause any problems. I’m guessing it’s not an issue for CheapThrills light. It might have just been the taking apart and reassembling of the tail switch pieces that created the problem.

I forgot they added those at some point. I wonder if CheapThrills light needed those solder blobs to space the switch away from the nubbin, but his weren’t there. Kinda like a factory part mix up. Hmmm.

Does it seem like the nubbin is now too short? I’ve seen people make new ones, they hammer a little tube into a piece of plastic and out pops a new nubbin.

Thanks for your input. I don’t have a dmm right now, although I have been meaning to buy a new one. I guess I’ll be getting in touch with Neal.

Unrelated to previous question: For Turbo, does the FSM/Anduril pull up all three output pins (1x7135, 7x7135 AND FET) or just FET? And will it have a difference in output?