Not that kind! Potting.
Do you pot your drivers?
As I have been pushing my drivers more and more and expecting more out of them I have been potting pretty much all of them. On some of these lights I'm sure it's overkill but I just like the idea of keeping my drivers safe. I really wish I had started doing this a long time ago. I am not exaggerating when I say that not potting has cost me a ton of money. I have at least a couple hundred dollars in destroyed drivers. Many of them from simply pushing them way too hard. I am convinced that some of my early disasters could have been avoided if only I had started doing this sooner.
Please chime in with your potting compounds and advice.
For me I have been using a combination of JB Weld and Silicon Carbide. I use equal parts of the JB Weld just like normal and mix in the fine grit silicon carbide until I reach the consistency that I'm looking for. The more silicon carbide I mix in the more like putty it becomes. Thicker stuff is good for molding around smaller drivers. Use less and it's good for running in and filling up areas on lights. I also use this on lights as well for adding heatsinking.
These are links to the silicon carbide and the JB Weld that I buy.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/141375753041?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
Here are some picture of the mixing process and what it looks like before and after.
It starts out a lot like making dough for bread. It really doesn't seem like it's going to mix together at all. It's all clumpy and stuff. But you just keep at it kind of mashing it up and stuff and before long it all mixed together. Keep adding more until you get it the thickness you are looking for.
One of the big things is keeping air out. I will actually roll it up a bit to make sure that the air is squished out of it before applying and after I squish it down even more to do the same.
This is a SRK driver. Yes I'm potting the driver. I also epoxy extra heatsinking material to the back of the "pill" sometimes washers or copper whatever I have that I can fit that will be as solid and conductive as possible. The entire area under the pill will be filled with copper and potting compound on this light when I'm done.
This is a 4x so those are 8 wires coming up off of a JB driver. They come up through the center of the pill. As I'm filling everything in, I slide the wires down with it. So when it's done I have the entire head completely filled with copper and potting compound. I then clip the wires, strip them and wire it up. Noctigons and XM-L2's two with domes and one without is what this light got.
How do I know it works? Well the light gets hot very fast, the heat transfer to the outside of the light is almost instant. Also the lumens stay high instead of dropping off like they would without all the extra heatsinking and potting. I have over driven drivers and killed them without potting and then done the same mods to the same driver and potted they run just fine. This makes them corrosion free, impact resistant and it's much less likely that you will burn out a driver.
So are you on Pot??