Lumintop Tool (AAA) Mod

And I’m jealous. Once I get serious with modding I’m going to do something like this since I’m a huge fan of “AAA” sized lights. A “Key-pocket rocket” for sure!

Phil

after seeing this, I’m just supposed to go back to using my regular old Lumintop Tool I’m so stinking envious of you modders.

Only the copper tool would make this better

Holy schmoly, what a mod. In the Book of Luke is said: “… it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man ….” Well, if I ever need a camel on the other side of a needle, you’re the go-to person. You describe it like anybody can do this, but this is far beyond the limitations of my eyesight. Awesome! One tiny remark. When I need an insulating piece of plastic that size, I use self-adhesive hole-reinforcing rings. Bigger rings I (also) cut out of a piece of plastic packaging.

Paypal sent ..... :P

never mind ...let me just send you my credit card .

Beautiful work

Thanks all for the wonderful comments. I didn’t quite expect so much praise :shy:
This mod is very much only possible as a result of the works going on at BLF. Buying PCBs made by BLF members, flashing firmwares developed “in-house” and well-documented testing to back up our choice of emitter.

Thanks for testing out the 219c for us! In theory, AAA compatibility is possible… you would need to stack the original boost driver on top and wire the one free pin of the ATTiny to a transistor (?) to shut off the boost circuit when battery voltage is above 1.8v and turn it on when below. For PWM control, wire either the FET or 7135 control in parallel with the boost circuit. Finally, as the ATTiny can’t work with such low voltages, you must use the output of the boost to power the ATTiny. Of course, the voltage reading will be off so you would use the final free pin to read the true battery voltage. On the software side, you would have to put all that extra detection logic into 1k of memory. I dare someone to do it J)

Programming is the easy part; I don’t even know how to code. You will need a usbasp programmer and SOIC clip, had for a few coins on fleabay. Connect everything together then download AVRDUDESS (AVRDUDE with a nice gui), write the correct fuse bits (Low:0x75, High: 0xfd for BLF-A6, probably others too), download a .hex file from Toykeeper’s repo, select and hit Program. To tweak, get Atmel studio and the .c source file, change a few numbers, press F7 to build and flash the resultant .hex file. Not as hard as you think.

I could be, though with 3 million people in Melbourne, the chances are fairly slim :slight_smile:

I’ll keep that one handy!

its time to steal this away from you

Update: Spring bypass done

Beamshot comparison (disclaimer, the wall is not white, the camera is a phone)
1/100s ISO110

Left: Convoy S2 with Nichia 219B (4500k) driven at 1.42A ~400 Lumens
Right: Lumintop Tool with Nichia 219C (4000k) driven at 2.70A ~840 Lumens

Wow, great mod. Kinda takes your breath away. A new bar has been set for AAA size lights……

c’mon, 840 Nichia lumens? In my lil Lumintop Tool AAA light?

could u start offering these up? I’ll pay anything.

In a failed dedoming attempt, the 219C turned into a deep blue LED :_(
Therefore I dedomed my remaining spare with a different method and reflowed it onto the Sinkpad, which due to carelessness, was cooked by excess heat.
Finally, the dedomed spare was moved onto the original MCPCB. As it stands, there is no DTP so the LED turned blue and emitted some mystery smoke that hung around in the reflector within about 2 seconds when 2.9A (this LED seems to have an even lower Vf :p) is pumped into it, but not at 2.4A. Fortunately, the LED was not damaged in that short burst but lesson learned, always go DTP to prevent overheating at high current. Now I wonder if there’s a kind soul willing to sell me a 10mm DTP star in Australia…

I updated my 4000K 219C with a 5000K model on a Sinkpad. The tint is a more neutral white, which is preferable to the warm white of 4000K. With the Sinkpad, there is no problem with blue shift or smoke driving it at full tilt. 2.80A is actually an underestimate as the light is visibly brighter when shorting the multimeter leads.

Great mod testedandbaked :slight_smile:

Now that you have tasted these crazy high output from a AAA light, you have to test out the XP-L V6 3D :wink: you did prefer the 5000K Nichia to the warmer one and the 3D is very close to the 5000K but it is more efficient at least at start, but the Nichia probably can sustain a higher output for longer with its lower Vf at turbo.
But if you manage to fit 22awg or even fatter 18awg wires, at start you should be looking at well over 1000 lumens :bigsmile: from that tiny light. Of course dropping like a stone :smiley: but i never get tired of that much light from a such a tiny light.

EDIT hmm, i forgot about that the Tool uses a switch, that could limit max amp a bit from twisty AAA’s.

If you need a 10mm sinkpad, you can always cut or sand down a 16mm noctigon, i used that before i even knew about the 10mm sinkpads.

Great light! I will try to copy if I get back to doing SS-5039s. (But I am not keen on programming my own chips. After a hundred or so computer languages and systems, it isn’t fun anymore.) It is almost an A6 that fits on a keychain.
This is the light of the future. Flashlights will continue to get smaller and brighter.

Amazing mod!

Nice, well documented mod !

What was the procedure to remove the “guts” from the light head?

To remove the pill, reflector and glass, you first take off the head. Looking into back of the head, there is the battery contact board with two holes for unscrewing the pill. Use something with two ends that can fit in the holes (e.g. tweezers or needle-nose pliers) and twist counterclockwise. Keep going until the pill is unscrewed. The reflector and glass are held in by the pill and will just fall out. Be careful not to touch the inner surface of the reflector.

Removing the tail end is very similar; unscrew the aluminum retaining ring, then push out the other parts of the switch by pressing on the button.

Thank you! I thought that must be it, but twisting the battery contact board sounded risky. So I wanted to make sure before I tried it.