So I finally got a chance to mod my Small Sun ZY-A629 (see Tecmo's review here) with an OP P60 reflector and swap in an XM-L T6 4C (my new favorite tint by the way). I really like the way it turned out and the modes seems a little better spaced than with the original XR-E (modes are Low-Med-High-Turbo with blinky modes hidden for those that don't go read the review). So here is my mod with photos along the way.
(Captions above photos they pertain to.)
Original XR-E in the pill with press-fit battery contact board removed (driver is in the tailcap). Original XR-E was 14mm but pill holds up to 16mm:
Innards of the battery contact board and inside of pill:
Showing battery side of contact board:
What's this? (2) 16mm emitter boards used as spacers? Yep and they won't budge either! Emitter popped right off too:
Original XR-E on a 14mm board:
But the pill will accommodate up to a 16mm board:
A blurry shot of the XM-L T6 4C installed.
The original emitter wires seemed awfully thin so I decided to replace them with 20ga silicone wire I had. I found out that 20ga is a bit too thick and so I'm going to need to get thinner wire. It was a little hard getting the wire through the holes in the pill and the wire to stuff into the pill (the force pushes the press-fit board out the back a little until it's mounted in the light body).
Don't ask me how I can find anything in this mess! I'm getting really bad about throwing my received packages on my workbench, letting them pile up, and not getting around to using the parts for the intended mods! Then better parts come out (i.e. XM-L2's, XP-G2's, Q-lite drivers, etc . . .) and it just perpetuates the cycle! (BTW - that's a chainsaw under the rag that I'm working around.)
Now for the comparison beamshot photos. Now the camera I was using (a cheap Nikon point and shoot set to Landscape mode) kept changing the shutter speed, ISO, etc . . . on me so take these shots with a grain of salt. You can really only judge the beam pattern and not the brightness. I admit I adjusted the images on my PC to brighten them up to look more like what I saw. I used a freshly charged protected Tenergy 2600mAh 18650. All shots on Turbo (except the comparison beamshot). PWM only showed up faintly in the camera. Light & camera both 10' away from my basement wall painted white.
The original stock XR-E (note the rings):
XM-L with the original SMO reflector:
XM-L with an OP reflector:
And a comparison between the ZY-A629 with the XM-L T6 4C (OP reflector) on the left and my Xiaozhi (18650 tube light) XM-L T6 3C on the right. Xiaozhi on medium (50%) and ZY-A629 on "high":
The XM-L T6 4C seems a much better neutral tint rending colors slightly better than the 3C. I really like it! I also like the OP reflector in the ZY-A629 for a smoother beam pattern from hotspot to spill.
I can't give tailcap readings on my new mod yet because my meter was found to be way off (reads way high) and I haven't bought a new meter yet. Comparing it to my Xiaozhi which is a 8x7135 AMC (2.8A) I'd say the ZY-A629 is a hair brighter, but it could be the P60's bigger reflector size resulting in a slightly larger / brighter hotspot. I'd say it's at least running at 2.5A on Turbo mode. I left the light sit on Turbo for awhile (about 5 minutes) and the head was getter hot, but not too hot to hold - probably slightly hotter than my Xiaozhi gets on high.
I'd highly recommend this mod, especially for newbies! It's simple and cheap - $11.33 for host from Manafont, $6.38 for XM-L T6 4C from FastTech or $4.51 for a T6 3C, $1.99 for the OP reflector from FT (with parts to spare), and a little thermal compound or adhesive (I had Fujik on hand). I also reused the clear plastic isolator that came with the light originally, but the FT OP reflector comes with a different style isolator too.
The result is a very nice usable light with 4 modes and well hidden blinkies:
-Garry
