Here is the pictures of both of my KE-5 which one is the right one?
I bought two of them off of Ebay and both of mine look like yours on top. I don't like them at all.
Tail cap measure 1.1 and 1.2. Not the bright thrower everyone was talking about. These two were my
first purchase after reading reviews here at BLF. I will try to select carefully in the future.
Komichi,
That's what I did, after reading all the great reviews and seeing pictures of how great they throw I had to have one. So I wonder which one is the correct one or both of these are the wrong ones also....
Did you measure the amps at the tail cap? My KE5's are still bright (I have no other modern flashlight to compare) I will probably not change drivers, they will wind up as gifts or back on Ebay.
I just measured them, one is 1.8 and the other is 2.0 with fully charged with trustfire flames 2400......
I dare say both are in the sweet spot , and unless have faults [ heaven forbid ] may serve you well for a long time ..
Push come to shove , maybe a driver swap ?
old4570,
Are you saying that they are ok? If so I guess I was expecting more and when I seen different parts inside made me think they are bad. I just did a tail cap reading on my Ultrafire 980L and it was 3.2 I wish there were more like that one, it makes everything look bad...
People read too much into tailcap readings ....
http://www.cree.com/products/pdf/XLampXM-L.pdf
T6 280 L per 700mA
280 - 700
560 - 1.4
840 - 2.1
1120 - 2.8
1400 - 3.5
Ok , you wont see it ... The lumens I mean ...
What happens is , as you increase current the emitter becomes less efficient , also the higher the current the higher the emitter temperature , the lower the output through heat loss .
So by the time you get to 3A , your not gaining very much [ unless your real lucky ]
And going over 3A is just going to stress the emitter all to heck ...
I dare say there is little point in going over 2.5A , and anything under is just going to give you much longer emitter life , less heat , lower current - longer run time , for the loss of some un noticed lumens ...
For throwers , its how well focused the beam is , and thats where it counts ..
Sure its nice to brag that your light pulls 3A+ , but the problem is , it might sag something awful [ output drops ] , stress the emitter , and if you run it enough on high maybe you kill the light ,
On the other hand , @ 2A you run it on high etc , and cause far less stress on the components , less heat etc ..
And OK , you may be down a couple of hundred Lumen from a cold start , but after 60 seconds the light pulling 3A+ has sagged to the same output as the lower current light , and after 5 minutes the lower current light might be doing a hundred or two lumens more ...
I said it on another forum , its not how high the engine revs , its how much power it puts out ...
Unless your down to 1A or something , I would not stress about not pulling 3A ...
Around 2A , is the sweet spot , good output , little stress , heat , good run time , well , its up to the individual , people want what they want , cant get past that ..
[ All dependent on those nasty variables ]
old4570,
I have never taken a tail cap reading until Komichi asked what it was, I always just charge the batteries up and go blaze some trees and compare how bright they are. I was just a little worried when I saw a picture of a KE-5 and it looked like it was a lazer beam of a thrower. I really appreciate you taken your time and explaining all of this, Thank you!
The lazer beam picture ...
Yes , if you have a camera with time laps , 1 sec - 5 seconds or something , you can get this affect ..
That's what made it look so good..mmm.....I guess I need to do more homework also.