I have actually been considering some white LED’s but didn’t order any and I have not even built one yet. With 90+ degrees in the house lately due to the AC being busted I just haven’t seemed to get as much done as sometimes lol.
Is that tailcap blue? What gives it the blue tint?
Also what causes the pulse? That is actually not a bad idea in some cases.
I would love a slow pulsing. I’ve seen it built into some 5mm LEDs. but never in a small SMD size.
The second pic show slight blue tint because my iPhone camera is sux at white balance colour.
I used clear tail boot and the light white.
I like this idea 
I do too but to get the drain low enough to not be worse then leaving the LED’s on by themselves would take someone that knows how to program ATtiny’s way better then me. I could most likely cobble something together that would do it (pretty simple to check voltage and activate a pin based on the voltage) the issue is reducing the parasitic drain enough to not be worse then the LED’s
If possible it would be best if the tiny could sleep entirely except for the single pin activation for ~30 minutes between voltage checks. It would not need to do anything at all during this time. If it lost power (aka, you turn on the light) it would reset the cycle and update the voltage check.
During a discussion I had recently the possibility of a lighted tailcap compatible with NiMH batteries came up. I have very little experience with this sort of thing, but I did a bit of poking around. It would seem a very simple circuit using something like this might work. That converter, a suitable inductor, and a couple of other basic components would be all we need. I think there would be enough room on the bottom side of the 5.1 boards.
Would that converter work for this application or am I missing something?
It has been discussed before I think. Basically, you’d need an entire boost circuit tail-cap ‘driver’, just like you would in the head for the main LED. I don’t think it would be very efficient to drive it (considering the flashlight is supposed to be ‘off’), and the two drivers might interfere with each other.
Is there actually a need for a full driver w/ MCU etc.? The converter I linked doesn’t appear to need a separate controller.
The schematic on page one shows that converter, an inductor, 2 caps, and 2 resistors. That’s all that is required.
When you convert to watt/hours a standard eneloop actually has more capacity than an efest 14500. I just did a lighted tailcap that was pulling .25mA, and it was excessively bright. At that current I expect that cell to be good for weeks. It seems a runtime of weeks on a NiMH could be obtained at a reasonable brightness.
I’ve yet to put one of these together, but wanted to for my next triple build using a 32mm Noctigon. What about utilizing the center led mount for one of these tailcap leds which would shine up through the optics when the light isn’t turned on? I think mounting it and running wires from a bleeder would be easy, but not sure how to disable it once the light is turned on since it wouldn’t be directly linked to the tailcap.
Using central led on xp32 is my old dream. There are lots of color leds in XP size.
It will be great if smb could combine teo ideas from this thread (blinking led+powering one of leds mounted on main pcb). I think there will be no need in turning this extra led off, it wont be visible when main leds are running.
Finally made it, stock driver/switchboard/washer, 750 ohm bleeder and 1Ks on switchboard.
Still waiting for the translucent rubber boot for more fun.
Man, that’s quite bright, Be careful of your vampire draw on the little 18350
Yes, I haven’t tweak it to get my ideal brightness.
Soldering SMD into driver board took a lot of patiences because I don’t have any proper soldering iron yet :person_facepalming:
I’d say jump straight to 6.8k or higher.
I haven’t looked, what do the astrolux S2’s use for the tailcap led?
Hmm I want to say maybe 2.2k?
Well I just pulled out the oshpark boards and parts to put together some of these finally but realized I made a mistake in ordering.
It seems I ordered 6x 5.1 19mm led ring and 6x of the pryo 16mm? switch board.
I could make it work in an S2 tailcap but I wanted to use it in an S2+ to start out with.
So to make sure I don’t make another mistake, what boards should I order to be able to build both S2+ and S2 tailcaps with the ones I have now included?
Any different parts for the astrolux tailcaps? What about the C8, 501b & solarforce L2?
I’m assuming that means you ordered the BIG SWITCH version?
For the S2+ (and most of the smaller 18650 lights) You’ll want either the 16mm Rev5.1 (for three channels) or the 16mm Rev5.3 Top (for two channels).
Both should work fine with the pyro boards, you’ll just need to buzz them out to see where to solder to.
I think I will do my own version of the pyro board soon specifically updated for the LED ring and my jumper pins.
No, apparently this is the one that had been linked to in the OP before you updated it: OSH Park ~
The 5.1 you linked to says it works with 14mm boots like the astrolux, does the 5.3 as well? I think 2 channels is enough, I don’t see me using more then 2 colors at a time.
What about switch boards for the S2’s larger cavity?
I was actually gonna ask if there was a header pin version as that would be much simpler. Do you think you would get around to that anytime soon?
Although I am debating between the switch and pot under the spring. I suppose you could just turn the pot all the way one direction and it should turn the LED off thus netting the same result? The pot under the spring saves the cost of the switch which is nice.