10440 for ITP A3 Eos

After seeing how much of a difference a 14500 can make over an AA in terms of output, I would like to try a 10440 for my ITP A3 Eos. Its the XP-E version. Has anyone found a protected 10440 that will fit? If not, what would be an inexpensive decent quality unprotected 10440 to run. I would like to buy a pair.

Forget protected ones. Maybe some will work but you force too much the head.... bad for the threads and the battery.

I use UNprotected from almost 2 years ago and no problems. Of course, not the same 10440 since 2 years ago. More like 3...

Forgot to mention, I have been using these:

http://www.dealextreme.com/p/ultra-fire-10440-3-6v-500mah-2pack-974?r=43033281

Avoid discharging them below 3,6v

Forgot to mention 2: Avoid usage on High mode for more than 1-2 minutes without cooling. Max runtime on high with 10440 is about 10-12 minutes until 3,6volt

What kind of runtime do you get on medium?

How much brighter is the light on high with a 10440 than an AAA? Wondering if its worth the trouble for such a low run time.

HIGH MODE: With 1xalkaline/NiMh it produces about 80 lumens during 1 hour. With 1x10440 it produces about 225 lumens but downs fast to about 160-180 (about 10 minutes runtime)

MED MODE: with 1xalkaline/nimh it produces about 22 lumens during many many hours. With 1x10440 produces about 40-80 lumens during about 1 hour

There is a viable solution to using Protected 10440's, which i had suggested in the iTP A3 review thread (the German trick with the sealing washer) but i have yet to prove that it actually works well with *my* ordered cells. If it does, then i will post my findings in the iTP A3 review thread.

What happens after 10-12 minutes? .. Can you really see that the light gets dimmer by then?

I dont have a multimeter or hobby charger .. you own the Imax B6, so for you it's easy to track the voltage

Once i have the protected cells it will be much easier (and safer) to clock the runtimes

When you allow to go down from 3,6 to 2,75... mixed opinions.

Some people say that when a battery is at 3,6v is fully discharged.

Some people say that when a battery is at 2,75v is fully discharged.

I can not take a conclusion, but, for safety, I NEVER allow any Li-ion batt to have less than 3,6 volt

ABOUT the itp and 10-12 minutes. No, you will barely see any drop in output unless the battery voltage is extremely low (less than 2,75 volt)

When you go below 3.6v, you are decreasing the overall life of the cell.

Panasonic states the cut-off and full charge for NCR18650A and NCR18650 to be 2.5v and respectively 4.2v That is how the cell was built to be.

Sanyo states for the UR18650F/FM 2.75v and 4.2v

A battery at 3.6v is never fully discharged unless the manufacturer says so.

For example the capacity is stated from 4.2 to 2.75v so if a cell is discharged only to 3.6v then you only get 1200mAh our of the respective cell.

Yes there is a very noticeable difference in brightness when you use 10440's in that light. That sucker is BRIGHT on 10440's.

i use some cheap, unprotected blue ones I got on Ebay...and the light gets hot quickly, I don't use them on high for more than a minute or so.

I have bought IMR 10440:s from Bestinone that I´m using in my ITP A3 and in my two Maratac AAA:s, works like a charm.

They are just sooo much more fun with 10440:s than with regular AAA! Crazybright the size of a pinkyfinger!

I first bought protected 10440:s a year ago or so, but had to remove the pcb:s to make it work.

please read the section of my Tank E09 review where my iTP A3 is depicted with a copper extension. no more need to remove PCB's ;)

Ive been playing with the 10440 , and it really can have very little capacity .. They seem to average 250-280mAh [ the good ones ]

The one I have been cycling , discharged to 200mAh capacity the first time .

So ? Run time ? oh dear oh dear , I have two Maratac AAA lights , one has a Alkaline in it the other a 10440 ...

The 10440 really pumps , especially on high , but I dont run it on high for more than 10 - 15 seconds , if I need a light for more than 10 seconds , I will reach for the one with the Alkaline , as it puts out plenty of light ... or simply another light ...

The 10440 is great for showing off how much power a small light can generate , but run time ? If your going to rely on the light , find a good AAA nimh or possibly Lithium battery .

Found this post from ages ago :

Well , I got me a 10440 the other day and decided it was time to see how the Maratac does on this voltage boost ..

On a Alkaline @ 1.6v

Med 26Lux 0.23A [ 0.37Watt ]
Lo 3Lux 0.03A [ 0.05W ]
Hi 93Lux 0.87A [ 1.4W ]

10440 @ 4.14v

Med 82Lux 0.31A [ 1.27W ]
Lo 7Lux 0.03A [ 0.123W ]
Hi 270Lux [ I checked and rechecked ] 1.2A [ 4.92W ]


Holly power boosted performance Batman !!

To compare , 2 XR-E R2's did 280Lux and 260Lux , a XP-G R5 @ 329Lux and a Akoray K16 with a Q5 @ 0.82A = 169Lux [ 3.4W ]

Now I have to say the little Maratac gets warm mighty fast , but there was no way I thought it was going to suck 1.2A from the little 10440 , thats just freaky , I was expecting maybe 0.5A .

I like the Maratac just fine on a single AAA , and I have no intention of running 10440 batteries in it [ Though I did order some more ]
For some of the cheaper lights out there [ Sub $5 ] throwing in a 10440 seems to really perk them up quite a bit , but the Maratac just seem to go nuts on the 10440 , a virtual pocket rocket thats able to give much larger lights a run for there money .

It would be interesting to know how many out there run 10440 in there Maratac and the hours achieved so far .


10440 @ 3.84volts = Lo - 0.02A / 2-3Lumen , Medium - 0.19A / 45Lumen , High - 1A / 230Lumen" From my ITP

you could easily measure real life CONTINUOUS runtimes with PROTECTED 10440's and wrapping the torch in a soaking wet dishcloth to enhance the heat transfer or leave it in a glass of water. someone's got some snow? :D

Since the regulation of the iTP is §$%&! anyway the torch would be beyond the danger zone after a few minutes and brightness would drop fast too (dimming effect). selfbuilt did measure 10440's on the iTP A3.

now with the CNY i might never receive my ordered 10440's :cry:

ref: 10440's

i finally got my hands on Protected 10440's, i.e the Grey Protected Ultrafire 10440's. they are clearly over 47.00mm long and of very good built quality. good news is that i can get it easily running in my iTP A3 Titanium with the help of 2x 1.0mm thick copper sealing washers 1 of which sanded such that the cell fits through it; however as expected it's difficult to turn off the light because the Titanium head (which is naturally not-anodized anywhere!!) and the copper washers would get in contact with each other arbitrarily (because i didnt glue them to the PCB LOL) and thus cause a dodgy electrical contact.

And that contact closes the eletrical circuit and we get (continuous/intermittent) light, which we do not want when we twist off the head huh.

To remedy this situation you could buy the aluminum version of iTP A3 EOS because it seems to have anodized threads in the head yay, and gone would be the dodgy contacts! However (again), you would still have to use those aforementioned 2(!) washers because the Grey Protected 10440 UF's are over 47.00mm long. And using 2 washers on the iTP A3 (aluminum or titanium doesnt matter) is very silly because 1. the threads are short, 2. you're beyond the o-ring (water-resistant? not anymore, promised!), 3. the head is wobbly (guess why?) and tends to get lost easily. no no no. no go. So the bad news is i dont recommend using this particular cell product in the iTP A3.

You can still do it (e.g. like i do, with 2 washers) but the point is i do not recommend it, so better find some other way to use 10440's in the iTP A3.

Actually there are 2 other good ways!

way1. Find and buy Protected 10440's with a length of 46.00mm (or less) such that you need only 1 washer instead of 2. In this case use the sanded washer (and you better buy an Aluminum A3; the Stainless Steel and the Titanium versions will again produce the dodgy contact unless you glue the sanded washer either to the body or onto the (-)minus contact of the driver's PCB). Some German man reports that the Grey Protected Trustfire 10440 fulfills the 46mm-requirement. My personal evaluation: Since i own the Titanium version and prefer not to glue the washer to anywhere and dont trust the grey Trustfires, i will avoid way1 and choose way2 instead.

or, way2. Forget about the protection and buy Unprotected 10440's. Unprotected 10440's have a length of 44.0mm (as the name indicates), so you're all set. Take good care of the voltage with a multimeter or hobby charger. You dont want to overdischarge the cell because recharging overdischarged cells could..etc..

or, way3. take the ITP A3 head (aluminum or titanium doesnt matter) and screw it on a longer body. For example, i've screwed the titanium A3 head on the body of the Tank007 E09 (incl. 1 washer only) and since the E09's threads are soo looong, much of the E09's threads (plus the o-ring) do not even get "used". Interestingly, there is no dodgy contact phenomenon. While this works surprisingly well (i.e. no dodgy contacts yay) and is for sure preferable to using 2 washers, i cant recommend it either. An iTP head on a Tank body wtf?? That looks plain silly dude! And more importantly, since the head is not in contact with an o-ring, you can imagine ..etc..

Summary of this post ;), i have proven/confirmed that the trick with washers works okay in practice but is only recommendable if you have a 46mm-long Protected cell so that you're good with 1 washer only. (with 2 washers you'd lose touch with the o-ring, etc.) And in addition, this trick works best only with anodized threads, i.e. with the Aluminum version of the iTP A3. Alternatively, forget the iTP A3 and buy 2 copies of the Tank E09. The E09 supports Protected 10440's much better than the A3!!

Don't go below 3.6V when measuring the battery voltage at rest. 2.75V is the battery under load. There is a lot of sag.

ahh i see. i know that you mean. it's the same with discharging cells in the C9000. An cell with 0.90V under load equals a 1.21V offline.

So it's essential to own a multimeter!

Thanks for the clarification :)