Where do I sign up? Love the looks and feel of this light. Absolutely HATE the UI.
The material only was for djozz, for anyone else here,
4. batch first drivers expexted in about 2 weeks to be build
NarsilM 12.5$
So the new 18350 tube arived
with it longer 18350 batteries fit
Here a picture with old tube and Convoy Tube and 2 Efest batteries
The protected button top Efest fits very tight with stock spring, as I cut it a bit shorter it fits without any problems
the new USB cover fits better does not get loose to easy
its not perfectly symetrical from production process
but getting it pushed in the hole was not easy some grease did the trick
removing the old one ripped of the part inside the flashlight
how can i know if my battery tube is the new or the old one
Can you measure the length of the new battery tube, thanks
the new USB cover fits better does not get loose to easy
…………
The new bit they added is too small and not fit tightly in the metal usb female.
The length of the new tube is 40.4mm .
Thats 3.4mm longer than the old one
@mrheosuper
when you press a battery in the tube, the bottom of the battery had to be below the rim of the tube. If it sticks out the tailcap can’t make contact.
thanks, mine is 40.2mm, i guess i have new one
Astrolux S42 driver designed
Running NarsilM
FET+6+1
sale topic
This is one strange flashlight ! - I wanted it as a pocket rocket, so the 18350 was the attraction for me. And then all the frustration started. - I bought unprotected Soshine 18350 and later Keeppower IMR 18350, and was pretty sure the light was defective. I could only do turbo 2- 3 times before it stopped working. zak.wilson´s Aspire INR 1300 mAh advice saved me. After 2-3 months of jumping through a lot of hoops, I finally succeeded in getting these and now the light works as expected. Banggood advised to use the Keeppower, but they do seem to know what they are talking about. The UI is also strange, now I finally realized, that you can not shut off the light from moonlight mode, it goes only into turbo. The light also taught me, that I do not like a light with as little throw as this…. How I love me favorite Thorfires VG15, VG 25 and the new giant killer TK15S, which Aliexpress is selling for at little as $ 15, what a bargain. They have the perfect balance between flood and throw, the VG15 a bit too floody maybe, so you get a thick white cloud in front of you, if there is much moisture in the air. - Wonder if you guys could make the pocket rocket work properly with other batteries than Aspire ?
As an aside note, those Aspire 18350 are not being made any longer.
What?
I thought they are only relabeled to Aspire 1100mAh ?
Both Aspire and KeepPower 18350 cells have stopped production.
You can read more about it here.
I don’t know anything about the 1100 mah cells. I don’t even use 18350, but I remembered reading about them.
Banggood has offered me the chance to help them improve the driver in this light.
So the plan is to make a replacement lower driver with a Texas Avenger layout and use Narsil.
The issue comes from the charging, it looks like if we want the charging to work, we have to put up with a 1ma drain or no indicator LED’s?
Tough choice.
That is unless someone has experience with USB charging circuits, I have never messed with them myself but if we could come up with our own circuit that would be even better.
Smart choice from Banggood. Now I might actually buy one of these.
Is it the side switch indicator led that is causing the drain? This seems higher than usual. Normally it would be about a 1/5 of that, 0.200 milliamp.
Or is it something to do with the charing circuit that causes it to be so high? I’m unclear on this. Frankly, driver design is a bit over my head so I’m probably not much help.
I can tell you that on the 2 lights I use everyday (in my sig) the lack of the Narsil “indictator” function is not an issue. Having some type of light is helpful though, as it shows when power is connected. If they have some clear switch covers then a small led light shining through should be doable at a low parasitic drain.
A note can be added to the manual that if you don’t want any drain, turn the tail cap 1/4 turn and make sure the light turns off. Simple.
I actually have no idea where the drain is coming from since I broke the driver when trying to remove it from the S42. So I can’t test it to figure it out.
I am just going on what Lexel reported earlier in this thread.
1ma is about right for an active MCU though, so it kind of figured that would be right.
At this point the simplest option is to leave the charging circuit alone and just deal with the 1ma drain, still a massive improvement to get Narsil and a good LED driver.
I do not have the S42 but would consider it with upgrades specified.
For charging boards I recently finished a light using one. I get 0.350mA drain with one green indicator LED in the SW button. There is also a red for charge indicator.
And forget the Micro USB plug too, I want to see a Waterproof magnetic connector like I have integrated into my Lil’ light.
The ME4056 Nanjing Micro One Electronics Inc. Charge controller chip is on the little board I used. It shuts off to a Low current state state.
I do not understand most of the technical electronics stuff but here is a link to a post I made on the boards I bought. Datasheets are linked too.
ME4056 Tiny charge board similar to TP4056
Link to the Clone M3 build specs in post #11
Interesting, it is simple enough to use, the question is how reliable is it? I suppose it won’t be worse then the existing charge controller on the S42.
I wish that TI or a more mainstream manufacture had a chip like this, I would trust it a lot more. I could not find anything when search though. Course I am swamped with the GT GB right now.
Can’t speak for reliability but it does have 10+ charges on it. I didn’t thermally sink the chip in the light at all. It does not get hot while charging, mildly warm.
My Clone M3 original charge circuit died on the first use.
Charge chip is made by the same Co that makes the supposedly better 7135 with the claw marking. The TopPower charge chip TP4056 is cloned to death. At least these would be original manufacturer. Minimal parts needed with it as the tiny design shows.
It looks like it has a 1% tolerance, so it could charge up to a max of 2.42v, a bit high for my liking but not totally unacceptable. About what most cheap chargers out there do and getting a better chip would add a lot of cost.
If anyone knows of a better chip like this, please let me know. Otherwise I will look into this chip a bit deeper and see if I can just remake the charging circuit from scratch. It says the chip itself has a very low parasitic drain.