This is a good idea. If we can get next gen firmware running on the latest MCU’s (the 1617 looks the most promising but not sure if they are able to be programmed yet) then we can have a few universal hardware and firmware options that should be able to cover almost everything.

The 15A TA buck driver that nobody has built or tested yet.

4×18650 series boost driver to power a XHP70.2 at 6000+ lumens with configurable brightness and number of modes from 1 to 7, ramp up, down, easy access to turbo and firefly, hidden SOS and blinkies, e-switch compatible with a find me led under the rubber button

OK
A driver with:
6V input (2S)
Output two independent 10A channels (controlled by own switch)
Fan connector that recieves power based on either or both output cmchannels (so when the two are at max, fan runs at max)

AlexGT wrote:

4×18650 series boost driver to power a XHP70.2 at 6000+ lumens with configurable brightness and number of modes from 1 to 7, ramp up, down, easy access to turbo and firefly, hidden SOS and blinkies, e-switch compatible with a find me led under the rubber button

4s boost driver for an xhp70? Are you thinking of a buck driver? Or a 4P boost driver maybe?

Firmware sounds like you just want it to work with Narsil lol.

Ideally I would love a buck-boost driver with a 2.5V to 24V input, 2.5V to 36V output at 100W+.

Realistically I’d like to see a boost driver based on the MP3431 IC, and a buck driver based on the MPQ8632-20 IC.

For MCU it would be cool to see something more modern like an MSP430 or even an ARM Cortex M0+, but at the very least the Tiny1617.

Multiple output channels for multi-color lights would be nice.

1. Buck-boost-FET, 1s/2s in 1s/2s out. On fresh battery, it’s a buck. On less fresh buck-boost, at the end boost. For max power, FET. Near optimal efficiency and optimal peak output.

2. High power, very efficient 3V in 6V/12V out boost. Actually moderately-high power (like GXB17) would be superb too if it got first-class firmware.

Buck/boost driver for high Vf UV LEDs
Input 1S
Output 3.8-4.4V max. current 1500mA
At low current Vf can be down to 3.2V

If possible double sided 17mm with 5-6mm spring pad

For e-switch lights, firmware will probably be relatively simple. I’ve been making a UI toolkit which abstracts out the hardware details, so pretty much any UI should be able to run on pretty much any hardware. When there’s new hardware, patch the toolkit to add support, and then every compatible UI should work with little or no changes.

Or that’s the idea, at least. So far I’ve only actually tried it on the D4 and Q8 drivers.

A 17mm 3.7v input 6-12v output boost driver to put xhp series leds in a S2+ or C8.

Edit: or mtg2 leds

Schoki wrote:

Is there a test for the XHP70.2? How many amps do you need for 6000 lumens?

It should be roughly the same as the xhp70 tests with a bit lower Vf.

At 6V it should need around 10A to reach 6000 lumens. Pretty normal for an XHP70 in a flashlight. Some are driving the .2 versions to almost 20A.

As a general rule we like to drive each die of an LED to 5A and as high as 10A. Less then this is not in great demand on BLF but there are cases where people would want this.

Schoki wrote:

The Miller wrote:

Output two independent 10A channels (controlled by own switch)

Which diameter?

There are a few that I want.

1. 1S Buck-Boost Driver for 2.8-4V LEDs which does up to 5A, but it configurable down to 3A. Controlled by eswitch with many low modes (like Zebralight), overtemp and overdischarge protection. Maybe also a version for clicky switches.

2. Buck driver with 7-8A for 3-4V LEDs and 2S-3s input. Should have all the usual features.

3. 30-50A Buck driver for 3-4V LEDs with flashlight compatible form (round, diameter not more than 50mm). Battery input should be 3-4S (with very low internal resistance). Must have overheating protection for driver and also LED. Must also have additional, small buck circuit for much lower modes. I know this one is rather difficult, but as long as it stays under 100$ and is actually useable it would be great. It would be used with Luminus CBT-140 and CFT-90 LEDs.

4. Boost Driver for 6V or 12V (preferably 6V) with 30W output, lots of low modes, eswitch, and all the other usual features.

A twin button e-switch driver with miniscule queissant current draw, as I’m tired of button pushing!

Edit for spelling correction(s)

Agreed, it would be foolish to input 4S and output 1S at 50A. There is no single LED that can handle that so you are better off running multiple LED’s in series. It makes things much simpler and more efficient.

Remember, voltage is easy, you pay no penalty for voltage other then needing to make sure your components can handle it (very easy up to around 30V).

On the other hand you pay BIG penalties for current. A 50A buck driver would be very difficult, I know as I am working on a driver that needs 30A and we ended up needing to split it into 2 separate 15A drivers to get the features we wanted.

I need a 17mm boost driver to run a Nichia 144A at around 3 Amperes from 1 cell.
It would be nice to have a boost driver like that with the option to set the current, like from 3 to 6 Amperes.
Optional e-switch would be nice too.

I haven’t yet seen ‘synchronous’ buck or boost drivers either.
Those are more efficient (iirc)

Jerommel wrote:

I haven’t yet seen ‘synchronous’ buck or boost drivers either. Those are more efficient (iirc)

There is a boost driver floating around using this design and would fit your goals except for the firmware. It uses custom firmware instead of Narsil / Bistro like we are used to.

The firmware is one of the bigger issues. We need good workign firmware for the latest MCU generation then some good base Buck / Boost setups. After that we can combine them to fit whatever we want.

My wish is similar to Jerommel’s, but a 2S input would be nice too, so buck-boost.

Input: 1-2S
Output voltage: 144A or 3× 219B/C, so 5-10 volts
Output: three modes is enough from 100mA to 3A

Texas_Ace wrote:

Agreed, it would be foolish to input 4S and output 1S at 50A. There is no single LED that can handle that so you are better off running multiple LED’s in series. It makes things much simpler and more efficient.

Remember, voltage is easy, you pay no penalty for voltage other then needing to make sure your components can handle it (very easy up to around 30V).

On the other hand you pay BIG penalties for current. A 50A buck driver would be very difficult, I know as I am working on a driver that needs 30A and we ended up needing to split it into 2 separate 15A drivers to get the features we wanted.

The Luminus LEDs which I mentioned are rated for a max of 28A. They will probably be able to take a bit more. So 30A is the absolute minimum here to make a driver interesting in this case!
The new Luminus CFT-90 is the one that is really interesting. It is much more efficient compared to older models. It is as bright as an XHP-70, but it’s factory de-domed and the DIE is only 9mm^2, the XHP-70(.2) should be around 14mm^2 when de-domed and 28mm^2 with dome). It also probably doesn’t have the 3D-Die of the Cree LEDs and will probably have a very high luminance (so very high throw with very high lumens). There is nothing on the market that matches it.

Please tell me more about your 30A project. You can PM me if you like.

5s buck driver. I have some black+decker 5s2p 4ah packs I would like to use to drive 12v leds, but can’t find a suitable driver that will accept 20+ volt input.

John-Galt wrote:

5s buck driver. I have some black+decker 5s2p 4ah packs I would like to use to drive 12v leds, but can’t find a suitable driver that will accept 20+ volt input.

Easy! The German company pcb components offers this. There are different variants. Two for up to 3A LED current:

https://pcb-components.de/led-abwaertswandler-buck-step-down/micro-2800m...

https://pcb-components.de/led-abwaertswandler-buck-step-down/black-power...

https://pcb-components.de/led-abwaertswandler-buck-step-down/ampere-5000...

The US company TaskLED also has some: http://www.taskled.com/

The_Driver wrote:

Texas_Ace wrote:

Agreed, it would be foolish to input 4S and output 1S at 50A. There is no single LED that can handle that so you are better off running multiple LED’s in series. It makes things much simpler and more efficient.

Remember, voltage is easy, you pay no penalty for voltage other then needing to make sure your components can handle it (very easy up to around 30V).

On the other hand you pay BIG penalties for current. A 50A buck driver would be very difficult, I know as I am working on a driver that needs 30A and we ended up needing to split it into 2 separate 15A drivers to get the features we wanted.

The Luminus LEDs which I meantioned are rated for a max of 28A. They will probably be able to take a bit more. So 30A is the absolute minimum here to make a driver interesting in this case!
The new Luminus CFT-90 is the one that is really interesting. It is much more efficient compared to older models. It is as bright as an XHP-70, but it’s factory de-domed and the DIE is only 9mm^2, the XHP-70(.2) should be around 14mm^2 when de-domed and 28mm with dome). It also probably doesn’t have the 3D-Die of the Cree LEDs and will probably have a very high luminance (so very high throw with very high luminance). There is nothing on the market that matches it.

Please tell me more about your 30A project. You can PM me if you like.

quite pricy LED, but like 6000 OTF lumens from 9mm² might be possible, which would even beat a very hard driven XHP35

The_Driver wrote:

The Luminus LEDs which I meantioned are rated for a max of 28A. They will probably be able to take a bit more. So 30A is the absolute minimum here to make a driver interesting in this case!
The new Luminus CFT-90 is the one that is really interesting. It is much more efficient compared to older models. It is as bright as an XHP-70, but it’s factory de-domed and the DIE is only 9mm^2, the XHP-70(.2) should be around 14mm^2 when de-domed and 28mm with dome). It also probably doesn’t have the 3D-Die of the Cree LEDs and will probably have a very high luminance (so very high throw with very high luminance). There is nothing on the market that matches it.

Please tell me more about your 30A project. You can PM me if you like.

Interesting, never heard of the Luminus CFT-90. The last gen models were so inefficient I wrote them off. This latest version is still inefficient but it is not that far off of what we drive other LED’s to here.

Still going to be a tough job to make a buck driver for that, it will need to be quite large to fit the components needed, even a 46mm driver could not be big enough for everything depending on what components are used.

The project is kinda floating right now, not gonna say too much till I know if it is going forward or being dropped.

Basically it is a 6s6p input that needs to provide 18V at ~30A output to some LED’s.

Some math can give you an idea of what the results might be.

The_Driver wrote:

2. Buck driver with 7-8A for 3-4V LEDs and 2S-3s input. Should have all the usual features.