Q8 modding

We discussed this wear&tear on the ground ring before, when TF first introduced us to the nightmare of removing the brass retaining ring for the driver. It's barely hitting the outer edge.

I see now what you guys are talking about with the screws pulling the driver up, resulting in poor contact -- this is why I drilled out the screw holes and am using low profile button head screws now. Believe I posted pics of this earlier. The wear is still an issue - we asked TF to use a thicker layer trace there, but doesn't look like they did. Dunno bout the follow-up on this, or if it was dropped. Think DEL, Miller, or djozz could recall better than I can.

What I would like is spare driver boards, so I can update my old SRK clones. Pretty please.

Only on BLF, I may have to ship my 2, when they get here, to Texas as some of this is getting over my skill level but certainly is really interesting. Meteor mod is an amazing idea as are all of the others as well.

Who needs a tail PCB at-all ? Just whack in a copper disc with springs soldered straight onto it.

But the tube and head probably have no continuity, the threads are anodised etc. Easy to test for, can you lock out the torch by loosening the head ?

I hear ya T18, that triple triple/quad insert is appealing enough that I might just have to put my 4-jaw chuck on the lathe and learn how to do offset bore. Been meaning to do that anyway, but always seems to be something in the way… (pain, mostly)

That’s the sort of thing I use, but my cunning trick is to wedge a suitable metal rod between the jaws, which I pull towards the handle to lock the jaws open whilst I twist. Difficult to explain, but dead easy once you grasp the idea. First two fingers pull the bar towards the handles, rest of hand twists.

I’ve been saying the same for some time, but it doesn’t seem to have sunk in either.

I don’t think so, they are anodised ?

If this was military kit I’d probably specify a thick electroless nickel plate on the driver ground ring. But it isn’t.

If the cells loaded from the tail, preferably in a carrier, it wouldn’t be a concern.

Texas, and just who I was thinking about ha ha and TA of course as well, but you Texas guys being relatively local for shipping really have this down that’s for sure and I think this meteor idea would really keep your mind off other issues for quit sometime perhaps or not since your rather a quick study IMHO.
By the way I love your lumber story, I still have that Ti X6 for you someday… ha ha, I’ve been so swamped for the last 3 years with a intestate probate mess that I haven’t been able to do much of anything that I really love, like mod lights which does help keep the mind off my own DD issues, I feel you there pal…! Hope you are improving albeit most likely slowly, I do know what your going through. Keep on

Let me try. I believe that DBC has the same concern that I do. That is a tilted driver may not make adequate electrical contact with the battery tube. A driver that is flat against the driver shelf should theoretically make maximum contact with the tube. Assuming, the shelf is parallel to the battery tube end. When you attempt to fasten two threaded objects together via a screw, you often get a gap between the two objects as the threads will line up with the screws threads and the only thing that will actually be tight is the screw head against the first object.

Are there real issues here or is it “if this is done like this we gain that so that is what I’ll do next”?
Sorry, lots of new posts, got a PM about this thread , trying to read up I see things like “corners cut” and Tom saying “oh gosh” which is not a good sign.

^

I don't think this is a real issue. It's just the driver mounting screw holes being too tight and sometimes not letting the driver sit properly. I would think most lights will work fine the way they are, but one may want to check it if they are using good cells and the light is underperforming. All that needs to be done to fix it is remove the 2 screws, open the holes just a smidgen, then rescrew the driver down flat.

EDIT: This post is the same thing.

EDIT2: OTH, it would be a good idea to make the manufacturer aware of the issue. If they have the 2000 drivers loose, it will just take a few seconds per driver to ream out the holes to a slightly larger diameter.

Yes Thorfire is planning on using better screws.

^

That might fix it if the screws have a narrower diameter across the threads.

Do you recall the discussions we had way back about the wear&tear on the driver ground ring from the battery tube? Think someone said it's not much of an issue, but we wanted ThorFire to make than ground ring a thicker trace than standard. The Q8's I'm testing a lot on are showing wear, but who knows - might take 1,000's on loosens/tightens to fail - I really don't know, but I recall we discussed this in depth, after TF got rid of the brass retaining ring from the first prototype.

I don’t think that Thorfire tickened the ground trace for us.

But this is only an issue once it is an issue, as you say it may take many years to wear through the ground ring or it may be sooner than that.

At least for folks who can use a solder iron a fix is easy once the ground ring is worn away: some solder blobs or soldering a copper wire around the edge will buy you another hundred years.

I just realized that my plan to swap out the existing 2 green LEDs with pink and blue may not work with the purchase I made. I measured the LED voltage and it’s currently at 2.17v when the batteries are full. It looks like the pink can be swapped in since it works between 2-2.6v but the blue requires 3.1-3.3v to function. Any ideas?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Free-Shipping-100pcs-SMD-SMT-Super-Bright-Surface-Mount-0603-1608-Light-Emitting-Diode-LED-Diode/32368361712.html
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/5-colors-x20pcs-100pcs-SMD-0603-led-Super-Bright-Red-Green-Blue-Yellow-White-Water-Clear/32383494488.html

The Miller, I think there is only one significant issue coming up here, and some other discussions about how to improve a few things:

1) The holes in the driver for the screws are too small, so the M3 screws, that were a surprise to see in production, (last prototype had M2.5 screws) have to bite into the driver PCB to be fitted, cutting their own threads.

This means that there is a chance the driver won’t be clamped solidly against the head (unless the screws were cranked down hard enough to strip the “self tapped” threads that they had cut into the driver PCB).

Knock-on from this is that the battery tube may not give a good contact all around the driver ground ring. We are seeing witness marks on the ring indicating only partial contact.

That’s why some of us are drilling out the holes slightly larger, to clear the M3 screw threads completely, i.e. at least a 3mm drill. Even then, I think some are seeing only partial witness marks, suggesting incomplete contact, which may, or may not, become an issue, TBD.

Personally I don’t think it is anything to worry about.

My own suspicion is that the drivers might have been drilled for M2.5 screws, and whoever changed that to M3 forgot to update the drilling drawing for the driver.

So if Thorfire are going to fit improved screws (M3 thin panheads ?), please could they also re-drill the driver boards to the proper clearance.

Given that they have 1500 near-completed torches held waiting for new switch LED boards, I assume that the drivers are as-is, the heads are already tapped for M3 screws, so please could they use the waiting time to re-drill the driver PCBs, so when the better screws are fitted, everything is just-so.

It might also be that the bare end of the battery tube is not cut precisely square. If so, this would be a trickier thing to fix.

2) Then we have a secondary concern, that the thin plating on the driver ground ring (was asked to be a heavier pour, 3oz ?), combined with a rough finish to the end of the tube, may lead to a wear problem, long term ?

Best we can suggest for now is to smooth the end of the tube, maybe apply some conductive lube, and file off any nicks and gouges, to minimise any such wear.

3) Then we are having a debate about whether there is a second current path from the battery tube to the metal of the head, and if so, whether there could be further improvement by making sure this current path gets through to the reverse side of the driver PCB. It’s a pretty academic debate at the moment (but I think that Flashy Mike and I have it correct :wink: )

But it is easy for me to pontificate, since I am on the backorder list, so frankly could be talking out of my ar**e

That’s my summary, I’m sure others will chip in where I have got this wrong. I haven’t been following closely today since I have been travelling all day (5 hours driving, 7 hours on 3 trains (thank you Virgin Trains, your WiFi is excellent), then a taxi, and I’ve only just got home and am knackered.

Edit:

I forgot a fourth one: there is a lot of room for improvement at the tail end. Large gains are being reported with mods, bypasses etc, but it also seems that the threads in the battery tube for the screws holding the tail PCB have got anodising in them, and sandblast residue. This is not good for this critical current path. If the threads were masked during anodisation, or tapped post-anodise, that would be a good thing. Meanwhile some are running a tap through them to remove the anodise, and cleaning out trapped sandblast residue.