GFS16 - Battery Indicator Tailcap Light & 1mR FET Tailswitch! (Rev B)

Look'n good all! Totally sort of unrelated, I have to get some ice blue AUX LED's. Got every color but that. Anyone have ideas? I think my previous LED buys were off of eBay.

I built and added the led board to the GSF16 with the SC. It works great.
One very cool feature with the SC and the led board is that when you first twist the tail back on the leds don’t light up, then at about 30 seconds the red leds light up, then at another 30 seconds the blue leds light up and the switch will work. When first screwed together the leds are indicating the SC charge. :smiley:

I don’t think they have ice blue leds but I just use blue and a high value resistor (120k to 200k). Looks more ice blue when not driven hard.
https://www.fasttech.com/search?0805%20leds
Takes a blue moon to get here but order different sizes and several colors and you’ll be stocked up when they arrive. :+1:

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I changed the resistor values on the led board today. I changed R3 to 536k and the low voltage threshold activated at 3.14v.
I changed R5 to 390K for a cut off at 2.83v, I’m ordering a few more values to play around with. Ideally I’m thinking 3.2v on the low and 2.75v on the cut off.
Most all li-ions now a days can run down to 2.7v under load with no problems, so I’m reducing the values to more resemble the cells recommended cut off voltage.
A cell under a heavy load with a cut off of 3v would still have some usable capacity left. In HKJ’s test data it’s usually given down to 2.8v.

This extra wouldn’t make much difference if a light was running in just turbo mode but if the low threshold voltage was reached, the leds turn to red then changing to a lower mode might give you enough usable light to get you out of a pickle before the cut off voltage was reached and your left in the dark. At least using this in combination with the GXB172 I would think is better, since the driver draws quite a bit of current in high or turbo.

I also changed the charging resistor on the fet switch board to 130 ohms (R1) and didn’t seem to make much difference in charging time. I’m wondering if my bleedback resistor isn’t a little to high. I’ll keep playing around with value’s until I find the happy medium.

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Update: Almost forgot, I switched all the led current limiting resistors out to 165k. This seems about right on the blue led with a clear switch boot if your one of those people like me that stands the light up on the bed side table at bed time encase of a emergency. I don’t like it lighting up the whole room blue while I’m trying to sleep, the misses doesn’t either :person_facepalming: . I prefer a little dimmer than what the 165k is producing. Since the red leds is a “your about to be in the dark warning” I’m thinking around 50k bright in day or night and the low voltage blue leds around 180 to 200K, blue just barely noticeable in the daylight but easily seen in the dark.

I got plenty of blues, pinks, reds, oranges, greens. I really thought ice blue was a separate LED - Lexel must know?

I have seen them around in ice blue but I don’t own one to know what color that is exactly. I just assumed it was like a white blue, dim or light blue.

You already know what the trit color ice blue is, I kind of figured it was like that. ENEDED - #22 by Tom_E

Yea, I know the trits are unique in ice blue, figured the SMD LED's would be too, but I really dunno -haven't done serious searching yet.

I was looking around at a few places for ice blue and decided to switch my search strategy, came up with this.
https://www.google.com/search?q=0805+ice+blue+led&tbm=isch&source=hp&sa=X&ved
I might order a few off ebay, look cool. Baby blue. :smiley:

I order a lot of different led including this aqua blue one from aliexpress. They have 0805and 0603 size:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/100PCS-0805-Ice-Blue-2012-Light-Blue-Clear-Ultra-Bright-SMD-LED-Indication-2-0-1/32715527561.html

Ordered those ice blues - for $2.44 shipped, worth it for that price. This is the store, US:

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/1758868?spm=a2g1y.12024536.pcShopHead_11169370.0

Only just came across this switch, its amazing work!!

Will it take much for a board like this to be implemented as an electronic switch with a small momentary switch instead of a clicky? Im imagining that it needs a bit more electronics to store the switch state.

Mechanically it also wont be the same either… but this thought comes about for a replacement switch for a V10R or other DIY projects.

Forgive my ignorance but where do the bleeder resistors go on the boards? I’m similarly interested in building this switch for use with an Mtnelectronics H17F. Are they soldered in addition to the cited components or in place of some them?

The bleed resistor goes anywhere you can get battery positive to battery ground (outside driver ring) on the driver. Its a additional component that needs to be added in some drivers. Some work without a bleed resistor.
Here’s a few pics.

Hi all,

I’m having a bit of trouble ordering the boards from OSH Park. Im using the tailcap switch and LED board in an S2+ Triple but I cant see how I change the board thickness from 0.8mm to 1.6mm?
Is this necesary when using this system in an S2+ host?

During the checkout process you select the “service” you want: 1.6mm standard 1oz, 0.8mm 2oz, after dark, medium run, or rush order. Just pick the standard 1.6mm 1oz service.

Awesome, thanks gchart. Cant wait to make a start on this!

Would anyone be able to suggest an alternative Super Barrier rectifier to the one suggested (SBRT05U20S3)?
I am having trouble tracking on down on digikey.

Thanks

I don’t think the particular diode is critical as long as it’s the SOD-323 footprint. The BAT54 is pretty common and cheap.

Anyway, that reminds me.

I still have a lot of these, and since I’m getting some new soldering equipment pretty soon, I could make some very low resistance switches :slight_smile:

I do have the issue of the components being a bit problematic to source however.

@gchart, do you know where to get supercaps? I can find all other components still available obviously, but not the supercap.

I found it!

That means I can still build it :slight_smile:

It’s also cheaper than when I looked last time, which is surprising.