Astrolux S43 - New model (On Sale)

I just gently sanded the head end of the 18350 battery tube to remove the traces of anodizing that I found there. Now my light works great, but only when the end cap or head are tightened just right. If either are tightened too much, the light works,but doesn’t ramp down to low. Instead, it ramps all the down to no output and turns off. From off, it won’t then go into instant moon or turbo. What is strange is that although I can get the light to work perfectly with one of my KeepPower 18350 cells, I can’t get it to work right with another identical cell,no matter how the head and tail cap are tightened. (Both cells are flat tops and unprotected.) So far now, until I can buy another brand of cell to try that might not be so finicky, I will just leave in place the one cell that works and take advantage of the internal charging ability of this light to recharge it.

After filing away the anodizing, the light worked better but would flicker if the head and tail cap weren’t tightened just right. I had to untighten one or the other for the flashlight to work correctly. If the head or tail were a bit too snug, the light misbehaved

Taking your suggestion about my batteries perhaps being too long, I then probably did a No-No, but it worked. I gave the negative end of the battery a light hit with a hammer and the flat end of small bolt, in order create a slight dent in that end of the cell. Now, the S43S with that effectively shortened 18350 cell works perfectly, even with the head and tail fully tightened. I didn’t damage the wrapper on the cell. So,I am hoping it is safe to use with the dented negative terminal.
What do you think?

Perhaps,without wanting to shorten the 18350 tube, I did, when I unintentionaly removed more than anodizing on end of the tube. Therefore, this flat unprotected cell may have been the right length to begin with, had the tube not been shortened. (I guess I won’t know unless I can get another tube.)

Hmmm, it’s always risky denting a battery. It might have been better to take some diagonal cutters and trim one of the springs a bit shorter.

If you have the S43, then you have single springs on both ends. When the springs are fully compressed you get “coil bind” and it becomes solid. Clipping one or two coils and bending the end so it doesn’t scratch should give you an extra millimeter or two.

I’m surprised your running into this problem with unprotected flat tops. I guess some brands 18350 are noticable longer than others.

I really think the cells would have been fine if I had a clean battery tube to begin with. The demension specs on my cells are about the same as any other unprotected cell that I checked. I probably just shortened the tube when I filed that anodizing away.

I am glad to hear that denting a cell’s cathode won’t harm it.
I appreciate all of your help. How does a long cell making the spring solid make the light not work right? Isn’t the cellstill making contact? (Forgive the newbie question.)

BTW,the S43S does not have a spring on the head end. It has a solid contact. Apparently, this was a change from the S41 and S42 design in order lessen resistance and improve current flow. Perhaps, a relatively long battery puts too much pressure on the pcb board, particularly when the tail spring is compressed solid.
As an aside, I am not sure if clipping the tail cap spring would have been a good idea for this light. I do also have a 18650 tube with which I might need to use that same tailcap, in which case it might not work right with that shorter spring.

With a battery tube that has anodized threads, like this one, the head and the tail have to be screwed down all the way.

If the spring coil binds because the battery is too long, or maybe there is solder preventing the spring from compressing normally, then you can’t fully screw the head and tail on.

If you want to think of electricity flowing from negative to positive, the negative side of the battery flows electrons to the spring, to the pcb in the tail cap, to the battery tube end, to the other end of the battery tube and touches the outer ring of the driver.

If you want to think of electricity flowing from positive to negative, after the electrons go through the led and driver they go to the driver outer ring and then to the battery negative end the same way I described above, just in reverse.

If none of the threads were anodized you would not have any issues with battery length, but then you wouldn’t be able to easily lock out the light.

So there are trade offs to each design.

Do you have the S43S? I thought you had the S43 since this thread is about that model.

The S43 had single springs like the S41 and S42, but they changed it for the copper head version.

If I had your issue with the S43S, I might just remove the smaller inner spring. This will let the bigger, outer spring compress a bit more, but maybe it won’t pull as many amps. I wouldn’t worry too much about that, though. This requires a bit more work and a soldering iron.

There IS discussion in this thread earlier about both the S43 and S43S, even though it began with the S43. I didnt realize they were different except for the copper in the S43S.

Anyway, my light now works great with the dented cell and the fixed, shorter than normal, 18350 tube. In fact, I like this light so much, I just ordered a second one with the same Nichia 219C emitters. You can’t beat the price of $29 Bangood has going now on the S43S.

Why a second you might ask? By having two lights, I can have two ready to go, one with the short tube for EDC, easier to carry use, and the other, with a 18650 tube for when more extended capacity is necessary. I will replace the 18350 tube I just fixed and accidentally shorted with the tube that comes with new light. Hopefully, the new tube will not have issues and allow me to use undented 18350 cells. We will see.

Jason, I have both the S43 and the S43S, both have a solid contact in the head and dual springs in the tail - see below

Why do my undented cells only work correctly when I find the sweet spot for tightening. Only if I tighten fully the light misbehaves. If I back off from fully tight, I can get it sometimes to work correctly.

Therefore, I am not following you when you say that the head and tail cap can’t be tighted down all the way. That might be true if the cell was way too long. But my cell can’t be way too long if just a small dent fixes things. Furthermore, as I just said, because it will work sometimes with an undented cell when head and tail are NOT tight.

So could my undented cell, sandwiched between the solid head contact and fully compressed spring in the tail, be placing undue pressure on the boards controlling the light when head and tail are fully tight? Otherwise, how would you explain that loosening the head or tail might get it to work correctly?

Neat, it looks like they changed production at some point.

That is bizarre and doesn’t really make sense. Maybe someone has a theory?

question-i want to change the nichias with quad xpl neutral…anyone tried it already? where in Europe we can buy in this size quad mcpbs with leds? ME is too far and too expensive,thanks.

You can swap the LED’s on the mcpcb and it will work just fine.

If you want to order an mcpcb with the LED’s already installed that could be a problem. The mcpcb is custom as far as I know.

okok…i would do it…but i check the fasttech……where they are available.is this size ok?will it fit on the star and under the optic?

https://www.fasttech.com/products/1609/10009336/3594907-cree-xp-l-hi-v2-1a-1000lm-6500-7000k-led-emitter

That would be VERY hard to make work in this light. The stock mcpcb is all one piece with 4 LED’s mounted on it.

It would be far simpler to just reflow new LED’s onto it.

okok….iam looking for them on fasttech…dont see them?
just leds…

Yeah, I don’t think anyone sells the complete mcpcb as it is custom only for the S43.

yes…but solo leds without board…nw

Oh, you can try http://www.kaidomain.com/

study study.but not succesfull…how to got simply to the menu and get modes instead ramping please?
what do you recommend? turbo timer or turbo til death…?