New favorite flooder with pics

(Posted this on CPF also. Got no comments there... what do you all think of this mod?)

One of these days I'll use the "real" camera and do some good pics outside during golden hour when it's not freezing out. These are quick shots.

Here's a new favorite! 1st generation KL3 with an M bin MC-E, Shiningbeam 2800ma driver, L2x body and tactical clickie.

I filed the reflector down from a retired Pelican I had here. Then I stippled it with Krylon crystal clear followed up by matte clear coat. Enlarged the original Surefire rubber ring around the reflector. Added a glow ring. The cosmetic piece around the emitter is a filed/sanded washer epoxied in place.

If you think that reflector was easy, guess again! I have no machine shop facilities and it's all done with hand tools. Took hours.

I opened the KL3 by heating it with a heat gun until the housing broke loose. (searched old CPF threads) Scrapped the original guts; had to gouge out the old driver anyway. Now, this sounds half-assed but I stuck the new driver in with hot glue to get it secure and keep it from shifting; then squeezed thermal compound around it-not gonna be open to the elements anyway. Glued it off center so that at least one edge makes contact with the head circumference so there's some kind of thermal relief into the head assisted by the compound.

I stripped out the original soldering pads for the LED and Arctic Alumina'ed the MC-E star in. (got it from LED Supply)

It's not a professional job by any means but I think she turned out pretty good! I love this thing!

I didn't measure current yet but I use an IMR 18650 and I get a huge ~100deg. flood that has a very mild, non-distracting hotspot, no artifacts at all in the very smooth flood that lights up houses a couple hundred feet away. The MC-E is my favorite emitter so far since I've modernized over the last couple of months-no bad tint issues at all-just nice white. I set the driver up for high, low and strobe.

Let me know what you all think-comments-and more KL3's!-welcome!



Front of the Death Ray. >)







Solarforce clickie also.





Semi-hack job cosmetic washer, scratches exaggerated in pic.



Too cold, and I'm too lazy to do beamshots. Enjoy!

Rich

Great job and thanks for sharing! Flashlight mods are a great way to bring the dead back to life, instead of letting them sit forgotten in a drawer somewhere. IMO, there's nothing better than an LED driven to spec when paired with a good driver, especially when turbo mode is called upon. The KL3 host looks terrific.

That's great to be able to get some more years of use out of an old light like that. That thing should give off a ton of light.

What kind of light was in the KL3 before?

Thanks for the compliments! The original was a dim luxeon low dome 1W with a horrible purple tint. Then I tried upgrading to a SSC P4 using the original driver with the Pelican reflector I'm using now. Still no good for my night vision... so I gutted everything and did what you see now.

Rich

nice, link me to the parts

ill add it to the to-do list, just with an XM-L (since i got 4x 14mm and 1x 16mm T6 lol)

Nice project!

The fact that the head is of a different color then the body looks kinda funny tough imo,
but i'm really impressed that you did it all by hand!

Apart the color mismatch the light looks sweet anway. It looks almost thait it was intentional like the powerstyle 109 something zoomie found by many retailers.