Lume1-FW3X: Constant Current Buck-Boost & FET Driver with Anduril1/2 + RGB Aux

Awesome! I guess this means I need to get off my butt and get the code merged.

I’ve mostly been trying to finish up Anduril 2 lately, but after that I’m planning to merge the Lume1 branch and the AVR 1-series branch.

It’s unfortunate about the swapped flashing pads. I should probably get myself another flashing adapter so I won’t have to constantly rewire things. Perhaps it’s time to put in an order with Hank…

My mystery ebay 30 AWG stranded PTFE arrived. OD is ~0.77mm, not the skinniest ever but smaller than silicone and assuming it’s legit should withstand high temp. Will investigate more as my drivers get closer.

In the detailed information, the following is noted:

“Max Turbo is done with a DD-FET, but the current path does go through the sense resistor, adding 20mR in the path. This reduces slightly the absolute max brightness. It’s possible to ‘fix’ this with an additional FET to bypass the resistor, but I’m not sure if it’s really worth the effort. This however can be beneficial for some kinds of lower V_fwd LEDs (marginally).”

So in a sense, that makes this driver even better for 219B’s, and I would think it should be fine for a single XP-L.

A related note, the FET is not PWM’d. If I understood right, the other components interact with it, and the resulting rise time of the FET is somewhere in the ballpark of a full millisecond. So the firmware works normally up to max regulated current, and then the FET 100% on / full turbo only.

I’m a little curious what the effect of trying to PWM it at high frequency would be - might it smooth the output at an intermediate value with ripple at the PWM frequency, or would it risk burning something out?

i have some 30 AWG solid wire-wrap silver-plated wire with Kynar insulation, measures 0.5mm OD, wire diam is 0.25mm. 50 in a pack, 5” long with 1” on each end already stripped off. i doubt this wire is being used to carry any significant current, it could be used as a fuse in a high current circuit.

I’m sure it’s a non issue but I’m pretty sure mcpcb can be higher than 100c but the wire (insulation) will likely never have good enough contact to cause issues. I only had down to 28awg silicone so just decided to get PTFE

Could this be used with very low vF LEDs, like red for example?

My drivers are in the country with an eta of Monday Aussie time. :smiley:
Now to choose the lights and emitters to go with them!

Mine were clearing on Wed, apparently - good old Australia Post being ded. Still in customs last I looked.

Mine is still UNFULFILLED...

I wanted a set but the $8 shipping killed it for me sadly. For $29.90 I can almost buy another whole FW3a with free shipping which makes it unjustifiable.

My Lume1 driver with aux LED board just arrived! :heart_eyes:

I’ll have to try installing it this weekend.

Also got a few Oslon White 2 boost LEDs. I plan to try them in my Sofirn S11.

Is there a newer datasheet?
https://cdn.shopifycdn.net/s/files/1/0031/0155/6806/files/LUME1-FW3X_Datasheet\_-\_PRELIMINARY.pdf

I installed one of the drivers I received yesterday. It is definitely not the easiest but doable.

1) start by filing down the pcb cut marks.
2) My FW3A had a flat lip on one side of the PCB, but Lume1 did not. If you don’t file it down, the driver does not sit properly. The circuit still works fine, but you will have a 1mm gap once you screw on the tube. I filed it down to the inner ring on the pcb, and then it fit just fine.
3) I used 0.3mm (28awg) enameled wire for RGB wire, marked them ahead with sharpie dots to distinguish later.
4) You absolutely have to have the original mcpcb. I had a noctigon mcpcb with sliced dogfarts, and did not have the right wire routing for secondary PCB to sit properly. So I switched over to original FW3A mcpcb with SW45K flowed.
5) It is a major PITA to make sure that the secondary LED pcb sits properly. It does not need to be flush with the mcpbc (I was not able to), but it needs to be as close as possible. In then end I had about a mm of gap and the optic sat nicely.
6) By the time I got to wiring the secondary LEDs, the sharpie dots were already cleaned out. However, it is ok if that happens - put together the battery tube, and test out the primary LED. Once you verify it works, turn it off and then start probing the secondary led wires with a voltmeter, you will find that one pair has some voltage between them on the order of volts. Between those, the (-) polarity is K on the secondary PCB, and the remaining three wires are RGB. Now, the modes are cyclic, so I honestly think it is not important how you wire between RGB wires, all permutations are valid, they just change the blinking order. I wired them randomly, and the flashlight seems to be working quite nicely so far.

In the end, I have a FW3A with a buck boost driver supplemented with a FET for DD and SW45K. It is the almost the same size as my SW45K SC64C LE (not McBob version, my DIY version, but definitely inspired by him) and a similar efficiency for most lo-mid modes, but with a much more powerful hi-mode. Honestly, this is quite the holy grail for me, thanks lone ocean.

Next, I’ll switch over my FW3C to Lume1 and the sliced dogfarts which are another favorite of mine for when I prefer purer white of sliced LH351D over rosy 219B.

We already went through the pcb variations with Lexel’s boards, even the OEM ones have like 3 versions. If you have to you can scratch off a new pos or neg pad if you really want to.

Thanks for the report. It sounds like the main challenge is fitting the RGB board into a tight space?

Do you think a Noctigon board can be filed or drilled to make room for the RGB wires?

To be honest, probably it can fit, I initially thought that the secondary led needed to be flush with mcpcb so I did the swap.

I ended up with a 1mm gap between them, probably that has enough clearance to route the cables underneath, though you would have to make sure that the solder bridged pcb connections on the mcpcb are not too tall, and that the primary led wires are somewhat flattened.

You know, I always try to salvage the mcpcbs if I lift off one of the pads. I was never successful, maybe I was unlucky. Is there a trick to it? I usually use a sharp blade to drag/scratch the coating

I’ll add a bunch of commentary and tips but here’s album from my build today:

For those of you that have installed this in your lights. Are your green aux leds much brighter than the red and blue leds? I just installed this driver rgb board in my light. The mixed, red-green and blue-green, colors look solid green instead of yellow and teal like my other lights.

The resistor on the green channel has a value of 100ohm. Does anyone know what the correct value should be? I checked some of my other lights and they have 120ohm resistors for the green channel.

I would like to confirm that the triple 219B can be used with Lume1 with the existing/installed firmware. The stock driver (the one with 7135’s) needs the different version of the firmware (less current) for the triple 219B.

219B SW45K with Lume1 is the holy grail for me as well. E21 would be good, too. It should result in the smaller hot spot/less flood.