*BLF LT1 Lantern Project) (updated Nov,17,2020)

You might want to PM the BLF Sofirn rep to see if that’s possible to do. All that was mentioned was that they’re coming soon but didn’t mention price or where they would be sold from.

Yes. It will be available again soon.

Considering previous timelines, I cant help but wonder if “Soon” means the same thing in Chinese as it does in English., I guess we will know ‘sometime’ in the future.

LOL on par with Chinese lumens ?

I have seen in the latest users photos of Aliexpress that the newest LT1 come without any pads connected. Has anything changed? Maybe now the solder it’s inside?

The newest LT1 uses 0Ω resistors instead of solder blobs, because that allows automated manufacture instead of manual soldering, which helps Sofirn’s quality control.

If you look very closely at the image, you’ll see four tiny resistors, two labelled R_AMC4 and two labelled R_AMC5. Those are the ones. There’s one of each on the WW side, and one of each on the NW side.

The solder pads were left to give people flexibility in changing the maximum brightness of their lanterns. If you desolder the resistors to reduce brightness and increase runtime, but change your mind, you can increase the brightness again by soldering the pads and save yourself messing about putting the resistors back.

Thanks for the explanation. If I understand correctly the pads 4 and 5 are connected with two resistors and the pads 6 and 7 are not. So if I want to unlock all the power I just have to solder the pads 6 and 7 like I did in the old version.

Yes, that’s right.

Many thanks :+1:

Sofirn I signed up for a group buy for two, but bought one. Will I be able to get a discount on the new version?

Don’t you think it’s too much overhead to maintain the quantity used by each signators ? Much simpler, Sofirn is giving discount codes regularly openly or through a PM . I was late to the party but i got the same price .

+1 on this. I’m holding out until a 4×21700 model is released.

Forgive me if this has been asked.

Is there a plan to have the 18650 version have power bank functionality?

My question is whether or not there anything concrete about a version 2 of any kind or is this all simply theoretical; a wishlist?

Nothing concrete at this time, but everyone is aware it is a frequently requested feature. DBSAR and Lexel have both needed (and very much deserve) some time off from projects like the lantern, so I would not count on any updates in the immediate feature.

Wow, that’s awesome!!! Can you share any details about the implementation? If not, I hope @Lexel can, I assume this is also his design.
E.g. will they support USB-C PD (quick charging, with multiple output voltage levels), or just a standard 5V/3A output?
Will the same, single type-c connector be used for power input and output (i.e. type-c dual-role-power, DRP)?
Will the charging controller (TP5100) remain the same in this revision, or will it be replaced, maybe with a fully integrated powerbank controller IC?
Can the light and the power output features be used simultaneously?

Just got 2 lights. Using both off grid 4hrs per night on medium. Voltage drops .1v each night. Should get 10-12 nights runtime. Such awesome lights. Have told friends to buy them.

Question……

1. Can a 3/4 second delay be put on start so that when clicking functions it doesnt flash light in face? During 3/4 second delay if second click is inputted it cancels out white flash.

2. Can battery meter be moved to orange button?

3. Can one warm led be replaced with red and 3rd flash during warm tint ramp function setup activates the 1 red led at 1 lumen?

That’s all that Sofirn mentioned in a group chat :frowning:

Hopefully they’ll shed more details on things soon.

1. There is a compile-time option to change the response timing while turning the light on. The driver is pretty easy to reflash with a SOIC8 clip or one of Lexel’s pogo pin adapters. So… no, that isn’t going to be implemented in the official firmware, but yes, you can probably modify your LT1 to make it behave as described.

Specifically, in the config file, change B_TIMING_ON from B_RELEASE_T (the default) to B_TIMEOUT_T. This tells it to wait until all clicks have resolved before it responds. Nobody I’m aware of uses this option though, so it hasn’t received much testing or maintenance. It may need to be updated to make sure it still works.

2. The firmware has support for indicating battery status with RGB LEDs in the button… however, the LT1 doesn’t have RGB LEDs or enough pins on the control chip to handle something like that. So it would require pretty big hardware changes.

As an alternative, it should be possible to modify the battery check mode so it would only blink the button LEDs and not the main LEDs. But this is not currently implemented, so it would require modifying some code.

3. There has been some talk about adding a third power channel for red LEDs, and adding a set of red LEDs plus the driver hardware to power them. It would be reasonably straightforward to add to the firmware, too. But I haven’t heard any confirmation about it actually happening.

The LT1 itself doesn’t have the hardware necessary; it would require Sofirn to change the design and manufacture new parts.

So it’s a “maybe” for a later version (LT2?), and a “definitely not” for the current version (LT1).

Thanks for the detailed info. Well I will buy 2 more of the lt2s then. I love the light the way it is. My requests would make it the perfect light. Its a 9.8 right now. Thanks for all the hard work on designing and testing.

Ok so the future requests are……

1 red led on 3rd tint ramp channel
Orange push button voltage remaining blink (instead of main led)
Short delay before main led comes on to accept button requests
Direct to red with one loooooong press. Low red maybe 1/2 or 1/4 lumen. Not some gosh darn 300 lumen red.
4x 21700 batteries. Or teslas new 4598 cells :slight_smile: (only 1 required) 350wh per kilo
Oh and maybe bluetooth so I can access on/off sitting on sofa 10ft away.