What did you mod today?

Flashlight Modding and DIY Parts
9536

What’s the best way to sand down a CU board in thickness evenly?

This comes up often but I almost think it’s easier to source a larger 1mm thick CU board and sand down the diameter instead. I thought the smaller Convoy boards were 1mm but according to their store only the 5050 footprint one is 16*1.0mm

I guess I should not disregard kiriba-ru as if I didn’t see his suggestion about using sandpaper wrapped file. I guess my question is then how to keep it even if that’s the best way. Rotate 1/8 or 1/4 turn for every few passes?

9537

Yeah, rotate every pass and even then it won’t be even :(

Only good thermal paste helps using this method or if the host is copper or brass, soldering directly to the shelf.

9538

Parallelism or flatness? Flatness can be achieved but parallelism is hard with hand tools. I’ve done it to a noctigon before using wd40 and 80/120/300/800 sandpaper. I double-sided tape in a few spots to secure the paper to a piece of thick glass, and soldered a copper rivet (misc parts bin) to the thermal pad to get a grip on it, and about 45 minutes later I had reduced it to about 1mm and it was pretty darn flat. Due to the heat buildup, I actually drilled a blind hole in a thick dowel rod and used that as an insulator. This was years ago so no pics sorry

9539

Get a SS washer the thickness that you want the Cu star to be, drop it inside (bore out the hole if probably needed), then sand/grind away. SS is harder than Cu, won’t wear away as fast as Cu, so you could probably grind down the Cu to that thickness without going too much thinner.

9540

Going to try to sneak in my other hobby.

Flashed a smart plug (Sonoff S31) to use open source local firmware to control some (flickering LED :confounded: ) Christmas lights:

Solder jumper wires to USB to Serial adapter to flash ESP8266 chip

Flash and setup device, web page is the local device IP with all configuration options. No more phoning home to the “cloud” and works instantly with my home automation (Home Assistant) running on raspberry pi.

Costco LED garland the wife really wanted hooked up to re-assembled plug. My 3yo daughter asked “why does it blink like that?” I guess she is already one of us… :person_facepalming:

9541

Time to gut the driver on that garland :wink:

Maybe bring along the little one along for a lesson :slight_smile:

9542

“Driver” is a pretty loose term since they are wired in series to use line voltage. I did some quick googleFu and it looks like I could convert half wave to full wave rectifier but I would need to re-string at least half of the lights (I dont quite understand all this though). If I did that I would end up just replacing the entire string and get a warmer tint along with it.

I can probably live with it as is as long as I keep it away from our other lights.

9543

Nice mod. I’ve thought about modding my E3, but a few factors have prevented it. First, the 5700K 219C is actually a good tint (if cooler than I typically prefer). No noticeable tint-shift and no green. Second, it was a gift. And third, the modes are excellent with NiMh. It does suffer from the typical AA/14500 light problem for me, though: it’s large enough that I often just grab the SC62w instead.

Looks great. Zoomies definitely have places and uses where I’d prefer them over reflectors or most TIRs.

Hey that is pretty cool. Especially preventing it from phoning home - my Pihole blocks so much crap these days…

9544

If I may ask, how did you open it?
I am thinking of opening mine to put some GITD tape inside but I don’t wanna ruin it right away :zipper_mouth_face:
Thanks in advance :+1:

9545

Nothing too exciting.

But I’ve decided to overhaul my UF-1405 aspheric thrower with an Osram LED. So I pulled out the de-domed XP-G2 that was in it today.

The Osram W1 LED is here, but still waiting on a driver for it.

However I did received a 3.04A Qlite from Int’l Outdoor.

I also found an old Convoy S4 on the shelf. It was missing a lens (think it broke) and I’d evidently pinched the driver and LED out of it at some point. Think it used to be an XP-G2. Not sure what happened to it. Anyhow it was bought as a host originally. I found a lens from a Convoy S2+ in the box, where I’d fitted a TIR lens previously.

So I thought I’d build up the S4 with the de-domed XP-G2 and Qlite.

The S4 host is ok, but fit and finish is a long way off the S2/S2+ models. But they do have quite a nice deep reflector.

I’m pretty sure the XP-G2 is an S2 1D. It’s on a Noctigon star from Int’l Outdoor. In the UF-1405 it had an amazing golden coloured tint after the de-dome (think Nichia219A).

With my XP-L HI S2

Sadly the tint isn’t quite as golden in a reflector, but it is quite a nice neutral white.

Seems to work really well outside. More throwy than the XP-L HI but somehow doesn’t feel short changed on lumens and spill beam either.

9546

I have drilled optic and used hes to pry out bezel ring. Yajiamei 17mm TIR is the same dimension as this one in Olight.

9547

Thanks for the information! I guess that would be too risky for me, as I intend to use the same optic.
I assume the bezel is pressed, not screwed, am I right?
Thanks again! :beer:

9548

Nice mod on the classic S4 Chicken Drumstick. I wish they still sold them so I could add them to my collection.

9549

Mod with XP-E deep Red Led Skywolfeye E-522 AAA zoom
Think I have made the smallest zoom Red light.
I like very much, smooth and decent made for below 2$,but coming with cool white Led.
The base of the head tube was filed 2mm to bring the lens closer to the LED and have more flood.Also the pill was sanded a bit

9550

Have you tried Skywolfeye B16? It’s a much better host.

9551

Nothing much, been playing Lego with my son: placing correct color LED in it’s C01 hosts

660nm

450nm

595nm

530nm

9552

OSRAM CSLNM1.TG



9553

Nice. That really satisfies my OCD

9554

That was my thought as well. This is how they should be sold!

9555

No maybe I will,B16 seem is 3modes,press fit lens and a bit bigger than E522
do you have both two?