I'm actually working on a Amazon review for this light right now, so took some pics. Not a complete tear down yet, but will be taking more of driver details with the "removable" switch. The weight of this is incredibly light - bout same as an 18650:
Comparison shot showing how really thin it is. Length, of course, can't be as short as the factory triples since the reflector has some depth to it, but still length isn't too bad From left to right: OTR M6, Amutorch AX2, the M200, Convoy S2+, Sofirn SC31B
With the batt tube off, the driver is fairly loose - nothing holding it in. The blue SS trim looks really nice on this light:
Standard XPL, guessing about a 3B/D or 2B/D. Looks like a thermistor on the copper MCPCB:
You see how small the LED wires are? Tiny, like maybe 28 AWG or so. This light seems to do better on a better cell, so betta if I replaced the wires with heavier gauge ones, might see a boost.
I got the repair done - M200 is back in working order! I left the stock LED wires - they are teflon actually. The backside of the MCPCB was ugly:
After sanded with 2000 GRIT paper:
The MCPCB is 16 mm x 1.0 mm - pretty thin.
Here's the driver with the "removable" switch:
After the re-soldering:
Other side:
I realized I had to remove the switch, then install the driver, than re-install the switch in order to get it to go together, otherwise I ran the risk of poking the switch off again. So using a spanning wrench, I got the switch off. The big plunger was hitting the switch, so it must be tight up against it:
So, last part was re-soldering in the MCPCB, and while at it, replaced the grease with MX4:
Tom E, that was quite a work :o
You then had to solder the switch from the to again
Incredible work, but I’d sweat like a pig (if they sweat…) to do it and make the flashlight work again !!
I am also amazed that the MCPCB is so thin. I guess that Skilhunt doesn’t want to force the heat in such a small light…although it turbo can be re-enacted over and over
Was that white stuff silicone? And was it originally on the driver? I guess it would be to avoid some shorts rathed than heat dissipation, am I right?
Thanks again for your tear down and information, and congrats for making it work again
I was also a little surprised at the thinness of the MCPCB but it's pretty common in mass produced lights - maybe weight, cost, keeping the length to a min, etc.. If you add 0.5 mm to the height, then you have to add it all the way up to the overall length of the light, unless you cut something else down by 0.5 mm, such as reflector depth. They seem to tout the efficiency of the SMO design, so probably wouldn't cut that.
I assume the white stuff is mainly for thermal protection (potting) the way it's applied. When I modded the H15, they had some sort of stuff on even thicker:
Slapped on some diffusion film… not bad. Might keep it.
The bigger hotspot seemed to be a little too crisp and circular. Figured I’d be using this puppy inside/around the house more, so floodier would be nice.
It also mixes the beam to almost homogeneous, too. My ’351s all seemed to have a hint of green, not objectionable like my Quarks, but still a bit there. Maybe tint-separation was bringing it out, hotspot vs spill.
Behind the film, the blended beam seems to be better. On a solid off-white wall, the slight green tinge seems there, but shining it on Generic Stuff, even white magazine-paper and some envelopes, there doesn’t seem to be any green tinge at all.
Reds and browns are soooooo nice, though.
So okay, it won’t throw anymore, but it’s a great flooder for, like I said, around the house. And it’s totally reversible.
Great, so now my M200 and E03 will be in competition…
A piece of heat-shrink tube in that area of the head can be used.
Make a hole on it, so you can rotate it when you need to use the charging port, and it will protect the charging port.
I don’t see many permament covering options as it is in the opposite direction of the switch.
There’s a version V3 out now for the M200. 1Lumens did a review of it. The UI has been changed… AGAIN. It’s now 3 groups (low, med/high, strobe), and they’ve removed the customization capability. It looked intriguing to me at first, until I spotted one glaring flaw. Once you’re in a brightness group, you’re in it until you turn off the light. You cannot move between them (e.g. Low group to Med/High group and back). So basically if you’re on low and need high, you have to turn the light off and back on again! That’s a pretty notable design flaw. No other lights do this.
Frankly, I found the UI v2 version to be pretty decent and it seems there’s a lot of sentiment for it. I really don’t understand why Skilhunt got rid of it.
I recently got the M150 V3 with that UI and it’s not bad really. I never had a V2 to compare with, though.
I think of it more like LMH in the main group, with two not-moonlight moonlight modes from off (the L1 and L2), then the two turbo settings. It works pretty well, probably not so well for people that really want low-low modes/real moonlight or firefly, and/or that are switching from low-low to higher modes frequently. They were on here pretty recently discussing a way to keep the L modes in the main rotation and seemed very receptive to it (I think they came up with 2C from L modes to enter the main group, sounds ok).
The M150 with the 519A 4500K is really nice. One of very few lights now that will take a true flat top 14500 like the old Sony and Sanyo versions.
Yes V3 519A I like a lot. I am noticing though that it terminates charging right about at 4.08 V. Would like to see it fill up a little further at least.
