My Soshine 26650 arrived yesterday so I could do some measurements:
Voltage. H. M. L
Fully loaded 6.2A 1.8A. 0.67A
11.8V. 5.95A. 1.8. 0.7A
11V. 4.7A. 1.4A. 0.55A
10.5V. 3.9A. 1.15A. 0.4A
10.1V. 3.1A. 0.95. 0.35A
And it’s bright, everything is bright. I have a 3 XML and you could see everything good during night with it but with this thing everything is bright. For example if you point on a car 40 m away the hole street in front of of you till the car is flooded. I checked the roofs and trees from my neighbors and pointed them in their Livingroom, I could see everything as if the sun shines right in there window.
And it gets warm/hot what we should expect from a 50W+ in such a flashlight.
The driver could be more linear especially in the mid low setting, the strobe and SOS is crap like every time.
I can’t do capacity tests of the soshine because my charger is only the 50W type which discharges only at 1A max. But I could load 3.5Ah in it after playing last night with my Baby, so I think that they are about 4Ah like advertised and tested from others. One of my soshine came damaged, the wrap is ripped…but I can fix it with some tape.
Man I’m so pissed right now you have no idea. I spent a lot of time installing my KD driver in my Skyray 9x T6, being very meticulous and all, only to realize this driver, at least my example of it, won’t work using 3 x 26650 batteries. Occasionally it’ll turn on using 3, but will only illuminate in HIGH mode and not change modes. But basically using 3 batteries it’ll simply flash for a second and that’s about it.
I tested it using only 2 x 26650 (Trustfire 5000mAh) and it works fine using all three modes. Funny thing is the original driver doesn’t work well using only 2 batteries. For this KD driver, I’m pretty sure the modes are 100–30–5% and no flashy modes.
I was able to determine the Medium mode (30%) is just slightly less bright than a Trustfire J12 on HIGH mode.
I’m going to reinstall the original driver tomorrow and just leave well enough alone. The Skyray 9x T6 was a powerhouse with the stock driver and really didn’t need anything more.
UPDATE: With 2 x 26650, I get 10.5a at the tail cap.
UPDATE #2: I ran the batteries down a bit and tried it again with 3x26650, lux reading jumped to 1850 lux.
The only readings I was able to get were as follows:
Skyray 9x T6 stock lux on HIGH - 1295 lux (3x26650)
Skyray 9x T6 KD 9x driver HIGH - 1520 lux (2x26650)
Trustfire TR-J12 Stock 3 x 26650 - 810 lux (3x26650)
I removed the spring from the stock driver and installed it on the KD driver as shown.
Here’s the Skyray all buttoned up with the KD driver.
first thing that comes to mind, is defective driver, since the specs say 3-4 cell, and ~2x the wattage
second thing is protected batteries
I think hkj tested the tf protected 26650s, and he usually does a protection trip test, right?
but…even if the driver was trying to pull 100W from 3 cells, it’d be less current than you’re already measuring, so that’s probably not it
don’t suppose you happen to have 3 x cgr18650ch unprotected?
anyway, if you determine it is defective and they won’t let you return it, you could buy another, and return this one in its place….of course if it behaves the same, you’re out $40!
I originally thought it could be the batteries protection kicking it, but I’d expect that to happen with 2 battery and not with 3 of them. What do you think of the tail cap readings from my post #96 ?
Hi Sigster, yes they were fully charged, but I discharged them each down to 3.95v each and it didn’t make a difference. However, once it did turn on using 3 x 26650 cells and I was able to get a tail-cap reading of 7a on HIGH mode. The stock driver on HIGH was 4a.
Also, I tried using 3 other very new Trustfire 26650 5000mAh batteries that serve very well in my Trustfire TR-J12 and it didn’t make a difference. It has to be the driver. Thank you for your input and suggestions.
Unfortunately I was getting pretty aggravated due to the problem I was having with the KD driver, and didn’t snap a photo of what the LED wiring looked like with the reflector removed. I’m sure anyone on this board would have appreciated such meticulous soldering using such thin wire.
I will say this much, the person that wired this light had to be a master at his or her craft. The wiring is so thin (wired in series) and so neatly soldered, I could learn a thing or two from this person about soldering.
It also amazes me that even with the super powerful stock driver in this 9x T6, this little wire can allow this flashlight to produce the huge amount of light it does and eat a Trustfire J12 for breakfast.
I have no doubt it would make a difference and seriously reduce the resistance in the existing wiring. If I didn’t love the light so much and didn’t care if I messed it up, I’d give it a try. But there would be a limit to how much larger the wiring would have to be in order for the reflector to seat back down correctly.
Initially when I had the light apart, I was going to replace the stock + and - leads coming from the LED’s down to the driver, but I felt it wasn’t worth it at this time.
I’m thinking this KD driver for the 9x T6 simply requires more power than what any of my batteries can supply. I tried it with my Redilast 3100 x 3, and within about 3 seconds coming on high mode, one cell tripped the protection. Unless someone else is willing to try this driver in their Skyray and verify my findings, I’d say just keep the 9x T6 stock.
I was thinking that too, but at this point, I don’t want to purchase more 26650’s, especially since I purchase these 3 extra Trustfire 5000mAh cells specifically for this light. But thanks for your suggestion.
LOL…okay, I reduced the voltage on my shorai 14Ah battery to 12.5 volts and connected it to the KD driver. OMG, this thing was so scary bright, I’ve never seen a flashlight this bright, as least first hand anyway. After 15 seconds, I noticed a very small bit of smoke come from the driver and then it went out. I removed the driver and can’t seem to find anything burnt, but it will not illuminate anymore.
At this point, I’ll just leave it up in the air as to whether this driver was simply defective only when using 3 cells or not.
Tomorrow I’ll toss the original driver back in, at least for now, until I get a chance to order another KD driver for it. Thanks for all the helpful input. It’s always appreciated