Lakeside Beamshots *Pic Heavy* K3, S2200, HD2010, M3

I guess the difference between your specific XML2 T6 and U2 bins were very noticeable.
I think I’m going to have a breakdown - that M3 is monstrous!

The original emitters were worlds apart, with the neutral white XM-L2 T6 being much preferred over the almost disappointingly blue XM-L U2. But the M3 came as a complete head unit and there wasn’t a choice of emitter. I really loved it’s style and compactness.

Taking that emitter off their aluminum star and reflowing it on a SinkPAD, then de-doming it really brought it into perspective! Put one of Erik’s 5 mode drivers in and added a couple of chips, yeah, it’s really a neat little compact light putting some serious light downrange! Still a favorite.

At least until my 18350 IMR’s come in. We’ll see if the K3 in the same compact form can still put the power on the line. :slight_smile:

Nice shots! Should be compared in full screen to get a good impression.

Are you sure the HD2010 sees 4,18A to the emitter??? The M3 kills it when it comes to throw. Where does the emitter come from?

Thanks for the shots. The MT-G2 lights have a longer reach than I thought. I still don’t have a light with that emitter. Need to get me one.

Race, they’re different animals for certain. The HD2010 has an XM-L2 T6 while the M3 came with an XM-L U2. The HD2010 has more tricks, come to find out it’s got about 4 more chips than it can use as it’s carrying 15 chips but producing the power of 11. It would appear that the Vf of the emitter at that power level matches the 26650 at around 4.2A, just won’t get any more power from it with this kind of driver. I’ve got the XM-L2 mounted on a little pilon of copper that is in turn mounted on the SinkPAD. Reflowed the pilon and star and emitter simultaneously. This gets the emitter up off the star about an 1/8” so that it can be fine tuned inside the reflector as a de-domed emitter. I had to relieve the inset into the head for the pill so it could set down that much further and give me room to adjust for optimum focus. Also put that slab of copper (1/4” x 3/4” round times 2) up through the aluminum shelf the SinkPAD sits on as a heat sink. So now the SinkPAD sits directly on a 1/2” thick copper heat-sink. So it’s got about all the bells and whistles I can think of. Notice in the pics below the fried switch. Had to put a McClicky in. Oops! lol

The M3 head I simply removed the star, took the emitter off the aluminum factory star and reflowed it onto a SinkPAD then de-domed it and put it back into the pill. Changed the driver to a 5 mode E1320 and stacked 2 chips. Bingo! 4.28A and mega throw with no other fancy tricks. :slight_smile: Well, they both have 22 ga silicone wires added and the same wires bypassing the springs.

It’s called LiNiMnCo26650 and is rated at 18A continuous discharge rate with less than or equal to 20 milli ohms internal resistance. Do you think there’s a 26650 cell that might give me better results in the HD2010? This one is made for Electric Cars and Electric Bikes.

Maybe the little thing you have the XML sitting on in the HD2010 is preventing some of the heat transfer?

That “little thing” is a cube of copper cut to match the pad size of the XM-L2 emitter. Pure copper 1/8” thick cut from a bus bar used in the telephone company back in the 50’s.

I used a strand of copper wire, approx 28 ga. ( I took it from a piece of 00 gauge wire, the strand is about a 1/32” thick), soldered in between the SinkPAD and emitter for electrical transfer. Which was not easy by the way!

Yeah, but it doesn’t seem to be covering the whole base of the LED which is what led me to think that it might be restricting some heat transfer.

Only the center rectangle is the heat transfer pad. The strips down either side are negative and positive connections for the led.

Nope, never reflowed an LED before. Total noob who knows nothing when it comes to these things.
It’s just so surprising how far behind the HD2010 is compared to the M3.

I tested the K3 modded light with a single 18650 tube set-up using 2 18350 IMR cells from Efest. Even with the cells sitting at 3.83V fresh out of the mail, they run this MT-G2 at 4.05A with no problem.

Now, this mod has lost the over-discharge protection in the driver. Can someone confirm that with a 6.3Vf on the emitter, the light will die from insufficient voltage before these cells get over-discharged? They can be taken down to 2.65V safely, according to Efest.

This K3, on a standard L2P host with 2 IMR 18350’s is seriously a kick butt little package! :slight_smile:

Ok, so perhaps it will only sustain a Hi mode for about 10 minutes. But to have nearly 2400 lumens in a pocketable light, for burst of Hi and useable medium and low numbers, that’s just awesome! Med is 1.09A or almost an hour run time at nearly 700 lumens. With low being at .04A, it’ll run a long time with some 30-40 lumens. Works for me!

Edit: Got a pair of the Efest IMR18350 V2 charged up. They run the light at the same 4.40A as their larger counterparts do! Amazing seeing that much light coming from something so small! No kidding, side by side ceiling bounce comparison against the S2200 (also with fresh charged AW 18650 2600mAh Protected cells x 3) the K3 is visibly brighter! With the tiny cells. Blowing my mind! lol

Link please for where to get non-crap 18350s, my MTG2 C8's 15 minute runtime with the TrustFlames ('rated' capacity 1200mAh, measured capacity 370mAh) is pretty disappointing.

The typical 3.0 volt cutoff/warning is pretty conservative, most cells get their rated capacity being taken down to 2.75v. 2.50v is probably safe, but not best for longevity. At 5.5v the MTG2 will be down to less than an amp, so it will be very noticeably dim by that point.

This is the cheapest place I could find AW IMR 18350’s when you factor in shipping:

http://www.rtdvapor.com/online-store/batteries/aw-imr-18350-3-7v-55-detail

Coupon code ECF5 will get you 5% off.

I have a second one on the way, but the one I have now tested to 740mAh @ .2C/.2A down to 2.8v on my Thunder AC680 hobby charger. It’s dimensions are 34.94mm x 18.12mm with the button top, measured with my digital caliper, so they should have no trouble fitting.

Hopefully some day I will force myself into buying an iCharger 208B, so I can test batteries at their intended current and not just industry standard (.2C) discharge tests. Right now I can’t discharge past 2 amps.

These Efest are quite close in performance to the AW, can be had in flat top or button top, and are almost the same price at $8.40…oh wait, that’s for 2 of them! :slight_smile:
http://www.efestbattery.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=57_67&product_id=882

HKJs comparator shows these V2 button top to match up favorably to AW’s, at around 700mAh capacity they fall just a wee bit short of the AW’s…not bad for half the price!
http://lygte-info.dk/review/batteries2012/CommonSmallcomparator.php

Oh, by the way, I ran a non-official test of a pair of these with the K3 head. Fully charged they pushed the same 4.40A as the big guns, ran em in 2-3 minute burst (heat being the issue) til they were indeed making a very dim output (maybe 200-300 lumens) at ~5.54V. They didn’t drop the light, so even at very low levels they wouldn’t leave ya in darkness. I measured voltage directly after the test and they were already bouncing back up to 3.6V. It appears that they would sag about 1V then stabilize. Once warmed up from the light they’d actually gain a bit of that volt back.

I couldn’t help myself, had to add my last 2 1 ohm resistors to the 3 I already stacked. The S2200 went from 2.49A to 2.77A in tailcap readings, which translates to some 4.86A at the emitter if my math is correct. That adds up to some 2780 lumens! So of course I had to get some beamshots. The standard target of a red 55 gal oil drum at 97 yds. G1X at ISO1600 f/5.8 .5 sec exposure.1st shot is at 28mm, second is zoomed in to 112mm. Third is just for giggles and grins, the barn at 610 yds getting SPILL from all the power! lol (also zoomed in to 112mm)

And just to show what this bad boy is really doing, here’s a shot from my M8, with XM-L2 T6 5000K at 5.02A , same scene, same settings…taken last night.



Apples to apples, same style of the new beamshots on the S2200 to compare with the M8 L2 at 5.02A

Edit: Note second side-by-side shot directly above.

Nice work DB! Danged nice beam shots too! Thanks for sharing!!

Dan.

I thought, taking those pics, that it was really kicking butt. Comparing last months pics to tonights on my 24” monitor it’s not so easy to differentiate those 300-400 lumens. What’s a few hundred lumens when you pass 2000, right? lol

Edit: I added an apples to apples comparison against the newly modded M8 above, while they seem pretty much the same you have to remember the M8 is doing that with a spot and the S2200 is doing it with a wide field lit up just like that. Huge difference in the “hot spot”!

Did we ever figure out why the m3 with a smaller reflector throws more than the HD2010? Any kcd readings? I thought the HD2010s were hitting 200kcd fully done up.

I’ve been considering doing a dedomed HD2010.

My HD2010 is now making 222Kcd, the old numbers on the M3 show 71Kcd. Nonetheless, the M3 with very little modding is putting nice light downrange. I need to revisit that one, can probably make it do much better now.