DQG 26650 EDC Triple XPG2

i want try a triple XP-G2!ā€¦where can i buy this flashlight?

http://www.cnqualitygoods.com/goods.php?id=1976

but itā€™s not available yet.

I like the look of this, but the 18650 Tiny hasnā€™t inspired me tbh. I still fail to understand how someone can design and build a flashlight that is too small for itā€™s intended batteries

A mm wider and 3mm longer would not have affected itā€™s physical size but would have solved these issues.

With regard to my own experience, I did pre order a Titanium 18650 Tiny.

It looks great, but needed a fair bit of work to it to make it work at all, I had to sand the end of the body tube flat and finish it off, fit O-rings, reassemble the optic and it still didnā€™t work as it should with High being very difficult to activate, would take about 10 attempts to get it to select this mode.

Rick did offer a new LED/driver module and I also paid for one of his recommended non protected 18650ā€™s. Sadly these bits never turned up.

After a bit of chasing Ric did offer to send me a brand new 18650 Tiny flashlight free of charge. I salute Ric for this and this kind of customer service is the only reason Iā€™d purchase from them again.

The replacement 18650 Tiny was black not a titanium though. It worked much better out of the box, but also seems less bright on high than the first one. And Iā€™m sad to report, despite EDCā€™ing it, this one now flickers and is a bit of a PITA to use. One handed operation is not really possible and when using high after about 30 secs on time itā€™ll flicker and often change modes, this means you have to tighten the head even further with two hands to stop this, but this then makes it very tight to then turn off.

Visually the light looks brilliant, but when I compare the overall quality to my EagleTac D25LC2, Iā€™m sad to say the DQG is a looong way behind :frowning:

Hoping this 26650 one is a superior product as Iā€™ll likely take a punt on it

Counter-point: I ordered, and received two of the original 18650s (one black and one TI/gold, and one NW and one CW). The only thing that I had to do with them was move the O-ring, per the info that RIC provided early-on, and they worked fine, once I figured out where to put the O-ring :).

Even though I didnā€™t have major problems, I did take advantage of RICā€™s post-sale offer for the 18650s and got 2 of them. If you didnā€™t receive the batteries, you should probably email or PM him (they donā€™t come with tracking if I recall).

I didnā€™t enounter any problems with battery sizes, though most of the batteries I have are unprotected batteries, including some 17670s from laptop pulls.

Did you not have to fit 2 small black O-rings to the body too? I had to do this even on the replacement one, which was many months later.

Hence why I got a 2nd flashlight for free. Although it still bugs me that I have the better looking titanium one collecting dust on the shelf :frowning:

No offense, but isnā€™t that kind of missing the point. The light by itā€™s very name is ā€œ18650ā€ Tiny.

And it fails to accept most 18650ā€™s. And recommending to use unprotected ones with a driver that doesnā€™t cut off until 2.5v is I think a bit of a copout. If this was a UK based company theyā€™d get legally linched for selling a product like this.

As for the batteries, I have:

Solarforce branded protected 18650ā€™s (unknown origin) - these do not fit the battery tubes on either light.

Intā€™l Outdoor branded Sanyo protected 18650ā€™s - again these do not fit the battery tube.

FastTech Sanyo 18650 protected - way too fat to fit the battery tube

FastTech 2900 Panasonic protected 18650s - these fit the tube on the black light, but not the titanium one, however despite being a button top, the light wonā€™t turn on.

EagleTac branded 3100 Protected Panasonic - this is the only 18650 I have that fits the battery tube and turns the light on

I do plan on buying an IMR 18650 in the hope itā€™ll fit. But I donā€™t see why I should be forced to use non protected cells.

I donā€™t have any 17650ā€™s, I do have a Sanyo 16650 though, but for some reason the lights wonā€™t work with them either. And my 2x16340 to 18650 EagleTac insert wonā€™t fit the 18650 Tiny battery tube either.

Re. the O-rings: Itā€™s been awhile, but I think that I did have to put one addl O-ring on (but it came in the box) on one of the lights (I think I posted about that on the original thread).

Re. you last comments: I guess that what I was trying to say is that I didnā€™t have trouble with any of the batteries that I had, and I didnā€™t go looking for batteries that I didnā€™t have that wouldnā€™t work (I think I posted about what I had that worked on the original thread also). I know that others had problemsā€¦

EDIT: BTW, Iā€™m (also) not trying to get into a debate/argument. I was just trying to mention that, at least for me, the lights I got were ok. Again, thatā€™s not to say that others didnā€™t have problems.

No worries I know what you are meaning :slight_smile:

BTW - how are your 18650 Tinyā€™s holding out? Iā€™m quite disappointed that my replacement one is so flickery now. I love the size and beam profile. But the physical act of using it and the frustration it brings when it acts up, means I never EDC for more than a day to two before it gets put back on the shelf.

Since this one has an electric side switch, and there are wish lists being madeā€¦ Ide really like to see a UI where if l-m-h you hold the button from off and get it to start on high or maybe have that as a hidden moon light. Also maybe an option for xml2?

L-m-h hold for moonlight and double click for strobe

Off>low>med>high>>strobe>ā€” moon light
Off>ā€” High>low>med>high>>strobe >ā€” moonlight

Although I like the light very much, the main dissappointment with the DQG 18650 tiny in my opinion is the extreme bad heatsinking of the led, causing 30% lumen drop in a few seconds that could have been perhaps only 5% if the heatsinking had been done well, what a waste! I hope they mount the leds in this new light on metal core PCB's (direct bonding to copper please!) instead of onto the driver board.

On the design side I liked the DQG18650 more, this one does not appeal to me much..

That is the only way to get the light as short as possible, it 2 boards are used then the light becomes longer.

Yes, I know, you need 5mm more length to do that, but I'd still go for that, compared to this much energy going to heat instead of light.

a quick estimation: the OTF output (optics losses are considered) of 3 xp-g2's at 1.4amps should be 1000-1100 lumens if the leds are heatsinked well.

Or you can go heavy on the viaā€™s under the center pad like pilotptk did for his tripple xml driver combo. That might make things easier in this case since its a tripple, you can have a hole in the center of the pill for the positive contact and still have a good heat path.

Vias, yeah that is actually in the CREE datasheets and it's quite possible they went that way.

I wonder how difficult it would be to fit 12 lm7135s 3 xpg2ā€™s and a mcu on the top of the same board, that way you could have a really good heat path really simply

And I wonder why there are not 3 XML2 in itā€¦

I second everything _the_ said, especially about that guy he quoted. :)

It'd be even better if they offered a version with high CRI emitters.

I see that Ric put up two pictures of the front side, with the TIR. It is a bit of a disappointment to me that (it looks like that) the standard 20mm TIR is used, while in this size head a bigger TIR would have fitted (with better throw, or more efficient XM-L2 could be used with the same throw), or perhaps best: a slimmer head could have supported this TIR.

(sorry that I am not positive about this one, I really like all the other lights that he introduced lately, still eying the brass 18650 one :-) )

That has an unique business end. Please let there be discount!

I do bellive that there are 5 led tirs available for prettymuch the same sizeā€¦ how about a 5 xpg2 version instead of a tripple xml versionā€¦ that would really make for a nice and toasty turbo mode :stuck_out_tongue: also its going to be really hard to decide
between this and blf s2