Nice looking light :-) and a well done mod!
Sometimes I wished I had all the time in the world for flashlight modding....
I love the polished looks of that light. Great mod. Thank you for signing up to share. Welcome to BLF :-)
I have literally all the time in the world but no money whatsoever :~
As soon as I sell some unnecesary stufs there will be more mods by me 
Thanks to everyone for the welcome!
Welcome to BLF ! That a gorgeous light you got there. 
How did you do the polishing ? Small grain sand paper ? It look like stainless steel !
If you wanted pure thrower de-domed XP-G2 LED would have been even better.
Thanks for welcome! First step was with 400 sand paper, second with 500, third with 1500 and final with 2000. After that finished with some polish paste.
I knew that xp-g2 would be better for throw but my goal was ultimate all-rounder.
Welcome, looks very nice now and great mod.
Nice one !
Welcome to BLF…
I love it! Loos like I’ll at least be messing with the finish on my SK98 clone. Welcome to BLF!
One question - I was under the impression that to get the increased throw by de-doming an emitter depended on the way the more widespread light formed a tighter hot spot from the reflector. I de-domed the LED in my Trustfire Z8 without thinking about that and all I did was lose some lumens. LOL. Since these zoomies don’t have conventional reflectors, I’m trying to imagine how de-doming improves anything…
Still, killer mod. Thank you!
Very Nice mod Oton!
That copper star may not have a true direct thermal path from the center pad under the LED to the bottom of the star though. It must be this one: http://www.kaidomain.com/product/details.S022418. You would have been better off with this one: http://intl-outdoor.com/noctigon-xm20-mcpcb-cree-xml2-u2-1a-led-p-749.html. I used to use the KD drivers but found the Nanjg's and QLite's better/easier to work with.
I've done several zoom lights though, and even though they can't get as much output as a reflector based light, they do come in handy with the zoom function, and can be easily improved with a mod like you have done. The use of the copper pipe to solve the 2 problems: 17mm driver to 20 mm fit and the "hollow pill" (no top on the pill) looks to be well done!
Also, making the copper spring is pretty original stuff there.
Edit: Can't recall the exact #'s, but de-doming an XP-G2 in a T20 zoomie definitely helped in throw, compared to with dome. Believe I got about 135 kcd de-domed, and think about 75 kcd domed. So, think you are doing better de-domed in any zoomie for throw, but lose about 15-20% in lumens.
Ah, good to know. Still confusing that it increases throw without the reflector…weird.
Thx for advice about thermal path. I’ve noticed that the copper star form KD is a bit curved and i was thinking about sanding it for better thermal path but since i’ve applied thermal paste mixed together with bits of filed copper from rasping the copper pipe i’ve find it good enaugh. Body is warming under a minute on high mode which tells me that the thermal path is sufficient. I was impressed with yours and djozz’s T-twenties with dedomed xp-g2. First minute after reading that specific mod uf-t20 was immediately in my wishlist :heart_eyes:
EDIT: Yeah… zoomies are gr8 all-rounders
Nice mod, I like the bling and the desk cloth most.
In former times I fell in love with the sk98 as well(when xmlU3 was THE THING) but today I seldom use it because I hate all the light what the aspherical steals and focused the beam isn’t really tight because of the XML, so I am a bit away from zoomies. Also the switches are most high resistance ones…
Check these 20mm adapterings for future mods
Mixing copper rasping in thermal paste is not ideal, the paste is just for bridging micro gaps between star and pill. Any rasp will be much thicker than useful…
But driven at 2.5A this is no big deal either.
Thx Werner for the link of adapters. About rasp… I thought about that but since the diy copper plate was not perfectly leveled with the pill so I thought that mixing would be useful but as you said the point of thermal paste is for filling micro gaps.I shouldn’t mix it… From time to time I take the switch apart and clean the contacts for eliminating as much resistance as possible. Btw emitter is driven at 3 amps(probably ) .
These adapter plates save a lot of work, I have once soldered a wire around a nanjg to fit it to 20mm, very ugly and took a while until it fitted and made good contact.
These drivers fall out of regulation very fast with decreasing voltage, with the switch resistance you will faster have a <2.5A driven LED than you can imagine.
I’ve came back with tailcap readings. With short thick copper wires my cheap dmm showed 3.22A with fresh battery. I’ve tried to measure resistance of tailcap on 200ohm range. It showed 00.0 but after 5-6 seconds it showed 00.1ohm. I’ll try to modify it with some solder but I think there will be no much gain in terms of reduced resistance.
I am planning similar driver for my Raysoon TD-398. I ordered an adapter plate. Guess I need to solder it to the back of the driver. Your copper is better but maybe the plate will be easier. I like this style for mod because of the cooling.
Nice polish. I have diamond sand paper. Wonder if I could polish the black anodizing with it.
These adapters are made for nanjg, it’s very easy just stick the spring through the hole and solder it to the middle pad. Add a piece of wire from the outer ring of the adapter to the nanjg for ground contact.
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Nice to see that you now can measure current, despite 3.2A seems a bit high…
Have you soldered the brass part of the switch to the switch itself? This helps a lot. I would supply a photo but imageshack is sucking at the moment…
I am not sure if I have modified the switch innards but I am really sure that it was crappy on stock form in the sipik and in the ultrafire branded version I got. Maybe you got a better version.
Just before a few days I played again with it to test a direct drive driver, which puts 10A through a triple XML board…this is what I call hot.
Maybe my DMM is calibrated for stock leads and that’s the reason why my measuring result is bit higher than it should be. My version had 5 mode driver with dreadful next mode memory and screw plate for tightening emitter star to the pill. Thx for idea of soldering direct on the switch. Soldering iron is heating up
EDIT: I’ve disassembled the switch and apply solder on all three contact plates.
These cheap DMM normally just have a piece of copper wire as shunt resistor to measure current. They “calibrate” them with pinching them with pliers, this can be done by yourself too. But you will need a known current to “calibrate” against.
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That is the best way to go on these switches. That reduces resistance a lot on cheap switches.
If you ever identify one which routes the battery negative contact through the spring, replace it immediately these will melt down on high currents.
The omten spare switches from fancyflashlights seem to be the best replacement they have near to zero resistance. It’s handy to have some around as these small switch parts can get lost fast…
I always plug switches/tailcaps to my bench power supply and push 3-5A through it, I measure the voltage drop to judge about them.