Guys, end of the road for my Sky Ray 3 x T6 SR3800

Direct drive with a fully charged SLA measured 2.2A to the emitters in series, i am getting 324 lux @ 8.17m. 21626 lux @ 1m, or candlepower.

Using slightly larger diameter wires on one of the them i could do 2.8A, giving me 360 lux @ 8.17m. 24029 lux @ 1m. This thing comfortably outthrows stock C8/UF-980L/U80.

Update, i pushed 3.3A and got 380 lux, that's the max. Head gets hot really fast.

Stock SR3800 is 260 lux @ 8.17m.

Engrotelis measured 1580 OTF lumens in his lightbox (he said his is pretty accurate). If that's the case 380 lux / 260 lux = 2309 lumens OTF.

Sorry to hear yours is dead too, 2100. I took mine all apart and the LEDs appear to be fine. I guess I need to find a suitable driver but I'm not sure I want to bother.

Run it in DD with a SLA, quite fun. 3S would drive it to approx 1.9-2.2A depending on charge level (12.4V-12.6V unloaded).

How about a taskLED.com H6flex or H6CC? Both are capable of 6.6 or 6.7A delivered and would provide a driver circuit designed for series wired Xmls. Granted at $30-40 you have almost as much in the driver as you do the light, but I'm betting you have a much harder time hurting one of those drivers.

Both of my skyray 1x14500 lights failed as a dead short too. TF Flames instantly shut off. I don't know why anyone insists it's OK to use unprotected cells, but people still do...

I'll give you $5 for your broken one. :)

--Bushytails

$5, no way.....I am getting comfortably above 2000 lumens OTF from the broken Sky Ray, form a good basis for comparison with say the TK70. Probably will order the Trustfire as replacement since it has so many threads. Sheesh why do I need 4 x 3xT6 for? (actually supposed to spend on HIDs but plans foiled again and again)

I’ve always wanted to try one of their drivers but that a big investment for this thing. But from the looks of it (and I’m an idiot when it comes to electronics), they need a higher Vin than Vout and with two cells that’s not going to work with the LEDs in series.

based on the tech info from the TaskLed site, I dont think that is a as big a problem as you might suspect.

From the site: H6CC is capable of running from 8V up to 22V as shipped (guaranteed operating range). H6CC may operate as low as 5V, but operation between 5V and 8V is not guaranteed at the full 6.7A output current over the full operating temperature range (0C to 70C).

But it still needs Vin higher than Vout, correct? Its a buck circuit and unless the 3 XM-Ls are run in parallel, its not going to fly.

With 6.7A, you'd want them in parallel - an xm-l doesn't do well at those currents. Someone recently posted some very nice graphs here showing how poorly they do when you go over the rated power.

--Bushytails

That'd would be match's excellent work.... For my "gut feel" last night on a real production light, there is some meat left from 2.8A range to say below 3.3A. But it got hot real fast, already starting to get uncomfortable to hold by the 1 min mark so that's fast. I suspect even a big thermal mass like the TK70 / Ebay HID aluminum torches it's just enough mass for a couple of mins run. Unless if you are in sub-zero temps so that host to air heat interface would be high.

Ok some updates :

Direct drive with a fully charged SLA measured 2.2A to the emitters in series, i am getting 324 lux @ 8.17m. 21626 lux @ 1m, or candlepower.

Using slightly larger diameter wires on one of the them i could do 2.8A, giving me 360 lux @ 8.17m. 24029 lux @ 1m. This thing comfortably outthrows stock C8/UF-980L/U80.

Update, i pushed 3.3A and got 380 lux, that's the max. Head gets hot really fast. 25364 lux @ 1m.

Again pushed it by cooling the head with ice-cubes, got 451 lux at don't know what current but killed it quite fast within 60 sec. The LEDs were just glowing faintly. Gave it a hard knock and it came back on (prob internal wires made contact again). I think the emitter internal wires melted or something. End of tests.... :)

The last one was a cool 30103 lux @ 1m. Using engertolis test measurements in his light box, lumens of 1580L OTF @ ~ 260 lux, that means i was pushing in the 2700L OTF range.

Awesome. Just awesome...

As powerful as the 3xT6 is, it is still "not bright" comparatively. When i gave it a hard knock to make it come back , i was looking at the emitters which were glowing faintly. and figured it could come back to life with a tough man's repair method. Wah la.....dumb idea eh?

The 3 emitters + reflectors after-image was burnt into my right eye's vision, but it went off quite quickly....like within 15 minutes.

The last time i was looking at the faint bluish and reddish glow of the arc chamber of a 75W HID bulb overdriven to 100W, i accidentally hit the switch and it hot-restriked. That "impact" was BIG enough to render me somewhat nauseous and nearly caused me to lose balance, yep its that bad. That one took like 24hrs to subside to about 20% and my eyes went puffy, one was especially puffy. I am on transition lens, so that took care of ~ 405nm plus a big part of UV-A (my transition lens attenuates a big portion of my 405nm laser defocused). Eye drops took care of it, a trip to the optemetris gave me a clean bill. With a laser you get a very small blind spot as long as you don't hit the optic nerve which ironically itself is already a blind spot (hit it and there goes your whole vision).....but this one left a huge burn after-image for like nearly 2 days before it really went 99% away. The lucky thing is, i probably got hit by the corona + at such close range the beam was not fully converged yet.

That’s not what I was saying. You obviously wouldn’t want to run 6.7A to each. Those drivers can be programmed to a number of current levels. I don’t understand why, but I remember reading something about that it isn’t the best idea to run LEDs in parallel due to different Vfs, but my comprehension of certain electrical/electronic concepts is fuzzy at best.

I just got a message at work from my son that mine burned out tonight. He is pretty bummed, he loves that light. Mine is one of the first ones out, not a dropin. I’m no modder or ever a very good flashlight repairman. Is there a driver that fits in there and works or has that not been figured out yet? I have not taken it apart or looked at it yet. It seems they are starting to have a few problems so maybe I’ll just stand by and see how things develop.

Damn, the drivers in these must run hot and something burns out on them. Maybe if the folk currently afflicted can take pic of theirs we can troubleshoot. Otherwise, Jim at MF should be able to source these, and he probably should given how many he sold out of this forum, esp. in lieu of any warranty.

Wow...the burn out season is coming.. LOL! Seriously I wasn't expecting much out of it esp that I really used it quite a fair bit. Remember try not to gun it for too long, esp if the head is too hot to touch.

The heatsinking is very good, but we also need the exterior to be cooled (with say ambient temps of below 15) in order to run for long. The cooler/more windy the environment is, the longer can it run in high.

I think the problem is w/ the mosfets or whatnot on the driver. It's not well sinked OOB with a shitload of power running through it.

Mine showed no visible signs of failure. Although I’m not sure how everything connects now. Anyway, why would I want another driver that’s going to fail? :stuck_out_tongue: I kid… I would love some input from Jim on these failures.