Ultrafire LZZ-06 AAA light with pocket clip 0.9-4.2v

The driver looks pretty decent. It's PCB is red and appears to be labeled "LG68". Has 3 good sized capacitors. Inductor labeled "3R3". Mode chip labeled "ECA1R". Diode labeled "S6 82". Has 2 stacked resistors. Top one is labeled R300. Quality of construction looks pretty good. Has a copper ground ring (Not just a trace).

My Google-fu is weak today.

EDIT: The driver appears to be far more sophisticated than this driver. I'll try to post a picture tonight.

Here is the top and bottom of the driver in the Jexree Mini:

Measured emitter current this morning as flollows:

High - 320 mA

Low - 110 mA

Tonight I will add a resistor to see how current changes.

Trying to find out more about this driver. It looks very similar to this driver which is good for (0.8-3.2Vdc) - AAA (350mA) and 2AAA (700 mA, 1000mA optional). Can have various modes including it appears a ramping mode. Even has stacked resistors (top being R270). Does have one less capacitor. The small one in my picture above.

If anyone has this driver, I would be interested in knowing if the components are labeled the same as I specified in Post 30 above.

EDIT: Also similar to this 1-mode driver.

My Google-fu is fued out. Guess it's just time to experiment with the driver. Was hoping to find info about mod options and current regulation. Wondering if changing resistor values changes voltage output or current output.

If anyone know anything about the driver in Post 30 above, please tell me.

The resistor under the R300 is a 271 ohms. Odd.

Well, I tried different resistor combinations, but could not get current to increase. Replacing the stock resistors with an R200 yielded the same current but no modes other than high. The driver does not like having 2S cells. Only gives a moonlight mode of .04 amps. After trying 2S, the driver modes changed to High, moonlight, strobe.

Even out of the light, the modes are wonky at times.

It looks like the driver should not be altered and just kept as a 300mA single Ni-mh driver. Good for run time. I think for gifting purposes, I will just yank the mode chip and to yield a one mode driver. Have to take some pin readings to figure out how to do that.

Hi,

CFBOW chip seems to be PAM2805 (ds) or its clone.
Hope that helps.

Best wishes

Thank you ericandor. I went to that site and searched for one with the label "ECA1R" with no luck. I will try again tonight.

I assumed the chip is functionally the same and pulled the chip. When I shorted the Vin and Vout pads no light came one. I'm in a rush. So I will try again tonight. Maybe the chip is needed for other parts of the circuit too. Looking at the diagram in the data sheet doesn't indicate to me it's necessary.

Thank you again.

My mistake…

That is what I have found regarding PAM280*
(X - internal code, Y - year code, W - week code)

CD X Y W - PAM2801 - single mode, 1W
CF X Y W - PAM2803 - single mode, 3W
EC X Y W - PAM2805 - 3-modes (100%/25%/STROBE), 3W
EE (?) X Y W - PAM2806 - 5-modes (100%/25%/50%/STROBE/SOS), 3W

So it seems that CFBOW is actually PAM2803, and ECA1R is PAM2805.

(added info about 2806 and modes)

I believe that 320mA is max you can get out of 1xAAA NiMH.
If you look at the PAM2805 specs, you will see that to deliver 350mA emitter current it needs to pull around 2A from AAA (at 1.2V).

Try to replace resistor with higher value one, eg. 1 Ohm should give you 95mA emitter current :wink:

Thank you again ericandor. Very good info.

There are some AAA drivers marketed at 500mA drivers, but I have never tried to measure them. I guess just means they are capable of delivering 500mA if the cell could deliver it. Or, it's just marketing hype.

What you say makes sense though because current starts dropping to around 270mA soon after start up. It's not thermal sag because I can let the emitter cool off and the current will still only be 270mA using the same cell.

I will take all the info you gave me take another crack at the light tonight. It sounds like this driver might be fairly efficient. I need to measure input current to verify.

By the way, welcome to the forum ericandor!

What would you recommend, this one or:
http://www.dx.com/p/319073
?

I like them both, but I favor the Jexree Mini because it's shorter, lighter, has a bigger reflector, has a stronger clip and is a twisty. I think it is quite a bit brighter, but I haven't compared side by side yet. I just need to figure out how to fix the wonky mode switching in the Jexree. Pretty sure I will just turn it into a 1 mode. I want these to be good gift lights that run on Ni-mh.

At $4.67 each, I can buy a new driver if I have to and still have about the same cost. I'm really surprised that the price. Seems well made and the finish is proving durable too. Glass lens and aluminum reflector too.

Check BLK capacitor, I guess that it is used for mode switching, strobe and dimming.

I saw that in the data sheet and wondered about that. I don't know how to test a capacitor. I didn't test if for continuity, but it looked well soldered. Pretty much everyone that has got this light has commented on the mode switching. So I'm thinking its a issue with that mode chip.

Maybe they all have bad caps. I do have a bunch of 1uf smd's. I could try to swap in one tonight.

Hey, do you think pulling the BLK cap will make it pretty much always come on in High mode?

EDIT: I'm wondering if I fried the BLK cap last night with too much heat because mode switching was not that bad once I fixed the driver seating.

I think I will try as you advise and check into that cap. Afterwards, I may swap in 10uf caps on the input and output since the data sheet indicates that bigger will be better. I don't know what is on the driver stock. I'm assuming they used min. acceptable per the data sheet.

Another interesting item. The data sheet indicates the chip can take 6V max.

It depends on default mode of that chip :wink: I have came across ones which has STROBE as default.
I have never really done that, but most likely it would be needed to short BLK pin to GND.
(Just search BLF for “next mode pencil hack”).

I think that swapping it with known value one should be the easiest way to verify that :).

Thanks again ericandor. Will try cap replacement first. I will report back on results after I work on this tonight.

The more I read the data sheet, the more I like this chip. I need to see if the driver followed the placement recommendations in the data sheet.

No problem! Can’t wait :slight_smile:

Check PAM2801 spec, it is really interesting!

Diode used is 1A (2A recommended), inductor is 3.3uH (4.7uH recommended) and so on…

Well, tonight was frustrating. At the end of yesterday, the light only had high mode and occasionally a firefly mode. I figured I may have partially fried the modes chip. I think the undersized inductor and diode may also be interfering with mode changes. They are probably also limiting current with 2S Ni-mh cells. Highlights:

  • Swapped the stock caps with known good 1uF and 10uF caps. Didn't improve mode changes.
  • I swapped the resistor for a R100. Current with 1S AA was still 310, 470mA with 2S cells. Should have been able to hit 750mA. Modes stayed the same.
  • Swapped in a Nichia 119H while putting the light back together.
  • Checked tail cap current of the assembled light and only got 1.3amps of current on high (Long stock DMM leads probably really reduce current. Funny thing, the modes returned including strobe.
  • Pulled out another light that had not yet been used or changed. It only had one mode for whatever reason. Inspected the driver and noted no visible issues. Swapped the caps and still only had one mode.

I plan on still playing with the driver. Like you alluded to ericandor, the inductor and diode are under rated for this modes chip. I'd like to upgrade them and see what happens.

Correction to diode markings that I posted earlier. It has two marks. At some angles a large "S4" is visible and it covers almost all of the diode top. From straight above, there is a small 6 after the large "S" and there is and 82 going side ways on the end of the diode that does not have the polarity lines.