Roche F6 hacking

It’s not scary ’till it comes on in your pocket. Think of it as a light saber with a focus problem.

With the non-ramping UI, if the button gets mashed in a bag or your pocket and stays mashed it just steps down all the way to off and stays there.

Here is my F6.
Finally it is now the perfect flashlight for me, thanks to @comfychair who helped me a lot with driver, flashing and now with the idea to fill the hole with an 3mm LED that I’ve glued there:

Out of curiousity, what firmware / UI style are you using?

He's using this: http://75.65.123.78/ramp_v07/

Color mixing from the status LEDs works better with the little optical pickup trimmed off flush with the ID of the driver cavity. I used a tiny little ball-end diamond bit, that also leaves a good scuffed-up finish that acts as a diffuser.

@ToyKeeper
Yes, I am using that one with ramping and it is the perfect one because it also has short press for on/off and memory.

Okay, I was just wondering… because I didn’t quite finish tweaking the ramping UI before I got interrupted by a work trip, and I haven’t gotten back to it yet. It’s pretty close; just needs some fine tuning on the ramp curve.

The levels I used in that one linked up above are:

0,1,1,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,10,12,14,16,19,23,28,34,41,49,58,68,79,91,103,116,130,145,161,178,196,215,235,255

That pattern, odd as it may be, works surprisingly well - and really well on the SRK-DD boards using the inductor.

The pattern in that one increases each mode over the previous one by:

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 20

Thanks. I pulled in the changes you made, and included it as a preset in my version.

That ramp pattern you made is a quadratic or “x squared” shape. It’s much closer to visually-linear than the logarithmic pattern I was using, but spends a bit less time at the lowest levels.

The new version I just pushed has a few updates:

  • Made ramping UI support both fast and phase-correct PWM. (compile-time #define)
  • Added explicit support to turn off PFM with a #define. Saves space but makes the bottom few levels get a stair-step effect.
  • Improved instructions for compile-time configuration.
  • Added more pre-defined ramps for various configs, including Comfychair’s 40-step quadratic ramp, a 64-step cubic (visually linear) ramp, and a 40-step logarithmic ramp with PFM.
  • Made PWM/PFM setup code clearer and more compile-time moddable.
  • Made the default ramp one which goes extremely low and uses PFM.

The default ramp now is 40 steps, uses fast PWM, uses PFM for smooth steps between PWM levels, and goes extremely low by abusing PWM=0. I’m measuring just 0.1 lumens with a Sanyo 20R at 4.18V. It can ramp to several levels under 5 lumens, yet still goes all the way up to 1800 lumens. However, this extra-low moon is extra-sensitive to voltage, so at 3.6V it’s virtually no different than “off”. And at that low a voltage, the stair-step pattern returns somewhat.

In any case, it should be a bit easier to configure now, goes much lower, shouldn’t have an audible hum if you enable fast PWM, and I’ve tested several predefined configs to make sure they work.

So are you saying the one from BG has more room in the driver compartment than the one from FT?

It’s worth mentioning that comfychair has been absent for about 4 months. You might not get a reply.

Well that’s a bummer. Maybe somebody else can answer?

I accidently crushed my roche f6 microswitch by tightening the brass ring way too tight. Does anyone know where i could buy or harvest a new switch to solder in?

Also, has anyine tried a dedome or xp-g2 on copper to get more throw from the f6?

phsinvent - sorry, cant' help bout the switch, but you may want to consider a whole driver replacement now. I just received my "Roche F6" from FastTech and got one labeled Convoy F6. The glass breaker won't thread in, and when I tried applying pressure to thread it on, the whole SS end cap popped out, and can't seem to securely get it back in and stay. I opened a support ticket with FT on it. Below are pics I included in the ticket.

Also, the way the modes work on mine (seems to be variations out there), is hold to turn on, click to change modes, hold longer to turn OFF. While on in any mode, double click will go into strobe with a click to return to normal mode. Weird - the light works with the end cap removed because the spring is held in by a ridge in the tailcap.

Now I dunno if the Roche OSHPark board I ordered will even fit... Have to check measurements... It's not bad stock though. Mode operation is decent, modes are well spaced. I measured:

On a fresh charged LG HE2: 1.92A tail, for lumens, Hi: 595 @start, 578 @30 secs, Med: 204, Lo: 54, throw: 4.8 kcd - 128 meters

Someone linked this earlier, but looks like BlackShadow is the OEM, but makes several brand names. Light is listed here: blackshadow.en.alibaba.com/StarryLight_SD01

All of comfy's pics are gone - does anyone have any idea on how to assemble the Ferrero Roche driver? comfy's post #175 has the OSHPark board link and the DigiKey parts cart - now I just need something to tie them together...

I could take a shot at reverse engineering once I get the boards - trace and guess...

Thank Tom, Where could I even begin to find a new driver for these F6 lights?

I can’t believe you got a Convoy F6. The whole flashlight manufacturing business in China is strange. Blackshadow was the first honest company that I had ever dealt with. They did confirm that they did not make their SD01 flashlight. They said it was another manufacture and they were offered a good price so they decided to distribute it. All of the other companies will lie through their teeth and say that they make all their lights. Convoy does not make their own lights. I have seen the F6 come from a few sources. Soshine used to have a flashlight called the TC2 or T1 or T2 that was the same as the Roche F6. But I have also seen the F6 from other factories. There is two mystery factories that produce the Roche, Convoy, Shadow, Jax and EagleEye lights.

Most of the components are marked. Resistors for low voltage protection: 19.1 = 19.1K, 4.7 = 4.7k. C = capacitor. Diode is marked with the diode symbol to show orientation. R3 and R4 are not usually needed. D1, D2 are indicator leds with R1, R2 as the resistors for each respectively. The values for R1 and R2 depend on what color leds you use and how bright you want them. Ground for D1, D2 is towards the 4.7k resistor.

Parts are the usual for attiny13 drivers.

Edit
I see comfy’s digikey cart also has the indicator leds and resistors. The red led would get the higher value resistor. Since red uses a lower voltage it needs a higher resistor.

Thanks Halo for the info - ahh, makes more sense now. Guess would have been somewhat obvious having the board in-hand and tracing - I usually trace out these boards anyway since getting burned by mis-labeling.

phsinvent - uhh, guess the only replacement is the Ferrero Roche board from OSHPark -- the one I have coming in soon (work and parts though to build up and program). Think I read Dr Jones never finished his F6 board, not sure though - maybe he did by now.