Itās the stock boost driver, it was (after some modifications tweaking restrictions) making 3600 lumens with 12 XM-L emitters. Now itās making 2974 with Samsung 26Fās. (I had LG HE-2ās in it with the XM-Lās)
There are 6 cells, 3 stacks of 2. The emitters are wired in series x 6, in 2 groups, with 2 channels on the driver. So I left the driver alone, upgraded the wires big time, spring bypass in the tail, and added brass rods in the teflon driver cover for ground to the battery tube.
They had 26 ga leads from the driver hooking up the positives on 3 emitters, and negatives on the other 3. (group 1) Then 32 ga wire jumping them for series.
I put 22 ga silicone leads from the driver, 20 ga teflon jumpers. The driver contact board is a familiar one, Iāve repaired lights that have had flat tops short out on it. This light they used a brass cup in a teflon or white nylon retaining ring that then let the ground rely on threads. So I put 2 brass 3/16ā rods through the nylon/teflon material to contact the ground ring on the driver and the battery tube sits on these.
Notice they claim 15,000 lumens! lol, it made 3200 when I got it out of the box. Actually it didnāt work when I took it out of the box, the driver is on a threaded plate which wasnāt screwed down snug, no ground contact.
Edit: Forgot, I also drilled and tapped the plate the driver sits on so I could screw the driver down. Nice and snug now. My Courui was set up much like this, very similar board, and gained 2+A by screwing the driver down.
1811 lumens from a XM-L2 U3 1A thats way more than i have ever hear someone reporting. Is it old stock or new?
The highest i have seen someone report on a U3 before i think was around 1500 & 5A thereabouts. For 1811 you would have to have more than 7A i would think, and i thought the U3 burnt out way before that :~
Please some more details, if this mean the good old XM-L2 is back at the high lumens game that would be very good news
Tom E recently got an T6 4C i think it was really high also, in Nitroās triple spacer order thread
I don't think that the XM-L2 was ever out of the high lumens game, but it was out of the high amps game. All of the M6s I've built with the U3s were as bright or brighter than all of those I built with U2s, despite pulling about 1A less each. The U2 1As at around 6.5A each would average about 4650 OTF, but a few of them broke 5000 OTF. With the U3 1As at around 5.3A each they are almost all doing 5000 OTF. So the average U3 build is about as bright as the brightest U2 builds were, and are also more efficient. Since OTF lumens and efficiency is what really counts, I am fine with them pulling less amps now.
Since I finished late last night, this will have to doā¦
My modified Fenix TK-75 at 4300 lumens
The 12 XP-E2 Torch Showerhead at 2974 lumens
Cajampa, I DID get this for the XHP-70 and Lum 5-90, but the head is SOOO shallow, thereās just no way without a lathe to make that happen. So I punted.
And yes, the 1811 lumen X6 is using a new XM-L2 U3 1A emitter. I first de-domed one, it was making over 1600 naked, so I put a stock one in and sure enough, over 1800 lumens!
On these Torch emitters, I really expected them to be on the blue/white side. But theyāre not at all bad, actually showing a nicer tint than the XM-L2 U3 1Aās in my TK-75. A pleasant surprise.
^ Whoa, that's got to be the tightest 12 emitter hot spot around. Can't wait to hear what you think about the spill and general usability of the light.
Is your final config DD using 2S3P cells and 2S6P emitters on copper?
Itās got the factory boost driver in it. But yes 2S3P on the cells, 6S on the emitter, in 2 groups. The driver has 2 channels, each channel has a positive and negative lead for the 6S set that it runs. There are 2 toroids as well, presumably one for each channel.
In a rather unfair side by side, I shot beamshots of the TrustFire 12x XP-E2 Torch at 97 yds and 610 yds against my new SupBeam K40 VN. This K40 was a gift by a couple of friends of mine and Iām blown away, nice guys, love the light.
TrustFire 12x at 97 yds.
K40 VN at 97 yds.
TrustFire 12x at 610 yds
K40 VN at 610 yds
Now, who would have thought a 12x showerhead light would be putting light on a barn 610 yds distant? The driver is stock too, going up against a highly modified thrower. Not too shabby says meself! lol
Do you have some kcd numbers on that TrustFire 12x? it looks surprisingly throwy for a showerhead light. And kcd & lumens on the K40 vn for comparison would also be interesting.
Thank you Dale for the follow up and the beam shots. I was just certain that you would swap out the boost driver for direct drive. I know you mentioned frying some xpe2's in that 4 up, but figured you'd give it a go in the 12 up. Now that I think about it, the 4 up was just one cell. So I see why would didn't go that way with 6 cells.
Hard to put the beam shots in perspective, without knowing emitter current but it would be a real pain in the arse to set up and measure in that light.
Just measure one of the two strings. Since they are in series all of the emitters see the same amount of current. With that boost driver it doesn't matter if you have 100% charged high drain cells.
With 3 of these Torch emitters left over, I got busy on an old project today. I used one of the Torch emitters on a 20mm Noctigon. I used the driver out of my new XR55 from Bangood, 7 7135 chips at 380mA. Engaging a star gives me L-M-H with no blinkies so Iām good with that. These went into a Courui D01 assembly, the head replaced with the massive Ledil Seanna. :bigsmile:
I didnāt even measure amperage, gotta be less than 3A, 2.8? So itās making some 200+ lumens, right? How about a 357Kcd throw from this little hot rod?