BLF17DD Info Thread - Reference

Thanx Richard for the info!

Yes - I bought a dozen of the SIR800P's at $1.50 each, so I'm burning through them. It's hard to say what's worth 75 cents, and I'm not sure if I'll continue buying them. Putting it in perspective of what the total cost of a full mod is, it's certainly a small part of the typical $12-$24 (driver, LED/MCPCB, UCL or AR lens, materials, etc.). I lack the time and maybe expertise to setup a proper test bench for comparing these FET's, so I really appreciate your experience and knowledge on this.

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Some very important tools/rules (hope it helps and not too late):

  • close-up work requires good magnified vision and good, strong lighting. A well lit room is not enough (from my experience).
  • you need magnified vision to wear (I wear contacts that are horrible for close-up work, but using glasses on top of them that are built-in magnified - from drug stores, DX, etc..., it works well)
  • I use a NiteCore HC50 headlamp for getting good lighting right where I need it
  • you also need a stronger magnifier for close inspections of solder joints, solder flow, etc. Better if it has it's own light source.
  • you need to carefully buzz out the board - pretty much all traces, before powering up the board first time
  • any surface mounts that must be in the proper direction (diodes), you must be certain you have it positioned correct.

It's certainly not for everbody - I could never have done it on my own without professional help I got from guys at work who know wayyy more than I do (super tech, EE's, etc.).

Of course this list is only partial... Probably could add a dozen more things...

Thanks a lot for the help!

I used one of those cheap ebay loops, which helped me to see that one of the legs of one of the components was just hanging in the air... put solder on there, and now its working..pffff

For this kind of stuff I use a stereo microscope, nothing beats that in seeing what you are doing.

I have one of these oldies (Olympus zooming stereomicroscope) , but any type will do a fine job.

I use a $4 magnifying loop from FastTech (fasttech.com-rotatable-25mm-40x-magnifier). Can't find a link right now for the glasses, but think I use reading glasses in the range of 2.0 to 3.0. You can get them at drug stores ($10-$60) or cheaper ones online.

You can go cheap and still practical Smile.

Bought a Radio Shack helping hands thingy a few months ago…. and NEVER USED IT!The glass is distorted bottle glass and the helping hands move about too much. P.O.S! Headlamp, aaa light, vice grip and a magnifying glass like what Tom linked to above are what I use. A needle nose tweezers are useful too but be careful! When a smd part pops out of those, they going flying off into oblivion!

Same here - I have a couple of those helping hands things and never used them. Can't figure it out, but same problems - mag glass is worthless and hands are too lose and unstable. I use a Harbor Freight desktop vice for just bout everything - with or without the rubber snap-ons, depending. The rubber snap-ons are now in real bad shape - too much distortions and damage from heating, filing, etc.

I bought a high end headlamp, Nitecore HC90 I think it is, helping hands, and of course I have macro lenses with full frame camera sensors that work in live view.

I don’t use any of it, merely take off my glasses and go to work. Sometimes when building just one driver or with limited time I hand solder the entire driver, solder paste masks be danged. I even spent good money getting a 1” thick piece of aluminum machined to fit on a 6” burner, it sits in my file cabinet.

I use the bevel tip that came on my Hakko, for everything. If it gets to not working I either scrape it off with my scissors or file it down then re-tin it. Supposedly you can’t do this, but it’s been working for me for 2 years. Don’t tell me what I can’t do, I might unknowingly succeed. :wink:

Yes, I know I bought few other things never wound up using.. But love my HC50 - nice wide coverage, use it on 3rd of 5 modes. Just wish it was more neutral tint than cool white -- looks like a bugger to take apart to mod. I really can't see as good without some sort of headlamp or extra light source, though I got 3 big flourescent fixtures in my small room - well lit. Before I used to use an 18650 tube light w/TIR optic in a NiteCore headband, but the headband would stretch out over time, and the light would end up drop'n right where I'm working...

How big host will you need to run DD? Will a Ultrafire/Convoy C8 be able to take the heat? Is there a chart somewhere that shows current and time with a good battery for this kind of driver?

Edit: Haha, Tom E is BLFs own little Sherlock Holmes with all his home made solutions. :bigsmile:

Smile The host size for DD is pretty much personal opinions but there's also a lot of contributing factors:

  • turbo timeout to run hi/turbo for only limited amt of time, or better yet, temp monitoring
  • outside temp. - winter outdoors at 20F may be just fine for DD in a thin tube light
  • battery dependent - don't want 6A? Ok, run a Pana PF that gives you only 5A max, or TrustFire Flame that gets you 4A max
  • don't use high/turbo modes too often - only short bursts. Use the next mode down for most usages
  • the max amps you will get is dependent on the LED/MCPCB - some are only capable of 4-5A max DD while others can go to 6.5A or so at the most (most I've seen)
  • thermal path, mass, heat sink/fins for the critical areas can vary - the bigger light isn't always the best
  • I'd recommend only an aluminum (not plastic) reflector lights for high amps for runtimes over 1 min. I've smoked plastic reflectors a little in a 16340 DD light (MXDL) doin bout 950 lumens in a neutral tint
  • might be ok for the head to get toasty, but probably not so good if the high heat gets down to the cell or any length of time
  • you don't have to have super high amps for all DD setups - keep LED wires small, don't bypass the springs and you'll reduce amps and heat

I got a 14500 size light, the G10 (dx.com/uniquefire-g10) doin bout 1,100 lumens with a 15DD driver, but actually it's a pretty chunky little light, big for AA size.

I got this for home use last year, and its the best 8 euros deal i had( bought it localy)

Modded the build in diodes with Nichias 5000k(5mm, 32k mcd)

That's a pretty darn nice setup, specially with Nichia's. Like it! Might be worth look'n around for.

Yeah TOm, the lens are glass ones( borosillicate, at least they stated so) the stand is high enough, has a build in 3xAA battery case, came with 220v adapter and a solder iron stand but i removed it
It has 6 emitters in that lamp but the default ones had a huge blue tint

For 8 euros its a great deal, prolly it could be found cheaper in the US( here we have massive taxes and VAT)…but even if it costed 15 i would buy it, i had several “third hands” bt this one is the best so far

Thanks to Tom E and his embossing gun idea this has been my set up for led reflows and one unsuccessful attempt at a driver build. It works like a dream for me reflowing leds. The helping hands are raised and lowered depending on how quick I want the item to heat up and how hot it gets.

The embossing guns wire clip stand just sits on the ally RHS and the gun removed without effort when not being used.

For anyone in Australia the gun came from Spotlight though compared to Chinese prices was not that cheap. The helping hands came from Jaycar at a real cheap price and have no issues with the magnifying glass that came with it. The small alligator clips are pretty flimsy though the way they are mounted in their holders but do the job. I also use the ally RHS as a spot to sit drivers etc when holding them in the helping hands to stop downward movement when soldering etc.

Oh crap! That's sooo much better than how I do it. Hhmmmm. Maybe I can use those helping hands... I gotta try it that way!

Why so complicated setup m8? I use the oven at 1( after approx 1 minute that plate is exacly at 200deg C) and a Cu plate from an old Athlon heatsink that has that thick Cu plate- never failed me so far, never! :slight_smile:

Ahh - nicer than my old beat up frying pan Smile.

My latest FET+1 batch of drivers:

I'm still doing everything with a cheap soldering iron (fail).