My opinion on xhp70 (in supfire L3)

I got this thing together, finally, after a lot of setbacks and failed attempts, and all I can say is WOW!

i don't know who all said this light isn't a thrower, but my opinion is that you are wrong. It may not have a super tiny super bright hotspot, but it DOES get light pretty dang far down range. Not only does it get light way down range, it LIGHTS UP EVERYTHING down range. Comparable to my super yz-t08, if the yz-t08 had a hotspot the size of a barn, like this light does.

I don't exactly have the kinks worked out yet, the supfire L3 has really really, really poor heatsink capabilities, so on high mode it only stays super bright 4-5000 lumens for ~3 seconds, then it quickly fades to a blue tint. with the reflector off the point where it fades to blue is when the led would be sliding out of place on the pcb. I have the reflector pinning the led in place touching the corners only for a temporary fix until I can drill the top of the pill and insert a solid copper slug of some sort to help pull the heat from the led.

anyway, I just had to post my take on the xhp70's since it seems like everyone here keeps running them down and calling them flood only emitters. They do flood but they definitely flood far getting more light further than the best throwing 4.5A xpg2 or 7A xml2 light I own, and I've had several in many shapes and sizes.

the "cross" section isn't exactly a cross at all in this light, there is definitely a black spot in the middle of the hotspot but there's SO MUCH light that it's easy to deal with.

All I did was use a 5/16" drill bit to drill out the center hole of the reflector, the led goes in the hole with about 1mm clearance around it, but the base of the reflector is actually sitting on the 4 corners of the emitter right now. I soldered 2 20mm sinkpads together and it's still not enough heat sink so I'll have to get that fixed sooner or later, for now even medium mode (25%) is more than sufficient and brighter/thrower than an xintd FET direct driven at 6A+

Do you have any comparison beamshots? What driver are you using?

I didn't get any pics last night but I can try to get some tonite if I have time. I'm using a 20mm Zener mod FET driver from mtnelectronics.

Beamshots are appreciated, but of course I wouldn’t run it blue anymore. Save the high mode for after you improve heatsinking.

I see that you graduated from the mwfire School of LED Reflowing. :smiley:

I recently completed the same build with my son Owen, and i agree its awesome, he named it the Owenator. a couple of suggestions:

1) the light actually has pretty good heatsjinking, its not heavy so it does heat up fast but i can run mine 90 seconds on turbo before it automatically steps down. Did you use arctic alumina to set the Noctigon to the aluminum pill ? if so did you compress it well while it cured so that it is very thin ? you need to do both of these things to get the thermal path well connected. here is a hint, the xhp 70 dome fits perfectly in the stock reflector so put thermal adhesive on the pill set the noctigon in place and put the light together so the reflector pushes down a bit on the LED. this results in a perfectly centered and set led. then proceed to step 2.

2) I had the dark center on mine as well. I got rid of it by milling out the reflector so it fits tight to the pill. The reflector has a raised portion that actually sits on top of the emitter. once you remove it the emitter will be further inside the reflector and the dark spot will be gone.

I initially measured mine at about 60kcd before and now the beam is tighter and ill bet its more like 80 or 90, quite a bit more throw than my xpg2 dd m43 now. Ill take a photo and measure throw when i get home tonight for you.

Cheers

hahahaa! So true.

Use aliminum foil tape or copper foil tape on the threads of the pill and you’ll get better heat dispersion out to the heat sink. The threads are a bit loose on that model least mine was and the tape helped a lot.

Good luck!

I'll definitely put some arctic compound on the threads, I didn't think about that, thanks!

What I did was solder two 20mm copper stars/sinkpads together (sanded the while top off one with a flat surface and elbow grease) then drilled two holes opposite each other into the pill, put down the arctic compound and used two tiny screws(extra convoy S series pocket clip screws) to hold the star down tight to the pill. I'm afraid that if I try to set the LeD further inside the reflector I'll lose throw.

I took some beamshots vs the yz-t08 and uploaded them to the flashlight fanatics Facebook page. I think I would be more of a hassle than it's worth to upload them here, really don't have that much time atm. If somebody doesn't have Facebook and really really wants to see them I can try to make time later.

!!

this increased throw. also not sure what you did but with your emitter but you just need to adhere your noctigon to the pill with thermal adhesive and it will work fine.

anyone ever get beamshots of this and also what does the inside look like where the MCPCB and driver go?

On Sale with RMM

Just curious, why not use an Mt-G2 which has a lower Vf?

Ok, the xhp70 quit working last week. Sucks, but what can I do.

i JUST swapped a xhp50 in its' place. It's mounted to an xm 16MM noctigon board which was soldered, both sides sanded flat on a table, to a 22mm copper noctigon star, which had thermal paste between it and the pill.

This xhp50 is getting hot and turning blue. This time I stopped immediately. I got my craftsman clamp meter out and tested the amps. It starts off at 4.5A or so when it first gets on high mode, then immediately starts a steady slow climb. Keep in mind I did this twice and it had plenty of time to cool between tests....

when the amp meter gets to 6.9A, the LED starts turning blue, and as the ampmeter numbers grow, the darker the shade of blue.

It is my belief as of now that the XHP's just can't take the power. I will be building a zener modded 4.5A driver and see how that works out... Will keep you posted.

PS......the throw is still outstanding! Hotspot is much tighter with the xhp50, not sure if thats a good thing or not yet.

Strange mines still running fine at over 10 amps. I made another in a 2 cell aspheric and used the LD-2 driver with the temperature regulation. With new batteries it steps down to medium pretty quick….usually less than 15 sec from cold. When the batteries are less charged this
goes up considerably. How long did you run continuously before it turned blue ?

geez I’d be mad if I ruined one of those emitters! my 3x XHP50 temperatures are almost stabalized at 105 C on a 6” piece of 2” aluminum square tubing. I wonder what kind of temperature yours reached? Cree rates the 50’s at max junction temp of 150C that’s hot!

I might get 10 seconds before it starts fading to blue, probably more like 3-5s seconds though. It's hard to tell, my adrenaline starts pumping every time I hit the switch.. lol.

So with that temp control driver, the led can't be maintaining a constant 10+A if it's stepping down quick, what's the amps drop to after it steps down?

I said the LED's can't take the power, what I should have said is that these LED's can't handle the power with such poor heatsinking. I've not had this issue in any other light including an mtg2 M2, but I know it has to be a heatsinking issue. I need this light to just work, even if it doesn't give me max output the LED is capable of... So I will find another driver that puts out what I think will be maximum safest lumens without frying another $15-$20 led, find a better host and try again with new components.

i'll try to get a temperature reading off the star, maybe I can rig the temp probe under the reflector on the star next to the LED and use the bezel without a lens to hold everything in place? I have a laser thermometer I use for powdercoating, I know it's fairly accurate up to around 450*, would I be able to get an accurate die temp reading with it?

I used a cheap ir thermometer on mine. The hot spot is kinda small on an led but it seems to work fine

Just got my L3 from richard and im kind of searching for what emitter/driver combo to use in it. Anyone have any suggestions?