BLF A6 FET+7135 Light Troubleshooting and Mod thread

Thanks, it is always even more rewarding when you do succeed after failing a bunch times :slight_smile:

About the gritty threads, i cleaned them with a toothbrush and greased them with some raw organic coconut oil. And now they are smoooooth :wink:

Coconut oil as thread lube?

I usually go with a teflon-based (PTFE) grease… though I’ve been lazy about it lately and have like a dozen lights I haven’t properly cleaned and lubed yet.

I have some “Super Lube” from The O-ring Store, but am going back to furniture wax with carnauba, bee’s wax and orange oil. It seems to be more slippery.

Yeah it works great, i don’t use thread lubes that are going to get close to my skin that i can’t eat, :bigsmile: and coconut oil dosen’t go rancid because of the mct component in it.
And if it gets on your skin it is an amazing skin oil.

I would never use fluoride based compounds(teflon) close to my skin, i don’t even use teflon based cookware only ceramic coated ones, stainless and glass, teflon is nasty toxic stuff :Sp

Interesting, furniture wax could be a good alternative.

I think i am going to experiment with some coconut oil, bees wax, jojoba & liquid lanolin oil combination to see if i can get a longer lasting and even slipperier thread lube.

If anyone wants to try, the trick is to heat them up together so they mix before gently cooling them down.

Doesn’t the non-conducting Lube increase the resistance?

(There is a post somewhere that even the supposedly conducting-lube is non-conducting.)

I don’t think lubricants increase resistance, because they are squeezed out where the metals touch. There is a thin film that may remain, but that doesn’t seem to affect resistance(?) They reduce corrosion that does add resistance, especially in things that haven’t been used for a while. I think lubrication also helps by slowing the wear of gold plating. The gold is another way of avoiding corrosion.

Weird maybe, but it seems after I Nyogel bare or close to bare threads, I always seem to get a little more out of the lumens measurements - same cells, everything else the same. Just did that last night, and I've seen it several other times. Nyogel is supposed to be non-conductive, but still seems like the best thing around. I'm so glad a while back I bought a large tube from a BLF member, who bought up a bunch of ol Motorcraft tubes for cheap.

For laughs:

“Forget conductive lube. It doesn’t conduct.”

“Comprehensive Grease and Lube Thread”:
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?242414-Comprehensive-Grease-and-Lube-Thread

As I said at that time, I am still thoroughly confused about non-conducting/conducting lube on threads.

Nyogel 760g is supposed to be conductive.

“NyoGel® products were developed for wide-temperature applications requiring water and salt-water resistance. The 774 series consists of silica thickened synthetic hydrocarbon of various viscosities depending upon how much mechanical dampening is required of various components. The damping greases also provide good water resistance.

The 756 series utilizes a silica thickened hydrocarbon that includes the incorporation of carbon black since it was designed to be electrically conductive for instrument and bearing applications.”

I'm probably wrong but it's weird: can't find any spec on it yet that says it's conductive.

Here: http://newgateonline.com/media/wysiwyg/Nye-TDS/TDS_NyoGel_760G.pdf

Here: https://www.armytek.com/products/accessories/grease/nyogel-760g.html

Here: http://www.nyelubricants.com/stuff/contentmgr/files/0/cd4ec0f4a93c98f4b26ce8e7fc8544e6/misc/760g_overview.pdf

Here: http://www.nyelubricants.com/nyogel

While we’re off topic, I would like to say that the lubricant thing is way overdone. The battery tube going into the pill up top should be left alone, dry contact between the two conductive components is best. At the tail, where the battery is removed to charge on a regular basis, only the smallest amount of lube to prevent the o-ring from tearing should be utilized. This will find it’s way onto the threads whether you like it or not, and will need to be cleaned regularly or you’ll be wearing black thread stripes. I try to keep it from being on the bare end of the tube and the contact point in the tail cap as much as possible.

I’ve had to repair lights where someone used way too much lube and the resulting black mess down in the tail cap virtually blocked the pcb from making contact. Thoroughly cleaned the amperage went up to the expected values.

Brylcream, a little dab’ll do ya. :wink:

NyoGel 756G—-Electrically Conductive

Obviously, too much of this can migrate into the driver and short it out. Not good.

It seems you are correct. 760g is not conductive, but the above site does not state that. On the other hand 768g is supposedly conducting, but the above site does not even mention the product.

Discussion on Nygel here:

As I said before, my observations with Nyogel 760G say something different with dependency on quality of threads a big variable in all this, but of course lubes like Nyogel 760G should be used lightly and maintained properly. I've never seen it turn dark gray on anodized threads like on Convoy's and Eagle Eyes or this Manker BLF A6 for that matter, but on bare alum threads that are frequently used, yes, of course the aluminum micro fragments will stick in the lube and build up with more and more usage, turning it into dark gray sludge, specially if it's over applied.

I did not specifically check output results with/without Nyogel on a stock BLF A6. I just take it for granted it's better with than without it from past experiences, but once in a while when I have checked it before/after, it's either equal or better after applied to both head end and tail end of the body tube threads.

Sounds interesting, but the discussion you all had after this post just made me confused :~

Exactly what kind of Nyogel are you talking about?

EDIT
I guess from post #356 the 760G kind?

EDIT2
At least Nyogel 760G looks to be pretty much non toxic.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ArmyTek-Nyogel-760G-Flashlight-Silicone-Grease-Cream-5g-/221391703670?hash=item338bf94e76:g:g1MAAOxyoVZTHylZ

EDIT3
It is almost impossible to stay away from something that could give an output boost so i think i will have to try it sooner or later.

Can you Tom E give a hint on the range we are talking about, is it about 1–2 when it does go up?

Here is an oddity that was first reported by markr6 at CPF.

Not sure it matters but mine is set to no memory, 4 mode. I guess that means I don't have "moonlight", but instead low. Shouldn't matter but maybe it does?

Using a naked NCR18650GA.

1. Turn light on with full click (now in low)
2. 3 half presses to get cycle to turbo
3. Let it sit for 45 seconds, watch it step down, wait a few seconds
4. Long half press to reverse cycle. It will go down to low (or first mode) but not any further (NO turbo>strobe>batt check>bike mode)
5. Turn light off for a bit, say, 10 seconds. Still won't reverse into special modes.
6. Wait another 10 seconds and everything works fine.

By following Mark's instructions, I was able to replicate this behavior.

Thanks, Mark.

I tested one of my A6 flashlights. It has the same bug!

I repeated the test, but entered Turbo mode directly from low. Same result. I also repeated the test in the mode group with 7 output levels. Same result.

One thing that seems odd is that the long half press in your step 4 seems to jump directly to low (4 modes) or moonlight (7 modes). I expected it to simply go to the next lower level. In the mode group with 4 modes, for instance, the lowest mode is level 1 and the highest mode is level 4. After the 45-second timeout in level 4, the light steps down to level 3. From there, a long half-press should go to level 2, not level 1.

Mine behaves the same in reference to turbo step down, except I don’t have the problem in your last paragraph.

ToyKeeper has programmed 3 press styles, a short press bumps modes forward, a medium press engages reverse, and a long press takes the light back to the beginning or in this case low. So it’s working exactly as programmed.

Waiting 10 seconds and seeing it repeat the process makes me think there is an issue with the off-time capacitor.

I think it's been said before the heat from turbo mode really messes with the capacitor. So click timing after running turbo is really whacky. I tried mine and got some weird results as you said but super fast clicks do run the modes forwards. Not necessarily a bad thing being that I've not really needed turbo for long periods let alone needing to go into strobe or bike afterwards.

Hey guys and gals,
My BLF A6 showed up today along with my blue Convoy S2+ host.

My plan was to change over the tail switch from the S2+ to the A6, but fortunately the whole S2+ tail switch threads onto the A6 tailcap. unfortunately the A6 tailcap does not fit on the S2+.
Mode switching and programming all work flawlessly.
Here’s the proof