[Mod] Convoy S2+ Mini - triple XPL with sideswitch *opinions needed*

Nice work, a few thoughts:

You could have used the pill from a S2 it is way shorter than the S2+ pill. Then make the top of the pill where the led goes flat and solder the noctigon directly to the pill.

Have you seen this thread? There the side switch is really discret.

Daggum! That is AWESOME!

A ton of work on that pill for sure…and with the extra mAh of the 18500 it probably won’t come on…blind everyone in front of you, then run out of battery :stuck_out_tongue:

Great build…keep up the great work!!!

I thought about doing the switch that way with an internally mounted tact-switch and a piston, but it would have made the light longer. One of the things I was trying to do was make it as short as possible… and the only way to do that was an external switch.

Did a bit more work on this light. Here are some updated pictures:

Switch cover and boot installed and painted and the tailcap switch removed:

I glued the cover on with arctic alumina. One disadvantage is if I want to remove the pill I’ll probably need to cut the epoxy and remove the cover so I can access the solder join on the tact switch. I think if I do that I should make a little plug for the switch wire to insert into. A plug would make pill access easy… I’d just need a tweezers or needle-nosed pliers to pull the wire out of the plug before unscrewing the pill.

Rear of the light showing the modified tailcap:

After removing the tailcap guts, I used a hacksaw to saw off everything behind the switch retaining ring. I left the brass switch retaining ring in and used it to brace a round copper end plate. The copper plate has a raised tab on the inside for negative battery contact. I glued the contact plate and retaining ring into place with superglue and then painted it.

I didn’t even realize I’d done it at first, but this light actually has no battery compartment springs at all. There’s a raised copper contact at each end. Battery contact is maintained just from screwing in the battery tube to the head. It feels very secure and makes a good connection so I think I’ll leave it as-is. This also allows the light to be super-short…. the entire light is just 72mm long!

A picture of the modified light showing its size.

Left to right: Kinoko IMR 18500 cell used by the modified S2+ mini, the S2+ mini, Zebralight SC52w, Sipik 68.

Here’s a picture with a heatsink installed.

I made a removable heatsink out of some copper sheet with soldered on copper strips and kester solder paste. In addition to absorbing and radiating heat, it isolates the hand so fingers aren’t so close to the pill. The heatsink allows for much longer runtime at max power. The downside is it makes the light heavier and doesn’t look as pretty.

You can also see from this picture that my paintjob on the heatsink and switch doesn’t quite match the anodizing. I may try going back and repainting it to see if I can get it closer. I think the paintjob on the tailcap is a closer match. When I painted this I manually blended acrylic water-based hobby paints, then brushed it. To provide a durable finish I applied a layer of brush-on super glue, then lightly sanded the glue with steel wool to reduce the gloss.

Still to do:

  • Make alternate 1x8650 sized tailcap.
  • repaint switch cover and heatsink to try for closer match to body anodizing.
  • consider reducing the height of the switch cover. As-is, the cover stands up fairly high from the light. It would look more graceful if it were flatter. Also after having used it a bit, I don’t think it needs to be raised quite so much around the button. I estimate filing down the bottom of the switch cover could reduce the height of the cover by 2mm.
  • consider making and installing an internal socket for the switch wire to make future driver and emitter swaps much easier.

I flattened the switch plate a couple mm. Here’s a picture:

This change made the switch around 2mm flatter so it doesn’t break up the line of the cylinder so much. The button is also less recessed and easier to press. Risk of accidental activation is higher, but it’s still a relatively stiff button.

I’m not happy with my paint job on the switch plate and heatsink. It’s durable, but it looks homemade. My paint methods work fine for painting something black. They even work ok for matching grey duracoat. But matching the beautiful metallic grey anodizing on the S2+ mini seems impossible.

I wonder if maybe I should just go with the polished metal look: remove the anodizing with greased lightning and sand off my paint job, then polish up the bare metal. I’d still probably need to use a little silver paint to hide the arctic alumina (or maybe replace the out layer of it with silver-colored epoxy), but that would be about it.

Looks a bit kludgey (as you stated) but I think you just created a homemade 18500 zebralight. That is pretty cool.

Agreed it really does look a lot like a Zebralight with the grey color, raised button housing and heatsink fins. It’s shorter and fatter than my SC52, but noticeably heavier due to the copper heatsink and larger battery.

It’s also ridiculously overpowered for such a tiny light. Without the heatsink on a fresh cell I figure I can run it for 10 seconds at max power before it gets too hot to touch under the head. With the heatsink I can probably go 30 seconds. Or perhaps a minute if I play “hot potato” with it and swap it back and forth from hand to hand.

Even at 25% power it’s noticeably brighter than my Zebralight SC62w at max power. It can be run continuously at 25%, but still requires “hot potato” especially when the heatsink is off. It’s a good thing I’m using a ramping driver with lots of steps (Dr Jones lumodrv with FET).

Here are some updated pictures:

Light with 2 external heatsinks added:

The larger heatsink at the front is made of copper with soldered on copper strips. The thinner one at the back is a single piece of aluminum sheet with slots filed in.

With both heatsinks installed the light is substantially heavier, but can be run at max power for much longer. I painted the heatsinks to try to match the anodizing. The paint significantly cuts down on heat conduction into the hand holding the light, but perhaps that’s a good thing as it allows the light to be used at max power much longer without getting too hot to hold.

Here’s a pic with just the thinner heatsink installed:

The thin heatsink is enough to absorb some heat from the head allowing the light to be run longer at max power, but not as much as the copper heatsink or the combo of both heatsinks. I think it looks better though. The ridges in either heatsink also help provide some grip.

Here’s a picture of the disassembled light:

I quite like how it came out. The paint job isn’t a perfect match to the anodizing, but it’s fairly close. Not really noticeable except on close inspection. As a pocket rocket this thing wows everyone who sees it. 2500 lumens from a light shorter than a Zebralight SC52. It’s my current EDC. :smiley: :bigsmile:

I think this light is mostly done. I’m not sure I’ll do anything else to it, but I’m considering the following additional mods:

  • File down the switch cover a bit more to try to make it a little smoother, but I’m not sure it’s worth the effort. The paint job on the cover is a very close match and I’m not sure I could get it so close on a second try.
  • Mod a second tailcap to allow the light to take 18650s, but that’s rather low priority at this point since 18500 is much shorter, lighter and more pocket friendly. And I don’t need the extra capacity.
  • Make a single piece heatsink sleeve out of copper with copper ribs that slides in from the back and covers the entire body tube and head (except for the switch). This would make the light slightly fatter and a lot heavier, but would allow even more prolonged use at max power. If I make it all of copper and put a matching copper ring around the tailcap the light could look quite pretty.

I filed down the switch cover an aluminum heatsink a little and repainted it. This is about the best I can do with the paints available.

The paint job on the switch and heatsink still just doesn’t match the anodizing on the body tube. The color is close, but the texture is off.

I’ve concluded that it’s pretty much impossible for me to get a perfect match with the anodizing with the paints I have available.

It looks ok from a distance, but still looks homemade close up. I have a few options at this point:

  • Option 1 - Leave as-is. It looks decent even if not great.
  • Option 2 - Paint the body tube in grey to match the paint on the head. It wouldn’t look great, but at least it would be uniform.
  • Option 3 - Paint the entire light black. The black is much easier to do well since I don’t need to blend any paints to match color. Also any imperfections in the texture are hard to see. From experience, the black paint just looks like shiny anodize.
  • Option 4 - Strip off all paint and anodizing and then polish up the bare metal. This is the most work-intensive option.

I’d have to disassemble the entire light to remove the anodizing, including removing the switch and switch cover, which are currently epoxied on. Then I’d have to soak the anodized parts in Greased Lightning to remove the anodize.

Removing the paint is also high effort. Every bit of it would need to be manually scraped and filed off. And it clings really well because of the layer of super-glue brushed on top as a finish. (Or I guess I could try soaking it in glue remover)

The light might look quite decent with bare metal. the switch cover body tube and heatsink are aluminum. The tailcap would have visible brass, copper and aluminum. I could use the other heatsink which is copper for more contrast. The only thing that would look a little off is the arctic alumina holding on the switch plate. I could replace that with shiny silver epoxy, but it still would never look as shiny as bare metal.

A second potential disadvantage is that without the layer of paint there might be to much heat conduction from the head into the hand holding it. This might further limit runtime on max power.

Anyone have an opinion?

Do you have any beamshots so we can see this thing punch a hole in the side of your garage like a Type X Phaser?

In my honest opinion,don’t try to hide your mods.Keep the original body as it is.Work with the small details like how the switch cover meets the heatsink and make the mods more visible with color of your choice (mine is aluminum).Enjoy your new “muscle flashlight” :wink:

S2+ originally has only sharp corners,I wonder if the switch cover would look more uniform if it had slightly sharper corners ?

My vote on option 1 - Leave as is: Has the look of a crack-pipe, but cool as f*ck

Awesome mod, love it! CNQG has really small switch covers and you can tint JB weld or clear epoxy to black with ordinary liquid shoe polish. I wish I were retired and had the time to do this more but it’s great to see what others come up with. Kuddo’s!

Very nice work, thanks for sharing. I look forward for the S2+ Ti version.

Not sure how I missed this but that is some awesome work!

Here’s a picture of the light with the final version of the heatsink I settled on.

The heatsink is made from a single piece of 0.064” aluminum sheet. I hand-filed each shot with a small file.

Nice!

Ok, you hand filed the grooves in your aluminum sheet? You, sir, need a hobby….

Seriously, your final light looks great, the workmanship may not live up to your internal standards, but it looks great… And the performance, that makes it all worth it.

Some beamshots would be great of course, but I have to applaud your ingenuity in this lights creation above all else, perhaps you and Hank from Int-outdoor could collaborate on a souped up version of the M43 meteor? Something like five more sets of triple emitters could be squeezed into the head with your skills, and then run it off of six 18500’s you shoehorned into a body 3mm narrower… good lord, the possibilities…

I’m not sure how I missed this thread from the beginning but I just went through the whole journey from a MacGyver light to Mad Max’s dream light. Well done!

love it!