Will write a review at some point. Meanwhile here are some pictures. The threads were lightly - i.e., correctly, lubricated which is nice. It came in a huge box that could have held four of these.
The business end. As you can see, an EZ900 XR-E. The reflector does not fully tame the Cree ring till about 2 metres. You'll never notice it unless white wall hunting. The dust on it wasn't there when it arrived - it has been knocking around in my work bag since it arrived.
Other side of emitting end. Soldering is neater than I usually manage. Humans in China are almost always cheaper than machines. These were almost certainly hand-soldered. There's enough for the threads to bite in to which should make contact reliable - this is a very big issue on the older ones. In fact the extension tube has a lot more threads than the older ones and appears not to be compatible with them though the threads are the same - this version is way better.
The long, slender light with its cells to keep it company. I'm not fond of the 2AA form factor but this one is neater than most.
We have a cupboard under the stairs at work with no lighting - this was just fine to light it up for myself, a nurse and a patient while we looked for an electric candle. (Don't ask)
The tailcap. It does tailstand and would tailstand better if the lanyard were removed. It was tailstanding on top of a door for the ceiling beamshot. Slightly unusual these days to see a plain black, non-GITD switch cover. Not sure if I'll put a more colourful one in there or not. At least no weird date codes or anything on this one.
Other end of the switch assembly - not had it apart yet. Pretty standard fare by the look of it.
Nothing appears to be glued - apart from the reflector that appears not to want to come off the LED.
More disassembly
Single cell configuration (Under an hour's runtime). Seem better (or at least deeper) engraving. I sorta like the subtle effect it gives. Having dug out the trusty 30x magnifier, the engraving and painting is very sharp - much better than usual. I think the engraving was deliberate but until there are more of them out there it is hard to say.
Just to show that it works.
That lot was much more fun than the rest of my day. I really should have stayed in bed and phoned in for hibernation leave - it would be handy not to have to come out till the squirrels do. But I doubt they'd pay me....
Dragged out a few lights into the cold. Sadly the moon came out to play - terrible light pollution just above the apple tree. Took the new C3 with two NiMH, an old C3 with 2 NiMH and the Hugsby P32 with an NiMH
Control - quite dark and cloudy despite its being a full moon a couple of days ago.
New C3. The washing line shows up nicely. I got sick or rubbish rope and replaced it with some LSZH solid core ethernet cable. That stuff doesn't rot or break and means I know where to go when I need some thin copper wire.
New C3 pointed at top of apple tree - guesstimated as about 60-65 feet. The base of the apple tree is measured at 17m - a bit over 50 feet. The apples are very, very sour and won't be ripe till late November/early December.
Control 2 - "the moon has put his hat on, hip, hip, hip hooray, the moon has put his hat on and he's coming out to play". Wonder if the non-Brits know that one?
Old C3 - also running two Eneloops. Same exposure for all of these shots - as you can see there is a large difference. The old C3 is pulling 2.5A from a pair of Eneloops so with an amp more it is pushing a lot less light. On the lightbox it is giving me 725 lux or about 130 lumens - best I've got is 140 with 2 NiMH - the cells tested were the ones used in this light for these shots.
Aimed at the top of the tree
Control 3 as the moon comes out to play still - or rather the clouds which have comprised my view of the sky for most of the last week have decided to have a rest. That is actually only a tiny part of the moon visible.
Hugsby P32 High - again on NiMH
This time aimed at the top of the tree
The low is barely worth showing as it doesn't look much different from the control at this exposure.
Yes, the abysmal Website is what’s keeping me from ordering a lot of stuff from them. When it comes to DIY parts, they have a much better selection than DX, but it is really hard to find what you are looking for. Even text search won’t work properly because a lot of the product names are misspelled. Pity, really…
Yep, me too, -1 for KD's website. Their search function is awful, and they have no sorting capabilities for anything.
In my case, my billing address and shipping address are different. KD turns it into an ordeal that requires manual intervention by a KD worker. Focalprice has the same issue, although their website is a million times nicer than KD's.
Thanks for the pictures, Don. I guess I’ll have to add a couple of C3s to my collection. For some reason, I’ve always been partial to grayish or red brass finish and on more than once occasion, I would have bought a light if there had been some option other than black. I guess Henry Ford and I would not have been drinking buddies.
As for the DX bug, it’s an old one. I’m not sure if they fixed and recently reintroduced it or if it’s still unfixed but the problem has been around forever. I vaguely remember Astroitboy saying that he had it on his to-do list about a year or a year and half ago but it never bothered me enough to follow up on it.
I don't see any other AA powered lights in the list. Did I miss something?
Don, do you have an UltraFire WF-606A to compare? Mine is brighter than my 504B R2, but my 504 has a slight green tint. My 606A is a real beast but after reading recent reviews, it seems that this is yet another once good light turned to crap in recent builds. Sadly, that seems the way of many Chinese lights.
I do, and it is pretty well made. However it is an old one with a Luxeon 3 LED and isn't all that bright by today's standards. Modding it felt like more trouble than it was worth.
The front bezel simply unscrews on the 606A and the lens and reflector drop out, exposing the led. Maybe plop an xpg in there (only 2 solder connections) and run it off the stock driver. People have been running xpg's at 2.2A without issue (in flashlights) so even if its over driven (and I suspect it will be), it should survive well enough with heatsink paste behind the star in the current design. Im running a xpg in one of my lunapower MRV's (2.35A at the tailcap) and its just a tad less bright and floody than a well driven P7, but with more throw, less heat and longer burn time. More fun added to the arsenal!
I doubt the original driver even hits an amp - Lumileds LEDs rarely got driven at over 700mA. A driver swap as well would be a pain, especially if you want to keep CR2 compatibility - mine doesn't like RCR2s. I have a couple of bare R5s which it might be possible to fit on an old 20mm star. Most lights of that generation used 20mm stars.
With a bit of fiddling and reflector cutting it might be possible to get both of them into it which would be a fun light with a driver swap. Rather hot runnning though.
The 2 lumiled flashlights I modded were about .7 or .8A stock. Because of the reduced resistance of the xpg, they both now push over 2A and they are both completely different designs with stock drivers. Obviously not truly current regulated but most cheap drivers arent. Also, the stock MRV pushed 1.05A with the xre and now pushes 2.35A with the same driver on xpg. I think a 16mm star would work well in your 606, be pushed HARD and allow you to center it perfectly where the 20mm came out. You could remove the 606 reflector and place it temporarily over one of your other xpg powered lamps to test the beam pattern before hand. Just hold it in place with your hand, turn on the light and you'll know very quickly what to expect, or what shimming/trimming may be required. I suspect you would be very happy with this mod if all goes as Id hope. Of course these are only suggestions. IMO, The 606 sure is a fine light to not have in operation and appreciated.
I also had similar experiences with my SS C3 xpg mod here - from xrc, no driver swap and more amperage being pushed through the stock driver. Im very happy with all my xpg mods and they were so easy to accomplish. Without the xpg's they'd still be sitting in in a drawer or gifted to someone who wouldnt use them either. Another benefit is that most of my hosts have a superior build quality when compared to the same trashy models they are trying to sell today.
That's useful to know - may just dig out the soldering iron and play. But I'd better finish the balance harness and holders for 6 18650. More to discharge them for storage since it then becomes easy to charge them up 6 at a time.