I know it’s pretty much agreed that this really nice little light is sadly under-driven, and maybe I should have searched around a bit more before I posted this - but I figured maybe it’s worth having a dedicated post.
Is there a fairly simple DIY way to make the Z8 driver DD? I like mine too much as a nice piece of work that it sucks all it does is sit in a drawer.
I was already silly enough to de-dome the XM-L. Ridiculous idea in a non-reflector flashlight. :bigsmile:
Thank guys.
Yeah, de-doming would just hurt the throw and the output. :P
If you want to make it DD you could just get a blank 15mm plate and use that. (Or desolder everything on the stock board and use that)
Thanks. I’ll replace the LED sometime down the road when I have some more spending money and feel more confident. Scaru, I’ve never messed with the driver board before - not sure what to de-solder. And will that make it a single-mode light?
And all this said, do you agree that it would give me the most out of this little light in terms of brightness, albeit sacrificing run time and probably a lower LED life?
Essentially what I am suggesting is taking everything off the board so it is just a blank board. Then you can solder wires to go to the positive and negative on the LED.
Of course this will require an IMR battery.
Ahhh….gotcha. Maybe not worth the fuss for now. But good to know I can do something with it… Thanks Sir!
If you put an IMR in direct drive, wouldn’t that destroy the LED?
Yeah, still wondering what the limits are in DD… The regulation comes from the cell capacity at that point, right?
I’m not too sure myself, but in DD I think batteries which can handle current better usually perform better. And with an IMR, the current will keep increasing to 10A+ because there’s no driver to hold it back.
Never use LMR with direct drive, the internal resistance is too low, it will be able to push too much amps through and pop the LED.
And to direct drive, there's no need to remove any components. Pull off one negative LED wire (FROM THE DRIVER) and place it in contact with the body. I normally sandwich the bare wire between the driver/body. That's it, it will bypass the whole driver now. You can even change it back later if you want.
A 14500 IMR can only do 3.6 amps or so. When I shorted one to get max current out of it (dangerous, I know) it only went up to 4 amps.
Fogive any ignorance here. But I don’t find my Z8 under driven at all. It’s brighter than an sk68 on a 14500 (in flood mode) and while it’s no thrower the zoom function lets it throw as far/further than some of my other lights.
But my real concern would be heat. It’s gets pretty hot now, driving the LED harder is only going to make it get hotter and likely too hot to use.
Yeah right, I have Efest IMR 14500s that will easily max out the 10A setting on my DMM. IMRs in DD will pretty sure destroy the LED. Unless the stock switch limits the current. But why not just put a KD V2 driver in it?
10 amps? I want...
Dont expect too much, it wont drive an XML at 6A for more than a few seconds.