Just back from very successful camping expedition with the kids, and used the BLF A6 amongst others. However, am looking for something with an even lower moonlight mode, which I can use to hang in the tent to give just enough light to make out people by, but not as light as the BLF standard. Suggestions, either for new driver software, or for another light, that will do the job? The camping lantern style (one was discussed here a while ago) would also be ok, if it runs very very low too……
(note that 18650, or at least LiIon is probably preferred, for compatibility and longevity - it will be used for normal flashlight duties too).
With the lowest of lows, you could get days of continuous light out of even Alkaline AA light. There are firmware available to get an ultra-low moonlight (firefly) mode. ToyKeeper is the one who made the BLF A6 firmware, and she loves ultra-low modes. You can look through her Flashlight Firmware Repository and see if there’s anything you like. The repository has firmware created by herself and others. Another one who would be able to help you out is Tom E. He also has written firmware which includes super-low modes. There are lots of others around. I’m sorry I’m not one of them. But, maybe this will help you know where to look at least.
I’ve got a couple NitEye (JetBeam) Eye10 lights and they have the lowest output of anything I own by far. It’s a smaller 1x18350 EDC rotary, and the 4 lowest settings/clicks are still dimmer than most moonlight/firefly modes in other lights.
thanks for some of the suggestions - as the torch needs to undertake ‘normal’ duties too then the firefly-only solutions are less useful to me - something else to lose! - but good to see them anyway as they are food for thought……
Please check the OP of the Q8 thread.
Tom E has developed Narsil, firmware that lets you choose your own moonlight brightness and set it to the ultra low 0.1 lumens
You need a AT85 based driver.
If you have a little patience we will publish (Pilotdog68) a newer version of the driver board on Oshpark.
The V1 Q8 Narsil driver already works stable so you could build one with that availabel board and the parts mentioned in the Q8 thread.
Yo need a SRK of soupcan light that accepts 46mm drivers and has a sideswitch, there are several of those.
If you find two others in the EU you could do a buy with them.
Oshpark has a minimum of 3 board to be ordered.
A lot have a SRK kind of light and I think some of them will want a Narsil driver for it.
I’ll give you a few suggestions on production lights.
The two lowest lights I own or have owned are the Jetbeam RRT01 and the Armytek Tiara A1 Pro. The Jetbeam has a magnetic control ring, that you can turn until the LED has the slightest of glows. I lost this one a few years ago, and wish I still had it. It’s kind of expensive though. The Tiara A1 Pro also has a ultra low Firefly 1. Actually one other light, no longer in production is the Flex Candles Asgard. You could program it for an insanely low, low. To bad the driver and Bluetooth were flaky in that one.
Otherwise, the Armytek Prime lights or Zebralights all have lows. I too, am like you- the BLF/Astrolux light don’t go low enough for my taste. Those moonlights were a compromise to please more people. But yeah, Zebralights and most Armyteks are known for their ultralow moonlights.
Yes that is a neat light, for $20 one get a copper version that is a real gem.
True have a ALU besides one bed and the copper besides another nowadays highly useful low mode!
The StarryLight DXM has a magnetic switch that lets you pull the LED down to sub firefly mode. 26650 runtimes and fully waterproof (it is a dive light) would work too. There is some parasitic drain from the magnetic switch, so between camping trips, just half turn unscrew the tail to lock it out…
There is visible PWM on the DXM. I normally do not like visible PWM, but this is a lot faster than stock cheap drivers. I mostly use this on high or low… the sliding switch is easy to use. In reality, I tolerate the fast PWM better than I thought, especially since I swapped it to a 7A tint…
As for the low… Incredibly low, like sub firefly low if you play with it a bit… Barely glowing phosphor with night adjusted eyes low…
HERE is the thread that led me to purchase my first one… Some pics to show how low it can go…
The A6 has an FET+1 driver, the +1 is a 350mA 7135 chip. These are programmed with the standard 0-255 set and typically have to have a setting of 3 or 4 to work reliably. And there’s the rub, you might could fine tune your specific driver for an ultra low moon but to set the driver up so that they all work is a different story. Some need a setting of 5, some will come on at 2.
I’ve seen some triples on a straight FET come on with a setting of one, the lowest possible (even a couple that glow with a setting of zero, you have to have a lock-out switch or unscrew the tube to completely kill em. My Noctigon Meteor is like that)
So it wasn’t about appealing to the masses, it was about getting reliable function out of all the drivers produced. Use a lesser cell, plop a Panasonic B in there with it’s 3400mAh capacity, and moon will also be lower, not just turbo. I guess you could also put a resistor between the pin and the mcu on the chip to further reduce it’s output, you’d have to play with it to see what allowed the emitter to come on, but it should be doable…
Measured the PWM frequency today (oscilloscope). 488 Hz. That is relatively low and very audible when lighting up a black surface from close.
Still, it is a compact, well-made, 26650 light and I even bought a second one. Very low low as noted. Tint is not bad, nothing is glued so easy to swap out parts. Mine measures 1000 lumens, 16.3 kcd.
Only cons are the parasitic drain (and with the hall-effect sensor there are not many/any driver upgrades available). And the low frequency PWM.
