Nah, he’s just saying that he’s going to retire his lanterns, not himself. 
I think TK said it increases the idle drain on the batteries far too much.
This was a while ago, I might be wrong
Please count me in for 1 as well!
What batteries are you all planning to use for the LT1? Should I go protected/unprotected button top/flat top high drain/normal? Thanks.
I am gonna use unprotected high capacity button tops.
I have a set of Samsung 30Qs, as well as several laptop pulls that I have been gathering over time. It’s rather easy to make these functional in the LT1 by cutting the strap that’s spot welded to the + terminal and bending it over on top of itself. Now there’s enough metal to make a good (enough) contact, as the max current with all AMC7135s connected is only 2.5A.
As far as protected or unprotected,either will do. But the batteries do need some protrusion above the cell on the positive end to contact the ring on the driver board.
Yeah, you actually want button top unprotected cells, especially if it’s for an emergency.
There’s a pretty good argument against using protected cells for such an item: the internal protection circuit on the cells themselves draw current, which can make standby runtime of the 18650s suffer.
Just retiring the old other lanterns. 
i can’t retire yet for another 1000 years
I will be using Samsung 35E / 3500mah unprotected button top cells for all the LT1 lanterns.
10uA current draw for a protection circuit (arguably could be more in a cheap cell, but likely not), 3Ahr battery, discharge time is 34 years. YMMV (hope I did my math correctly)
Please put me on the list for 1
Thanks.
Good info. Thanks! 
Are you in the US or Canada? (we have a Canadian supplier offering a discount to all BLF members for the LT1 lantern for these high capacity cells, but not sure what sellers in the US are offering the 35E Samsungs for a good price there.
Yes, any continuous change or checking requires that the microcontroller be awake and running. A “breathing” mode needs the MCU fully awake, but a “heartbeat” mode could allow sleeping in between on/off switching (heartbeat brightness should be controllable via the on time). We typically want the MCU to stay in Sleep mode whenever the light is not actually “on” in order to reduce power consumption while it sits unused.
As is being discussed at great length :person_facepalming: in another thread which I will not utter here, lights with electronic controls are never truly “off” unless the power is disconnected via the tail or head or a secondary power switch, such as the tail clicky found on the Sofirn C8F.
It is fine to create a new mode where the light does what you have asked, but this mode would add drain to the batteries. It would still be less drain than the existing candlelight mode, but users might be tempted to leave the “breathing” running non-stop and this would drain the cells more rapidly. That is not so horrible if users understand the cost of using such a mode, but here we get into philosophical territory about user expectations .
If I were to add a breathing or heartbeat mode to a light, I would turn the mode off once the battery voltage dropped below nominal (~3.7V per cell) or perhaps below 33% (~3.4V per cell). I would not want to drain anyone’s cells empty just because they left the light “running” in this mode; best to leave some useful capacity for both emergency usage and the possibility of extended storage. This might also let the user know that they should charge the light to restore the breathing/heartbeat.
That logic could not be applied to any mode that most users would define as “on”, of course. Just my thoughts…
I’m in the US. I’ll just have to shop around a bit.
Remember, the LT1 needs button-top batteries. Or you can add solder blobs to the tops of flat-top batteries if you’re confident in your soldering skills.
Be sure to buy batteries from a trusted dealer. Steer clear of Amazon and eBay, and don’t be tempted by off-brand batteries.
ILLUMN is a respected and dependable US-based seller. Calvin from ILLUMN is a BLF member, too.
They currently have 3500 mAh Sanyo NCR18650GA button-tops for $5.99, with free shipping in the US for orders over $50.
Liion Wholesale is another great US-based seller. Their current price for the NCR18650GA is a couple dollars higher.
Great post :+1:
Once the LT1 goes into production & if Sofirn offers an option with good cells-included or not, i may add links for all US customers & Canadian customers looking for genuine HC 18650s. Maybe we can have other members from Europe & other places around the world chime in with their favorite links to places to buy high capacity 18650 cells too. As of now for us Canadian members we have the deal with 18650Canada offering a discount for us buying for the LT1.
For anyone in the UK OLight Uk (no affiliation) usually have a decent supply of button tops.
I don’t know if they’re any good or not but here’s the link,
https://www.olightstore.uk/olight-18650-lithium-ion-rechargeable-battery-2600mah.html
Yeah the heartbeat should be a hidden mode like blinkies, and not a standard feature when the light is turned off. I would think that the heartbeat would conform to the same low battery protection as all the other modes.
Or these