I had been messing with adding 7135s to my 105c driver powering my 502b light. I just wanted to share the “secret” I figured out how to do it very easily. I bend the pins down first then I put a small drop of super glue on the chip.place then solder. Piece of cake. I have not read of anyone doing that. If so I apologize for reposting.
Be very careful bending the pins. The lead frame/package on ’7135 chips is VERY fragile, brittle, breakable, curse-able. Horrible little creatures…
Sounds like a great idea is there any negative repercussions that we should know about?
question: does adding these chips only effect high or will all of the modes increase current??
Done probably well over 200 7135's, all the same way: bend the pins, but I don't use anything accept a tweezer to hold it in place. When you bend them, I use a bent needlenose and do all 3 at the same time, but have to do it slowly... Last bunch I did, 1 out of 10 I broke a pin off, but that never happened to me before - thinking it was because of rushing it because I had like 30 to do in a batch.
Bend the pins down, and snip off the middle pin. DO NOT try to bend the big tab down on the backside, that's the part where I usually broke them. Clamp from the top & bottom with smooth jaw pliers so the bending doesn't affect anything on the inside of the package.
I keep the middle pin and solder it - another heat path, many guys cut it off though because it's not electrically necessary if you solder the back tab. Yes - don't bend the back tab.
Of your knowledgeable Input I am getting ready to order my first batch of 7135 chips and start trying to do a few more basic mods ,now next question whick mah rating do I go with 280 mah , 300mah or 380 mah? Thanks again everyone for great tips.
That’s the way I’ve been doing it too, I think I picked up that method from one of O-Ls builds.
I use a pair of tweezers to bend all 3 pins at once, over 30 7165s done without damaging a single one. I used to attach them with A/A but the last few drivers I’ve done I just held them in place while soldering all 3 front pins. I think I’m going to go back to using the A/A because without it the chip will sometimes shift while soldering the rear tab.
I find soldering the rear tab is the hardest part. It’s a much larger area to bridge.
Load up a blob of solder on the base of the lower chip, then flip the board upside down and drag the blob down to the tab on the new chip. Gravity really does work, in spite of it being 'just a theory'. ;)
I’ve got 4 to stack for an upcoming triple XP-E2 micro-mag build, I’ll give gravity at try.
Thanks for the tip.
+1 - though FT has the 380's pretty cheap now. I'm on my 2nd qty 100 order from FT of the 350's. You can mix & match also, don't have to pair the 350's/380's. Once FT got them down to like 13 cents from 50 cents -- game over, no other choice... I think they are like 18 cents qty 10, also great deal...
Please do some BLf search'n: lots of info on soldering 7135's. Here's one of mine:
Got a lot scattered in my album here: http://s1054.photobucket.com/user/TomE2012/library
Great to upgrade the XinTD's w/Qlite drivers the same way, up to 3.5 to 4 amps does fantastic on those lights!