No doubt about that.
And don’t forget a clause in contract that production must produce lights 100 % identical to approved sample 
I don't think there is a written contract, but I may be wrong. 
I have been wondering the same.
Nice!
Saw Q's earlier on performance of a hot rod 14500 light - the copper or alum K6 in this case. I fully modded a ThorFire TG06 with basically the same wight FET+1 driver - post #52 here: https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/33146. I got more amps/output with the WindyFire cell at 4.02A tail, as opposed to the EFEST IMR V2 700 mAh cell, or SANYO 840 mAh cell - both about 3.60A tail.
Of course on even the best 14500 cell, you get a healthy drop (1387 lumens @start, 1234 lumens @30 secs), as expected (low capacity cell and not much available heat sinking in such a small light). In the 1,200 lumens range coming from such a small light is pretty stunning though.
Cool
When you have time, can you please compare it with some other flashlight?
Thank you so much.
Tom, that’s what I’ve been saying all along, it does no real good to measure a light like this at 30 seconds because the cell is almost gone by then! 4000mA on a 650mAh cell, yeah, brutal.
When I first got into the flashlights, little hot rods were pretty much all I built. I have a thing for the nitro glycerin effect. Itty bitty body, great big light!
I just got my first Efest Purple 14500’s yesterday, plan to see how they stack up against an AW IMR (Red) and Windyfire….
What “issues” did the A6 have that people are referencing?
The Efest Purple 14500 just did 4.95A in my little SS Ultrafire C3! :bigsmile: XP-L emitter.
Edit: Check it out! Our very own SB did a review on this light some 5 years ago!!! Ultrafire SS C3
Pic by Don, the C3 is on the left, the smaller one.
The Ultrafire SS C3 is a small light, not much bigger than the cell itself. It’s got an orange peel reflector but makes a pretty nice beam profile. Here’s how it tested with the 4 different cells I have, with some cooldown time in between em…
Efest Purple 14500
4.95A for 1083.3 lumens at start, 931.5 lumens at 30 seconds with the cell at 4.13V ending.
AW IMR (Red) 14500
4.52A for 1000.5 lumens at start, 824.55 lumens at 30 seconds with the cell at 4.12V ending.
Windyfire IMR 14500
4.59A for 1038.45 lumens at start, 893.55 lumens at 30 seconds with the cell at 4.10V ending.
Efest Red IMR V2 14500
4.51A for 1041.9 lumens at start, 890.1 lumens at 30 seconds with the cell at 4.10V ending.
All cells taken off the charger at Full. The Efest Purple are brand new, just got em yesterday, with the Windyfire the next newest. The AW and V2 cells have been with me for a while but barely used, mainly in a few tests.
The Efest Purple 14500 might be a hair better but it’s a close call, any of these 4 will do a great job in the new Paired release when it hits. I’ll double check the sample on these 4 cells and see how it performs as compared to this A17DD S08 driver C3. I’ve got 7 modes on this one, but not TK’s firmware. Spring bypasses top and bottom. 
While it’s been said many times that Stainless doesn’t conduct heat well, this tiny light gets hot, fast! Each 30 second test was almost enough to make it too hot to hold to get the cell out so the light could cool down for the next cell test.
So be forewarned people! The FET driver in a tiny light makes some serious hand burning heat!
Nice job, Dale!
Thanks!
-Chuck
This kind of heat cycling is pretty well documented as the way to rapidly degrade li-ion cell membranes.
https://www.google.com/search?q="lithium-ion"+battery+cell+heat+cycle+damage+degradation+degrade+failure+membrane
45 degrees C = 115 degrees F
60 degrees C = 140 degrees F
above I read
and moments later, picking up a book of short stories, I read
Dale - nice mod. Interesting you got higher amps across the board. The lumens difference might be that mine has a XP-L V6, top bin, AR lens, maybe? My conversion factor in the pipe light box is/always been 0.34 - think you use the same. I used 22 AWG LED wires, no driver side spring, added the 20k resistor to suppress the mode change/ON blinky thing. Could be the LED lottery too. Always lots of possibilities.
I think my emitter is an V4 3D, I did this a while back. Fairly certain that’s the lumens difference. My charger takes the IMR cells to 4.21V, that might be the current difference or simply the clamp meter with big heavy wire. Don’t know. There’s always going to be variables, like a thermometer. If you set up 5 thermometers around your place, it’d be unlikely 2 of em read exactly the same. The lights are like that, varying with time, age and temperature. For me, my numbers… your numbers… djozz’s numbers… Richard’s numbers… just a basis to go by, I doubt there’s hard cold facts anywhere to be found when it comes right down to it.
My light box uses a .345 conversion factor.
For amperage, I use a 12ga Turnigy loop with a Mastech Clamp Meter. (run the single 12ga lead from ground to battery, clamp the meter on the loop that forms)
I haven’t ever used the 20K resistor, the blink doesn’t bother me in the least.
I was merely trying to show what we might expect from the little K6 with one of these top 14500’s. I believe the K6 will have an TIR optic, so everything will be different on the output and beam profiles.
Really, an optic? I must have missed that. Cool!
Love the K6 prototype too! And I think I do like it to be a TIR light, not sure yet. (same TIR as the DQG18650tiny?)
I would like it to be a SMO reflector.
Thanks,
-Chuck
The prototype looks great, I can’t wait for the next update and test results.
A couple of questions:
What’s everyone’s (OK, maybe not EVERY one ) view on ring notches instead of tailcap wings?
Will the flats on the production barrels go edge to edge like the prototype?
Can we get the copper without flats? Or maybe forgo the flats on the K6 altogether but keep them on the X6? What do you think?
Regardless, these are great lights and I will not be sharing or splitting them up with anyone. Muahaha J) . Thank you kronos, Dale, JohnnyMac, George, and TK for undertaking this (no doubt I’ve missed a few) not to mention Neal and the production team. OK I’ll stop now.
Cheers,
Mo
I’m just putting this out there,
Has it been considered just having the parts manufactured cheaply in China and then shipped in their raw form stateside to be assembled competently? It seems to me the cost savings are primarily in the host, mcpcb and driver ie not in the assembly labour?
Then only disadvantage I can see is international shipping costs for non USA BLFers. Im sure this would also save time.
Just a thought.
Chris.