yea I wouldn't want Simon to implement anduril or Narsil either , mostly because I already like what he has started with the Convoy UI and itd be nice if he just built upon that and keat his own thing.
awesome that you grabbed the 3x21a with sft40, I just got my M21c in eith sft40, the led Inpresses me very much. It is a great thing to see, and that 6500k is a really pleasant one, not Blue and terrible like others, I won't point any finger lol.
the molicel p42a and 18650 P26a are well known for having a slightly raised positive terminal, so I wouldn't worry much about that messed up button converter (I saw that on the Listing this morning as well), because you may not even need it. I run molicel flat top P26a in my FireFlies rot66 with no solder blob, no magnet, and they make contact fine. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised!
can't wait to hear your feedback on the 3x21a eith sft40. Should be a beast of a light. I have a Astrolux ea01s (4x sst40) coming in today, and I have 5 sft40 bare leds on order too. Going to reflowed the little pocket rocket ea01s with (4) sft40's and see what kindve fun I can have. Itll be like a mini 3x21a lol!
Artiet59, actually it was you and your great beamshots that convinced me to order 3X21A with SFT40 6500K. :BEER: ;-) Those pictures you took outside look really great. I was afraid the tint may look AngryBlue™ but it seems alright and rather neutralwhite. :THUMBS-UP:
Thanks for the helpful hint about the P42A's raised flat top. Maybe I will not even need the adapter as you said. However, it might turn out to be useful if I chose to put in some Samsung 50G or 40T batteries. I think I will not mind some "serious marks" since this adapter is hidden inside the light anyway. My only concern would be that some of the plastic material could be scraped off while being in contact with the brass ring. Never mind, I may sound like someone subject to OCD already, haha. :-P
Simon: Could you please handpick the best looking flat top adapter for my order of 3X21A (ordered today with some pouches, order ID 3011866015422654)? :-P 谢谢！:-)
I got the Astrolux EA01 (single SST40 5000K only) and I was quite surprised about the nice beam. I am still torn about buying another EA01S like yours...should I, shouldn't I? :-)) I really look forward to seeing your beamshots of the EA01S with 4x SFT40. Must be some amazing pocket thrower with a big hotspot. I wish I had some soldering skills but I was born with two left hands, lol. Fingers crossed that SFT40 5000K will soon be available.
I'm ordering a 3x21A w/SFT40 6500K so I can upgrade it to Anduril 2
I gave up on power switch lights a while back - not ruling them out 100%, but it would have to be some unique set of circumstance to justify.
Hank experimented with a simple ramping UI a while back, insisting NarsilM and Anduril were too complicated. Eventually he converted to the full rich UI of Anduril/Anduril 2.
If the stock e-switch Convoy UI had all the proper basic features I'd look for, then probably wouldn't need to upgrade:
proper non-linear ramping over the ideal time duration (easy to get from Anduril source code)
1 click ON to last used level, 1 click OFF
Press&Hold from OFF goes to lowest
ramping Up and Down work on press&hold, standard methods to reverse direction
dbl click from either OFF or ON goes to max or turbo
support for a lighted switch LED, with power LVD support (turn it OFF when batt is low)
If they can't do smooth ramping, then "n" fixed levels would do, but better if at least 5, 7-8 may be roughly ideal.
Regardless of what you think of Anduril 1/2 the best thing to come from how that played out is that we now have open source firmware and flashing keys.
I guarantee if Simon made all his future drivers use a similar flashing key and had the firmware built on some common (open) architecture someone would branch out his work and fix most of the small issues these drivers tend to have in their first revisions. (for free!)
His drivers are becoming advanced and powerful enough that (besides Tom E ) there is less incentive/value to throw in a FET+1 with Narsil/Anduril.
I just ordered the 3x21A SST40 5000K. Would like to know if the XHP-50.2 is a future product? I like extra lumens, slightly more flood. At 21 amps a triple should push just over 8,000 lumens. Or a single SBT90.2. I like the triple 21700 format over the quad 18650 and would like to stick to this one for mods and improvements. No real reason why, but I do.
As far as the machining marks on the flat top adapter, I like them. It adds a little more character to the light.
I haven't seen a recent e-switch UI light from Simon, so not familiar. Reading through the UI described for the 3x21A, it sounds pretty decent but assuming it's not using the switch LED though, accept for charging I guess. The remaining issue with the UI is timing, and that can't be documented easily, best to try it, so I ordered the light and will see myself.
Thanks, LP! Im sure simon will pick the best top for you, he came through with my tan m21c the day it shipped instead of the gray i ordered lol.
The EA01s arrived today, just fired it up and it works really well! i have good luck with Astrolux for the most part! Hoepfully my sft40 come in soon so i can get to work on swapping them. i never did a multi emitter swap, but this should eb a good start since there are no aux leds or a second board or anything!
I will be taking beamshots, and (hopefully) throw measurements (I have a lux meter, but still havent used it because i dont know how to do the math. i do have 5 meter and 10 meter markers in my yard though lol) with the stock 5000k sst40's. Then i will have a comparison of what the sft40's have improved.
Heres to the LED's coming in soon! If it all works out (i hope i dont mess my light up!), who knows maybe i can do one for someone else one day lol.
The 3x21A compared to a Q8 with 4 XP-L's discounted at $40 is not a great deal for $60. I hope the bezel is SS for this price, can't tell from the listing, but don't think Simon ever used bare alum for a bezel like this. But still, you do get Convoy quality of the anodizing, threads, etc.
What’s wrong with flood? That’s why I like the original Q8 (warmer, floodier) vs the Sofirn (cooler, throwier) versions. If my DC7 didn’t have onboard charging (which neither the Sofirn/BLF versions have, “forcing” the horrible horrible inconvenience of removing the cells and charging them in my Ope and then replacing them), I’d probably not use it for the same reason.
To me, the Q8 is kinda like 4 S2+es bundled together, more useful (to me) as a wider floodier beam.
Yeah, would require a boost driver, but that right there gets rid of pwm issues (too tempting with 3V emitters), and loses a lot of inefficiency vs linear regs (N×7135, etc.).
Unno, but to me, a throwy beam is kinda limited to long(er)-distance snooping. You wanna light up a trail 300yds down, etc. But for practical use (driveway, basement, cabinets, backyard, etc.), floody is way way way more useful. Just yesterday I got kinda tired of my E05’s beam, and slapped some diffusion film on it. And it had a fairly wide hotspot to begin with.
Anyhoo, in cases where I want throw, I got C8s, L2s, P30s, GTmini/-micro, etc., that would work great.
im not being stupid here (not trying to be), but I always see people mention the Q8 for prices like in the $40 range but I've never seen them for that, where could you find such a deal? I don't own one but becoming more and more interested in trying one. Mostly because blf did the light. Thanks in advance!
) there is less incentive/value to throw in a FET+1 with Narsil/Anduril.