I wanted to do something a little different today, and I had a 30mm Carlco MT-G2 optic that needed a home. I dug around and found a forgotten Convoy M1 host that looked promising. Perfect. The optics diameter is a perfect fit.
The difference in height between the stock reflector and the optic is 8mm, so I’ll have to get busy.
The biggest problem for me is all my work has to be done on the kitchen table, so I had to take the first step into the great outdoors.
At least copper doesn’t bind up so badly when it’s cold. The part I hate is; every time I make the final pass with the hacksaw, the little piece falls off the balcony and I have to go down and dig through the snow for it.
A little solder paste and some heat will extend the pill to the proper hight.
To drive this light I added a resistor and Zener diode to a Qlite driver. This was the first time I ever did that. Man, those resistors are tiny. I hooked it up first to make sure it worked. I’m good to go. How come I have no problem soldering these minute components, but I still can’t stack chips worth a damn.
Everything assembled itself as planned. I kept the lens in the front of the optic. Normally I don’t. If an optic gets scratched up, I throw it out and replace it. I have lots, and they’re normally only $1.50 apiece, but I only have one of these, and they’re not as common.
I popped in a couple Efest 18350 IMR and got light. A nice big round spotlight like on a stage show. The copped chunk seems to be doing its job moving heat to the pill for dispersal. It’s the middle of the day, so I’ll need to wait for night to best get a feel for its true output.
It was fun building this light, and not one thing went wrong.
