Cooked Driver- any place for replacements?

jericho0o · 2019-05-23T04:03:54.000Z

Hello! Hoping to get some help and that I’m posting in the right place. Been searching for weeks on what kind of driver to get to replace the ones in a. Bunch of DQG Tiny Triple v2s that I gotta hands on (price was right at $5 a pop)

They were broken and I took one apart to find a fried driver. Fine, I can replace that easy but unfortunately, I haven’t found a place that sells these drivers. Was hoping someone here with far deeper knowledge of this stuff could point me in the right direction. Finding one that can play with an eswitch is proving to be pretty difficult.

Here is the driver in all it’s chicken fried glory:

Would really appreciate a push in the right direction. I have four of these… now hosts and I’d love to tinker with them to get them to be what they once were or better.

Thanks!

Wrathbringer27 · 2019-05-23T04:43:49.000Z

Tom E or Mike C might help

Mike_C · 2019-05-23T08:34:35.000Z

I might have something that could work, but my drivers aren’t exactly budget options and firmware still isn’t completed. I think there are others here that can offer something more reasonable in a more reasonable amount of time.

In any case, it would help to know the exact diameter of the driver. What is it? Also, it looks this driver normally has the E-switch soldered directly on the board? Has it been removed or is the switch actually separate with wires to the driver?

jericho0o · 2019-05-23T16:29:06.000Z

Thanks for dropping in Mike C, would be happy to entertain any options. I’ll also see if any other members can propose other solutions.

The switch is attached by wire leads - nothing like the Sofirn eswitches as far as I can tell - diameter is looking to be around 28.6-.7 at its widest. In retrospect, running a triple setup with such close proximity to the drivers and near non-existent heatsinking may have been a bad design choice but while i wait for potential solutions they make for some nice paperweights

Mike_C · 2019-05-24T08:13:53.000Z

How much room is there under the driver when it’s installed? I’m thinking that piggybacking a driver on top the old, using the old as a contact plate only, might be a good option if there is enough room.

I just did a quick search on that light. I found a review of one, don’t know which version, but that review suggests that the triple LEDs are wired in series and the driver is in fact a boost driver. Would you know anything about that? It this light requires a boost driver, then your options will be much more limited unless you can chop up the LED MCPCB and make it serial. I’ve had to do that myself when I made a new driver for a triple originally wired in series: Mod: Olight SR Mini with triple SST-40 and host bypass.

jericho0o · 2019-05-24T20:43:12.000Z

I’m not against replacing the MCPCB- would need to make sure the optics match the layout, but definitely would consider - as for the room, it’s pretty tight. That big square in the middle has I believe thermal paste on it which placed the driver right up to the plate separating itself from the MCPCB- driver’s press fit too no retaining ring which really had made this whole search hard-

Here’s some more measurements just to consider (by the way, many many thanks for shedding some expertise on this issue - these small lights are so appealing to me plus if I can refurb them, i’m good for a couple Christmas gifts so I “save” money)

Driver thickness (excluding springs): 6.1mm
22mm MCPCB (triple) - and yes just checked they are in series. Will probably run parallel and just watch what battery to put in especially if the driver chosen has a fet/dd

EDIT: speaking of mcpcbs, appare rly also hard to find 22 mm PCPCBS but not drivers. Is this shaping up to be a custom job?

Mike_C · 2019-05-25T10:07:26.000Z

Well, with series MCPCB I would look at chopping them up before replacing them, then you’ll know the optics fit. The job I did in my link above wasn’t pretty but that light pulls over 24 amps, that’s 8 amps per LED, so chopping and soldering works well enough. I didn’t even bother looking if there where replacement MCPCBs.

In terms of drivers, at least for parallel LEDs, Lexel might have something. EU based though: Lexels driver compilation
I don’t really know who in the US provides an assortment of drivers to choose from besides Mountain Electronics: Drivers

Lexel · 2019-05-25T17:27:35.000Z

DD driver might work, but the MCPCB should be DTP

jericho0o · 2019-05-26T14:22:59.000Z

Hey guys thanks so much again for the help-

Mike C: when you chopped did you simply sever the path and scrape off some of the surface to isolate each footprint? Looks doable- I’ll give it a shot- beats the scavenger hunt I’ve been on. Cheers mate

Lexel: thanks for the suggest. Probably an unorthodox size the 28mm but I figure if I can sand down ~1 or so mm all around a 30mm board I should be able to get a fit going on- this would be my first eswitch mod- these drivers would work alright with them? Up till now I’ve been strictly tailcap so this is officially beyond my experience (low threshold really)

Mike_C · 2019-05-27T09:47:04.000Z

jericho0o:

Mike C: when you chopped did you simply sever the path and scrape off some of the surface to isolate each footprint?

Yeah, that’s about right. I used a screw driver and didn’t care the least about how it looked. Looks very sloppy but worked fine.

jericho0o · 2019-06-02T05:25:45.000Z

Lexel:

DD driver might work, but the MCPCB should be DTP

Thanks Lexel can you let me know why DTP is mandatory in this case? Is it due to the heat generated?

Also what drivers do you have would be best suited for this given that it has an eswitch?

jericho0o · 2019-06-08T05:10:15.000Z

Update for anyone following -

I was able to get in touch with the guy who makes DQG and he said he has some spare drivers lying around to ship to me (hooray!) plus some MCPCBs but they’re not copper.

I stumbled across this site however - has anyone tried to order from this place? https://en.maritex.com.pl/printed_circuit_boards/mcpcb_for_cree_leds/mcpcb_for_3xled/mcpcb-xp-nt-3cb22.html