At least I'm not the only one embarassed not to notice the thin film - you and Richard .
There's no freak'n way I would have seen this, until hopefully trying to use it. Can't believe I didn't buzz out the +/- pads - actually I know I buzzed them out last night, but must have been on a 26mm board, or, I pressed the pointy probes harder and they poked through the film - dunno... I showed both boards to an engineer here at work, see if he visually could notice a difference and he spotted the covered holes. The LED wire cutouts are not filmed over, just the two small screw holes.
I'm thinking something changed. Looks like they upgraded the 16mm MCPCB to a big one, and probably changed the centering piece, or maybe a change in the reflector. 548 meters (75 kcd) ain't bad at all, plus great runtime at 2.6A on 3 cells, all out of the box. Just not certain bout the flickering - can't find anything obvious, but maybe it will go away after I finish the 1st round mods.
I think I am going to shunt the resistor on mine, bigger wires, UCLp, copper braid springs… and see where that gets me… if I fry something or break something I can always grab a custom driver (which will probably end up being round 2 of modding for this light haha)
I guess I’ll wait until after the holiday wraps up and we see if anybody’s tracking number starts working right. I don’t want to have to ask for a $1.99 refund and bother with them wanting to give me store credit.
It’s probably important to point out that this driver is not available, finished, or even prototyped yet (development thread?). So far the three high-powered buck projects I’m aware of on BLF have fizzled (gmarsh’s fizzled I think), stalled (me!), or turned out to have unforseen limitations (Mattaus). So while Cereal_killer may beat the spread in the end, it’s probably important to consider that the driver he mentioned doesn’t exist yet when you’re purchasing one of these lights!
IMO there isn’t currently a great way to mod this light for MT-G2. The 6 * 18350’s and FET driver suggested by Cereal_killer may be your best bet… but there are easier lights to mod for MT-G2 - ones that don’t involve a fistfull of 18350’s. I’m not knocking that method, but I think most of us would rather steer clear of the limitations 18350’s bring with them for such a bulky light.
That said, I think a series conversion for this light sounds like a nice idea and a good thing to shoot for. Hopefully it’s achievable in a way that doesn’t require a crazy amount of work.
I don’t like the 6* 18350 solution either.
I don’t have any of those and don’t want to.
But plenty of 18650…
Shouldn’t be that big problem, to get the 3 18650 in Series. But then you need a really good driver or you loose a lot of energy.
Is there a driver that can do that?
I have a 6V MT-G2 just laying around here, so I’m very interested in modding this light.
I ordered this light as a host for the MT-G2 - but would like the Courui more.
Then it’s better to use a 2*18650 light.
I just couldn’t use a light, that has one empty battery-slot.
I just couldn’t
So maybe the Courui is not the best host for the MT-G2. I think, the Roche LS01 is better, even though I don’t like those thin 18650 Bat-Tubes very much.
Getting the 3 cells in series in a nice way looks like a bit of a problem from where I’m standing. Assuming you got that figured out in a way that was satisfactory for you, I think the driver is not too big an issue. You should check the teardown thread for more info, but I think that there is enough space for a buck driver such as the HX-1175b or maybe the “new DRY” driver. It should get pretty tight with either driver though, so I’m not positive that they will fit - there is enough diameter but you might have to do some serious grinding on the driver shelf. Either of those drivers should be an acceptable choice for MT-G2 on 3s.
If you just had 2s you could use a DD driver or linear driver, both of which can be very small, so no problem there.
If you want to know for sure that you can do the conversion in a nice way you should focus on something which is already setup for 3s, 2s2p, 2s, etc.
Later if we get a good 3s conversion for this light the situation will be totally different!
The circuit design is running on my breadboard(sans PWM input at the moment), both an XM and an MT (both 2 & 3s cells, have to tried 4) only problem I encounter was that the sense resistor and diode get hot quick just pinned onto the breadboard, my first test boards went to fab Monday so I’ll have a better test setup soon. I also just bought another MT to mess with (my one old test one is in very very bad shape)
Also worth pointing out- it’s very typical application of the chosen buck chip so I was able to exactly follow their spec’d layout design, I’m more than confident its a viable option. I have several different design test boards on order (tho no Courui ones yet till I get the one from DX to have the driver in hand while designing that board). If I wasn’t sure this will work out I wouldn’t have bought multiple hosts and more importantly spent the amount or time I have on this. This is my full time job now days, I can’t afford to waste any time/money on project that won’t payout (also why I’m using a standard FW and not new code, to decrease the time till the first batch of units are produced and ready to sell as much as possible). Same reason why I’m not trying to come up with some all now circuit or do something crazy, this is all proven circuit’s that work exactly as intended when following the MFG’s spec’s (which is what I’ve done). I’m not at all saying mine will be better than you guy’s, all I’m getting at is my project isn’t actually that ambitious at all, I’ve got quite a bit invested in it already and it’s not some side project I’m doing in my spare time… In short, this thing will work, no not tomorrow but ASAP. It’s a top priority project for me (the courui’s specifically as well as the MAXIM based buck driver)
The only other concern with the courui is the series conversion with having to rotate the body (cell holder) to change cells. Because of the Courui will absolutely require the tail clicky mod so you’re not connecting the batteries all wrong while loading cells. One option I’m going to be exploring (again once I get one in hand) as a better option is modding the tail end of the light to allow drop-in cell loading from back there.
FWIW both Mattaus and I very closely followed the application circuits. (gmarsh had a little bit crazier project going on)
All I’m saying, and not as an insult or slight or anything like that, is that I’d prefer for it to be 100% clear that you don’t have a driver yet, that the driver will likely require one or more physical modifications to the light, and that those things have neither been pinned down or fully figured out yet. And you don’t have a host in hand.
While it may not have been intentional, your post was misleading IMO. L4M4 asked if there was an easy solution and you said “my driver,” which was/is not currently true. With luck in the future your driver will be a medium difficulty conversion since it’ll require drilling the tailcap & some other physical mod. It won’t be a drop-in solution like what you are shooting for with the TK61.
The gray version is expected to be delivered perhaps tomorrow. Until it is in the hands of GB shall it be officially announced, with the corresponding SKU of that model.
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