I'm under the impression that using a current regulated driver that you can "push" more current through an LED than it would take being direct driven. Seems this is the case with the Jacob A60 which usually takes around 2.1A with the stock driver (which is direct drive I think) and some have modded them with a 2.8A Nanjg driver to push more amps through the LED.
-Garry
I don't think that is correct but it's not the first time I'm wrong.
The 2.1A from the stock driver could be caused by inefficiencies with the driver itself or thin wires, etc. Ever tried DD an XML with an IMR battery? POOF!!!
Pretty sure that is wrong, the LED will take a certain amount of current at any amperage, say 2.1 amps at 3.4 volts. When you use a 7135 driver you are limiting the amperage flow, you are decreasing the voltage (by a minimum of about .1 volts) along with an extra decrease to it further dropping the voltage to whatever the LED will take.
Ok, well I could be wrong. How do we explain the Jacob A60 scenario then? I know people have direct driven the A60 (gords, speak up), so what are they getting on direct drive at the tail? Perhaps after adding a 2.8A Nanjg driver to an A60 would not give 2.8A at a tail cap measurement? Tom E where are you???
-Garry
Thanks for your explanation guys, but I’m still confused with the purpose of a linear regulator.
It’s supposed to provide a voltage drop so that 350mA would pass through a single chip.
In order to get a higher LED current, it would need a higher voltage, but i’m not so sure how the LED is getting a higher voltage than from the direct drive setup. The linear regulator would drop the voltage, not boost it. 
Ok, I see gords posted the A60 drew 3.17A direct drive. So what would happen if you added some AMC's for say 3.5A? 4.2A? Would it take? Or would you only get the max capable? Or os there no max and you would eventually push enough current to "POOF"?
-Garry
I upgraded the xRE on the A60 to a higher bin led (from Q5 to r2 i think) to take the higher amperage.
You can see some of the results from Foy's supercharged XRE thread.
Here ??
There's issues, maybe I can tailcap measure higher amps but no measured increase on the light meter, lightbox or throw, something like that (can't recall exactly). I know 2.8A was a waste, but 2.45A maybe did better than 2.1A.
I know I consistently seem to get more lumens on running regulated high amps than I do on direct drive at even higher amps, but, too many variables in the mod, so hard to tell the true cause. It would be a total PIA for me to do one thing at a time - but I'm lacking a proper bench setup to test configure/wire things up...
Care to share any thoughts on this issue based on your modding experience with the A60? You did add a 2.8A Nanjg to an A60, right? Did you ever check current on direct drive with the A60? Comparable to gords?
-Garry
AMC7135s regulate current by dropping a sufficient voltage from battery to the load — Much like a variable resistor. Direct drive will always be higher because a 7135 has the mentioned small voltage insertion loss. The trick for efficient 7135 operation is to have a minimal difference between the battery and load voltage at the current operating level, and a flat battery voltage discharge curve so that the 7135 can stay in current regulation as the battery discharges.
Think of these chips as linear buck regulators. No PWM and no boost in the 7135 itself. However the current can be chopped using PWM to get the lower light levels like low, medium, and the strobes that everyone here so desires…
You know, I'm pretty sure I measured like 2.8A with that setup but saw no increase in lumens/throw which didn't jive with what people stated, about the circuit only allowing what the LED wants to take, so in that setup you'd expect to measure 2.3A for example if that's what the XR-E would take at the max.
Oh - that A60 setup doesn't exist anymore, now it's still2.8A, but an XP-E2/SinkPAD doing 106 kcd or so...
Do you know of any?
I have the driver that came with the popular high output Ultrafire Manafont drop in. I always considered it DD. But the other day I found out the output current was not that impressive. Tested it today. 7,5A input, around 5,3A output (rough numbers) It will probably overheat in no time… The stock driver spring melted in seconds btw… J) 0:)
I have been waiting 40+ days for a supposedly DD east 092 from Fasttech… Mail or something messed up… It may arrive tomorrow or in a month…
My first east 092 was not DD on high.
I always like your thinking Scaru… “More is more, and more is better” pretty much sums it up it seems…
_
Thanks to everybody for the links and info (so far)! 
So you’re saying that the linear drivers shouldn’t provide more current than direct drive?
I saw 3.26a direct drive on an a60….
I pooped my pants and reduced the wire size to give a much more sensible 2.8a :bigsmile:
as far as I’m aware, emitters will draw whatever you permit them to draw, you limit current by “designing in” currently bottle necks, that’s why its a bad idea to deoxit all the contacts and threads then wire the tail spring on an hd2010, your removing the current limiters.
Agree on a stock HD2010 direct drive setup, but I did a few XM-L2/SinkPAD 2010's and gotta get rid of all that resistance. The new KK ICR 4200's do pretty nice, as well as the MNKE IMR. I measured one 2010 after the mods, and was like what? This is disappointing, then ooops, forgot to wire the tailcap spring, so tested in the lightbox by jumping the batt neg to the body, and wow - 170 lumens added! Wired the spring with the solder wick down the middle, tested again -- all 170 lumens came back, interesting to see the direct result...
I = V / R
Which ever has the lowest resistance will win. The winner should be direct drive, the amc7135 drops .12v. The battery voltage would stay the same as long as the load was the same, if the current increased the voltage would drop more from the battery but the resistance in the circuit would have had to decrease for that to happen.
If using a direct drive driver then it has to have a voltage drop off less than .12v or the amc7135 driver will beat it using the same setup.
hahah!
Great one! 
Everybody is missing the fact that the higher drive current here was done with LiMn battery and the direct drive was with Li-on. The Li-on most likely had a much higher internal resistance and could only deliver 5 amps. Direct drive with the same LiMn battery setup and I would expect to see more than the regulated 9.16A.
That actually might be the case.
Sorry if I confused everyone. I knew I was missing something.
So to recap, it’s not possible to increase the current with a linear driver compared to a direct drive setup, right? 8)