Well, in high modes I don’t shine into my eyes. So only at low. In high modes, a slightly darker area can be seen on the white wall. Not too big, but still.
All the LEDs are wired in parallel so all should be equally as bright. If one of yours is significantly dimmer than the others there could be a problem.
- maybe it’s just a bad reflow. If that’s the case, redoing the reflow should fix it.
- if it doesn’t maybe the LED needs to be replaced.
Do you have access to a welding helmet? Or even the glass out of a old welding helmet. That will allow you to look at it on high in complete safety. I have a C8F that has one LED dimmer than the others on the lowest mode. Once I get above a few hundred lumens all the way to max brightness there is no noticeable difference in the brightness of all 3 LED’s.
Note that I said moon or slightly brighter than moon. The FW3A has a very low moon level stock where the LEDs might have trouble lighting up. An imbalance here is common, no big deal. Anything above moon should correct it.
It sounds like yours is a bit dimmer all the time. This is not so common. IDK what could be causing it. Maybe like Firelight2 said, the reflow on one might not be so good or maybe the LED is damaged. Maybe someone more in the know can offer suggestions.
My D18 has one dimmer led ,it’s about half the brightness of the rest at moonlight , I daren't look at 14000 lemens directly to see if it is dimmer on full 8^)
ps ,
theres no need for the Russian twit to say my god man did you know it is lumens
My D4 had a much dimmer LED at all brightness levels. My theory is it happens when they come from different reels so the efficiency isn’t exactly the same.
That’s not how this usually works. When wired in parallel, all the LEDs get the same voltage. There’s normally some variatien in the Vf curvers per emitter though, so it’s normal for some to be brighter than others at a given voltage.
This sounds like it’s probably normal, and happens all the time on parallel-wired multi-emitter lights.
For example, the bottom pic here is a D18 with all 18 emitters wired in parallel. There are 3x3000K plus 3x6500K in the inner ring, and 6x4000K plus 6x5000K in the outer ring. Every CCT has multiple different brightnesses because of individual Vf variation per emitter, and the four CCTs have different brightness overall because of having slightly different Vf.
Basically, if the difference is relatively minor, don’t worry about it… it’s normal.
Problem solved 
I think I see a newly reflowed led and one a bit off-center 
I noticed it too, but after applying the paste. It was the end of paste, so I did not want to change it. Then I noticed a photo of the violet version of fw3a and I decided to put those leds in this one. Then I will correct it.
Today received my fw3a, but one led is darker than other two… RMA since all are in paralel?
Mike
As long as it’s only at lower levels, I believe this is pretty normal with multi emitter lights. Individual emitters can have slightly varying Vf’s, causing the minor brightness differences.
Tested till medium, one is dimmer than others. Will test on maximum when get ND filter.
I’ve built a few triples, all had the same brightness across the leds.
Mike
There certainly could be something wrong, I suppose.
My FW3A 3D has one that is a little dimmer than the other two, and here’s a recent post with example from TK:
Honestly, it would probably drive me nuts if I wasn’t planning on swapping the emitters.
Mike
hm my light is acting up, when i switch in battery and turn the head i cant shut it off and it ramps up by itself, what to do now ? is there a way to reset this ? dont get it its been running fine and tailcap is tight screwed i havent touch that really…
See here:
And here:
I apologize for asking this. Is there a how to on flashing firmware to a different firmware from toykeeper? I want to go 219b
Yes, yours looks like it has more variance than usual. Most of the time, the differences are smaller… and not very visible on modes higher than a few lumens.
hi all, hoping I can get some feedback on this. I recently nodded my fw3a with toykeepers andruil firmware for 50% power reduction and a reflow of 219bs. There’s two problems I’m seeing
1) when using a vtc5a or vtc6, the emitters are on full speed ahead and the head gets hot extremely fast. I thought that the power would be cut by 50% irrespective of battery type.
2) when screwing the head, the light turns on immediately, with the vtc6 or vtc5a, I cannot turn the light off when fully screwed down. However, with lower amp batteries like the lgdbmj11865, I can toggle it off/on when fully screwed in.
Both of them turn on when screwing the head down, not sure if this is a problem I just dont remember it doing that prior to my mods.