FW3A Troubleshooting / FAQ

[JasonWW]

@xevious

OK, so I’d been using my stubby (18350) FW3A with only a few hiccups… had to loosen & re-tighten the head to clear that peculiar auto shut-off when ramping up, just a couple times over the past 2 weeks.

Last night I’d used it a bit. No problems. Set it on my nightstand pointing towards me so I could see the GITD insert… and at about quarter to 6 am, I open my eyes to a blinding bright light. My FW3A had turned itself on & auto ramped to maximum!

I was lucky that I wasn’t in a deep sleep at that point and woke up in time. The head was almost too hot to touch and the table had a hotspot where the head had rested. Switch was inoperable. I unscrewed the head and cut power. Fully tightened the head & proper function was restored.

I wonder, if I did a software lockout would this have still happened?

I’ve never had this trouble with my full size FW3A (18650), just the use of the 18350 tube.

Anyway I’d forgotten to apply the kapton tape I mentioned back in April. Definitely going to give it a try now… Hopefully I can find the stuff! (My junk drawer situation is a bit fubar)

That sounds quite unacceptable to me and a bit dangerous. My old man response would be to either retire that light (remove battery) or else return it to the original 18650 tube. I guess I no longer have the patience to do a bunch of investigating and repairing to make it reliable.

[Firelight2]

@SammysHP

IIRC that safety feature was added already to Anduril 1 shortly after the release of the FW3A.

Ah.

Good to know. My first and second run FW3As, my FW3 Ti, and my EDC18 all lack that feature. I just tested them.

[SammysHP]

Also IIRC Lumintop didn’t update the firmware for more than a year after the fix…

[idleprocess]

@xevious

OK, so I’d been using my stubby (18350) FW3A with only a few hiccups… had to loosen & re-tighten the head to clear that peculiar auto shut-off when ramping up, just a couple times over the past 2 weeks.

Last night I’d used it a bit. No problems. Set it on my nightstand pointing towards me so I could see the GITD insert… and at about quarter to 6 am, I open my eyes to a blinding bright light. My FW3A had turned itself on & auto ramped to maximum!

I was lucky that I wasn’t in a deep sleep at that point and woke up in time. The head was almost too hot to touch and the table had a hotspot where the head had rested. Switch was inoperable. I unscrewed the head and cut power. Fully tightened the head & proper function was restored.

I wonder, if I did a software lockout would this have still happened?

Barring a software bug or unlikely corruption of the ROM, software lockout should guard against this. Given the flaky nature of the FW3As switching I use it whenever it’s not in my hand. Thankfully I’ve only had issues with it activating while clipped to a pocket whenever I’ve neglected to lockout - presumably because that switch is all too easy to bump.

[MtnDon (Don Miller)]

Yep, I use the e-lock all the time.
ALL the time.
I have little need for an instant on all the time. That’s me, though.

[xevious (Gary)]

@cyclops

Is it the first batch version or later ones? I hear that the later versions were having unreliable quality.

It is an early one. In particular, this is the one with the ToyKeeper icon on the switch. My full size 18650 had this same trouble very early on and was resolved after cleaning and reseating the tube. Hasn’t happened again since.

@Firelight2

Definitely sounds like the signal tube accidentally shorted. With that short, the driver thought you were holding the button down so it ramped up to turbo and stayed there.

Some tips:

• Remove, clean everything, reassemble. Check alignments when reassembling.
• Make sure the tailcap retaining ring is slightly loose. That ring is just there to prevent the tailcap guts from falling out. If you leave it a tiny bit loose the tailcap pcb is able to free-float and may actually connect better to the signal tube.
• You can prevent the issue of accidental ramp-up burning a hole in your desk by reflashing the firmware to upgrade from Anduril to Anduril2. Anduril2 has a safety feature to prevent this kind of thing happening. With Anduril2, if your signal tube malfunctions and the light ramps up to max it will pause there a couple seconds then ramp back down to min, turn off, and put the light in lockout mode.

Thanks. I did clean everything before, which should’ve taken care of the problem… not sure how to “check alignments” as I can’t see inside the tube when closing up. But I did not know about that tailcap retaining ring tip. This one does have a retaining ring, unlike my other FW3A. One of these days I will see about flashing firmware, but right now I’m not set up to do it. Good to know that Anduril 2 has a failsafe to mitigate that problem!

[Alexxey]

Hi everyone! I’m new here, but reading quite a while.
Just got my fw3a sst-20 4000k from aliexpress and wonder how to check did I have a “full version” with all the power channels or missing some.
Head inside looks just like on the left (I mean photo in the first post). What else can I check?

[raccoon]

I hope you have fun here, Alexxey!

[Alexxey]

Thanks a lot

[JasonWW]

@Alexxey

Hi everyone! I’m new here, but reading quite a while.
Just got my fw3a sst-20 4000k from aliexpress and wonder how to check did I have a “full version” with all the power channels or missing some.
Head inside looks just like on the left (I mean photo in the first post). What else can I check?

Mainly just count all the 7135 chips. There’s 6 on the back and 2 on the front, but the front side might require unsoldering the 2 main wires to look at it. You can check that the brightness when ramping up or down is smooth.
There should be a short dip in power as you ramp between the 7135 chips and the FET. The newer firmware might be different though. Let’s see what other folks say. (My light is a very early one)

[Alexxey]

@JasonWW

Mainly just count all the 7135 chips. There’s 6 on the back and 2 on the front, but the front side might require unsoldering the 2 main wires to look at it. You can check that the brightness when ramping up or down is smooth.
There should be a short dip in power as you ramp between the 7135 chips and the FET. The newer firmware might be different though. Let’s see what other folks say. (My light is a very early one)

All 6 are in the back, but don’t want to unsolder anything to count those on the front.
Ramp is all smooth and there are two ‘blinks’, one on the high and one in somewhere in between.

[JasonWW]

@Alexxey

@JasonWW

Mainly just count all the 7135 chips. There’s 6 on the back and 2 on the front, but the front side might require unsoldering the 2 main wires to look at it. You can check that the brightness when ramping up or down is smooth.
There should be a short dip in power as you ramp between the 7135 chips and the FET. The newer firmware might be different though. Let’s see what other folks say. (My light is a very early one)

All 6 are in the back, but don’t want to unsolder anything to count those on the front.
Ramp is all smooth and there are two ‘blinks’, one on the high and one in somewhere in between.

I checked mine. When ramping up there are two short blinks. One when it switches from channel 1 to 2 and another from 2 to 3.
I’m still not sure that’s a guarantee you have 3 channels in yours. I’m not even sure which software version your light has. Hopefully someone can give you a more concrete answer.

If the ramp is smooth I wouldn’t even worry about it.

[Alexxey]

@JaredM

80-85C. Mostly for safety of the battery.

Is it safe for leds, driver etc? Won’t affect flashlight lifespan?

[Alexxey]

[quote=JasonWW]

[quote=Alexxey]

@JasonWW

If the ramp is smooth I wouldn’t even worry about it.

Ok thank you nice to hear.

[JasonWW]

@Alexxey

@JaredM

80-85C. Mostly for safety of the battery.

Is it safe for leds, driver etc? Won’t affect flashlight lifespan?

The led and driver components get heated to over 200°C during assembly. They are quite robust.

[SammysHP]

@JasonWW

@Alexxey

@JaredM

80-85C. Mostly for safety of the battery.

Is it safe for leds, driver etc? Won’t affect flashlight lifespan?

The led and driver components get heated to over 200°C during assembly. They are quite robust.

But only once and with a very specific heating profile. Otherwise they will get damaged. 80 °C is a pretty safe temperature, though.

[JasonWW]

@SammysHP

@JasonWW

@Alexxey

@JaredM

80-85C. Mostly for safety of the battery.

Is it safe for leds, driver etc? Won’t affect flashlight lifespan?

The led and driver components get heated to over 200°C during assembly. They are quite robust.

But only once and with a very specific heating profile. Otherwise they will get damaged. 80 °C is a pretty safe temperature, though.

They can actually handle higher heat than that, but briefly and people have ran the leds to the point of the heat melting the solder. My point was that 85° is a good upper level to not exceed due to the battery. Then there is a huge gap from 85°C to 200°C. So no one really needs to worry about the led or driver components. Worry about battery heat first (and not burning your hand). Don’t waste time worrying about the driver and led. They are quite robust.

[Alexxey]

JasonWW, SammysHP, thank you for detailed explanation!

[quote=JasonWW]

[quote=Alexxey]

@JasonWW

If the ramp is smooth I wouldn’t even worry about it.

Actually I checked one more time, ramp is not so smooth near to moonlight level. I can see several barely visible steps (starting from moon) before it gets nice and smooth. Is it same for original version or is it a bad sign?

[JasonWW]

It’s not very likely you got an old original model with all 3 channels. It’s not the newest version for sure either which is one channel (no 7135 chips). So you might have that middle version. It’s hard to say for sure. Even my early model is not perfectly smooth around the very lowest levels.

You should decide if whatever version you have is going to work for your needs and not worry so much how many channels you have. That is a tiny detail that makes a tiny difference. Even a FET only version should be pretty decent except for the very lowest levels around moonlight. It’s really not that big a deal as long as it’s operation and functionality is good.

[Alexxey]

@JasonWW

It’s not very likely you got an old original model with all 3 channels. It’s not the newest version for sure either which is one channel (no 7135 chips). So you might have that middle version. It’s hard to say for sure. Even my early model is not perfectly smooth around the very lowest levels.

You should decide if whatever version you have is going to work for your needs and not worry so much how many channels you have. That is a tiny detail that makes a tiny difference. Even a FET only version should be pretty decent except for the very lowest levels around moonlight. It’s really not that big a deal as long as it’s operation and functionality is good.

Yeah I know, it’s just some deep desire of a perfect toy
For sure it’s not the old original version, but what if Lumintop decided to make fw3a great again? I guess there is no way to tell other than unsolder something.
Comments like this made me worried in the first place actually - Which Lumintop FW3A to buy? - #10 by BlueSwordM