Is it time for the next generation Q8?

Lightbringer · 2019-04-16T04:35:29.000Z

BillyBobJoe:

The DC7 keeps getting mentioned…It a decent light? Wanting to get my first soda can and not sure where to start. Q8, D18, Meteor, DC7? Is there another thread that could help me out?

Which one would you recommend? Niwalker MF5SV1 vs BLF Q8 LED Flashlights – General Info

Wellp, I can’t speak to the Niwalker, but as far as Q8 class lights, you have BLF Q8 Sofirn Q8 Airpro DC7 I got a few BLF Q8s. Pretty good build quality, nice floody beam, great CT/tint right out of the box. No Sofirn Q8s, because a) they’re throwier, and I find the BLF’s floody beam lots more useful, b) it’s more CW than NW, again, a negative to me, but Sofirn’s quality in general is spot-on. The Airpros are quite nice, excellent build quality that I’ve seen, everything nicely lub…

AEDe · 2019-04-16T05:10:59.000Z

Just 10000-15000lm for several seconds is already boring. There are many such lights.

Is is interesting to see some new hardware features. Good charger with modern parts. CcT adjusting, active cooling and so on.

Tangra · 2019-04-16T07:13:24.000Z

AEDe:

Just 10000-15000lm for several seconds is already boring. There are many such lights.

Is is interesting to see some new hardware features. Good charger with modern parts. CcT adjusting, active cooling and so on.

Active cooling is good solution. What about oil cooling? Like those in big transformers.
Other budget LED option is 4 x SST40.

Spartan · 2019-04-16T08:05:10.000Z

Tangra:

AEDe:

Just 10000-15000lm for several seconds is already boring. There are many such lights.

Is is interesting to see some new hardware features. Good charger with modern parts. CcT adjusting, active cooling and so on.

Active cooling is good solution. What about oil cooling? Like those in big transformers.
Other budget LED option is 4 x SST40.

Nooooo….I can imagine the leak issues!

Small fan behind the head. Cheap and effective, like CPU fans.

Lightbringer · 2019-04-16T19:09:37.000Z

BOMBAY:

dc7 has a lighted switch only when the flashlight is on?

Try 5 clicks. Mine’s at home, so can’t do it now, but while I here and remember…

Tally-ho · 2019-04-16T19:30:02.000Z

Tangra:

Active cooling is good solution. What about oil cooling? Like those in big transformers.

Dialectric oil is used to isolate different parts and also to transfer heat from parts that can’t touch metal or touch each-others (short). In a flashlight, it’s the metal that is used to transfer heat, oil won’t help.

Scallywag · 2019-04-16T20:37:14.000Z

Yeah, more and more light is boring for me, too. Larger and larger lights to do anything more than scorch your fingers and eyes for a handful of seconds. The "more light" category needs some major innovation in lumens/Watt before I'll get super excited there, or at least some cooling innovations.

Throw is also relatively stagnant these days, with people still putting XP-G2s in some throwers. Larger optics was the game, and then the GT and MF04 did their thing.

USB-C charging is beginning to see adoption in the flashlight industry. 21700 size, too.

Interfaces are getting pretty advanced, especially for single-button. I think the FW3A will nearly "solve" the single-button tail-switch UI. There's a few nice dual-button configurations out there, but not many, so I guess there's room for innovation there, or for further adoption of selection rings like the RRT-01.

What else is there? Small OLED displays like the vapes have? I still need to be able to fumble in the dark for it, and turn it on without blinding anyone. I could go for every driver ever from now on having a battery check mode of some sort.

I'm also not sure how much I like TIRs these days. Are there any good options for throw? I've lately been feeling like my TIR lights need 1000+ lumens to be useful outdoors at night, for example to see across a parking lot, but admittedly that is the tiny TIRs of triple/quad. Maybe I need to find a big TIR for an S2+ and try it for a bit. They would probably be nice to mod with, too, so I could stop worrying about shorting onto reflectors...

BOMBAY · 2019-04-16T20:52:19.000Z

Lightbringer:

BOMBAY:

dc7 has a lighted switch only when the flashlight is on?

Try 5 clicks. Mine’s at home, so can’t do it now, but while I here and remember…

I only have Sofirn Q8. Maybe if they offer neutral white I will buy DC7

Lightbringer · 2019-04-16T21:28:07.000Z

Tried it, it’s a “breather”. I’m leaving it off. Beacon or constant-on, sure. Breather, nope.

Tangra · 2019-04-17T06:02:16.000Z

I thing BLF Q8 is just fine. Only improvement we can do is how to increase time in turbo.
First we can use XPL2 and second to put active cooling.

Agro · 2019-04-17T06:11:35.000Z

Tally-ho:

Tangra:

Active cooling is good solution. What about oil cooling? Like those in big transformers.

Dialectric oil is used to isolate different parts and also to transfer heat from parts that can’t touch metal or touch each-others (short). In a flashlight, it’s the metal that is used to transfer heat, oil won’t help.

Actually with some CSP LEDs it is not easy to cool the phosphor. Clemence has shown that submersing the LED in liquid allowed driving it much harder.

As to active cooling: lots of complexity, big cost, noise, problematic waterproofing….not my style.
However a big passive radiator shell like Olight X6 Marouder with liquid metal and magnetic pumps would be:

also very complex and expensive
silent
waterproof
And unless it springs a leak it should be very reliable.

Though heat pipes would be even more reliable, much cheaper and should work well enough.

Di_Joker · 2019-04-17T06:24:19.000Z

Tangra:

I thing BLF Q8 is just fine. Only improvement we can do is how to increase time in turbo.
First we can use XPL2

The difference will be a few seconds.
Only setting 4* or 6* XHP50.2 will give an increase in the operating time to a stepdown in the 5000Lm mode.

ZoomieFan · 2019-04-17T07:18:51.000Z

Tally-ho:

Spartan:

I have to check it out, but I’m pretty sure 3 21700 are smaller diameter then 4 18650s

Slightly bigger if i’m not wrong with my paint skills :

4x 18650 fits in 44mm diameter, 14000 mAh
3x 21700 fits in 46mm diameter, 15000 mAh
4x 21700 fits in 51mm diameter, 20000 mAh

Tangra · 2019-04-17T08:05:58.000Z

Di_Joker:

Tangra:

I thing BLF Q8 is just fine. Only improvement we can do is how to increase time in turbo.
First we can use XPL2

The difference will be a few seconds.
Only setting 4* or 6* XHP50.2 will give an increase in the operating time to a stepdown in the 5000Lm mode.

To keep throw with 4xXHP50.2 we have to increase reflector. Better big cooling fins.

Diomedes · 2019-04-17T08:15:01.000Z

I feel it would be hard to sufficiently supersede the Q8 at a reasonable price point when looking at the current competition. The HaikeLite MT09R with XHP70.2’s is a good step up at _{$120 with coupon code and then there’s the AceBeam X45 for}$135 with coupon code (and excluding the value of batteries included). The X45 is great value considering it has a boost driver that maintains constant output and it can sustain 5,000 lumens without overheating and it even happily sustains it’s 9,000lm turbo mode in winter. A successor to the Q8 would really need to be something special for me to justify buying. Even if it was $80-100, I would still rather pay the extra for something like the X45 to have a well regulated boost driver for more constant output.

ZoomieFan · 2019-04-17T08:34:50.000Z

While 4x21700 parallel is tempting (40% more power) I think the light shouldn’t get any thicker. Not even the 7mm required to fit bigger cells. I happen to think people with smaller hands already find the light to bulky.

Just wondering, can the Q8 driver handle 6.5 volts?
If so a new longer tube would allow for doubling capacity, without any redesign.

I don’t know the drawbacks of such a driver but I can see it as selling point if all BLF designs allow (at least) 2 cells in series.

Caleb · 2019-04-17T08:31:33.000Z

If I recall correctly, The Miller wrote about followup lights once the Q8 project was complete… a whole series of lights based on the Q8 design, but scaled up or down to accommodate different battery sizes.

What about a scaled up version with 4 x 26650 and also 4 correspondingly larger reflectors (think Palight Boss 1 size)?

Di_Joker · 2019-04-17T08:43:54.000Z

Tangra:

Di_Joker:

Tangra:

I thing BLF Q8 is just fine. Only improvement we can do is how to increase time in turbo.
First we can use XPL2

The difference will be a few seconds.
Only setting 4* or 6* XHP50.2 will give an increase in the operating time to a stepdown in the 5000Lm mode.

To keep throw with 4xXHP50.2 we have to increase reflector. Better big cooling fins.

For the throw already done Sofirn Q8 4*XPL HI.
Big cooling fins do not give a significant effect. The efficiency of the emitter is crucial. You can verify this: Turn on Sofirn SP33 (XHP50.2) and Sofrn(BLF) Q8 into 1000Lm mode. You will see that the massive body and big cooling fins Sofirn Q8 has no advantage.

ZoomieFan · 2019-04-17T08:54:01.000Z

Di_Joker:

Big cooling fins do not give a significant effect. The efficiency of the emitter is crucial. You can verify this: Turn on Sofirn SP33 (XHP50.2) and Sofrn(BLF) Q8 into 1000Lm mode. You will see that the massive body and big cooling fins Sofirn Q8 has no advantage.

Cooling works in two steps.

Increase area that’s exposed to the air. That’s what fins do.
Remove the heated air from the fins.

It’s my guess that with a slight breeze the fins will show their advantage.

Without a breeze another thing comes into play. Heat difference cause airflow. While the cooling area of fins is bigger the temp difference to the surrounding air is less. So the airflow is less too.

All that said I 100% agree efficiency is very very important. I think it’s often overlooked.
More efficiency means:

- Longer runtimes.

- Longer turbo.

Less bulky => The body doesn’t need to be heavy to dispensate heat.

Spartan · 2019-04-17T09:21:13.000Z

ZoomieFan:

Di_Joker:

Big cooling fins do not give a significant effect. The efficiency of the emitter is crucial. You can verify this: Turn on Sofirn SP33 (XHP50.2) and Sofrn(BLF) Q8 into 1000Lm mode. You will see that the massive body and big cooling fins Sofirn Q8 has no advantage.

Cooling works in two steps.

Increase area that’s exposed to the air. That’s what fins do.

Remove the heated air from the fins.

It’s my guess that with a slight breeze the fins will show their advantage.

.

I keep going back to the BLF Sabre design because that is exactly what it was designed to do. Separate the head and cool it from underneath.

Instead of re-inventing the wheel, I simply stole the cooling design of CPUs, which is pretty much a “mature” method of cooling and applied it to flashlights.

Fans are dirt cheap and take very little draw. Even passively, the extra cooling right behind the LEDs helps a lot.