Kaidomain XM-L/U2 drop-in

Flashlight Modding and DIY Parts
1

I wanted to comment about a couple of U2 drop-ins I got today. (finally) I'm too lazy to find the thread but about a month ago somebody posted a link to a 5-mode XM-L/U2 drop-in for $11.84 from Kaidomain.

http://www.kaidomain.com/Product/Details.S009990

Pretty good price . . . if it performs so, Foy rolled the dice and bought two. Shipping was rather slow (34 days) but so far . . . it's no replacement for for the 3-mode T6 from Manafont we all love but I'm reasonably pleased.

tail cap amps measured with an old style Solarforce L2 in silver

Tenergy 2600 unprotected

high 3.46 - 3.30 amps

medium 1.59

low .15

Panasonic 2350 unprotected

high 3.10 - 3.27 amps

medium 1.53

low .15

Xtar 185700/2600 protected

high 3.10 amps

medium 1.44

low .12

They came with an OP reflector and one has a sloppily installed, off-center emitter. No surprise I suppose, that same drop-in pulls about .20 less amps overall than the other one. As far as tint goes; they're not as green as the "generic" XM-L I tried in December from Manafont that cost $12.20 and pulled a whopping 1.80 amps on high. Also not as clean and defined as my latest UltraFire T6. The tint snob in me says . . . meh.

All in all, a good value and definitely worth $12. Will I buy another?

noFoy

2

Thanks for being the guinea pig on this one. I was tempted to pick one up considering a few months ago U2 emitters were going for more than the price of this complete drop in.

3

These will be inside my next give-away light.

Foy

4

shoot. i thought this might be the answer to my "killer p-60 drop-in with awesome strobe" for bicycle application question.

oh well.

5

sounds like a pass

but those tenergys...might have to get some of those!

6

You know what's weird about those Tenergys - I found them at Fry's and they came with leads soldered to each end - I bought two just to see how they would do (and because they were almost $20 for a 2-pack) with low expectations and they have been superb. I have subsequently seen them on eBay for a lot less. I don't know how they will be long term but they really deliver the juice with certain torch/drop-in combinations.

They're unprotected so, gotta keep an eye on them.

Foy