Anyone who owns this light, knows if it works with 10440?
I don’t own one of these but I’m thinking of getting one. No idea if it runs on 10440, but I hope it does.
Advantages:
- Smallest light available with a LED Lenser style lens system.
- Nice styling.
- Been awhile since I bought a 1xAAA size light.
For me the biggest downsides are:
- If it is constructed anything like my LED Lenser M1 this thing will be incredibly difficult to mod. (that light had awkward features such as the LED attached directly to the aluminum pill… no star at all. Good luck trying to reflow to that. Also the driver was a rectangular thing stuffed sideways into the light and fully encapsulated in some kind of epoxy or fujik. And the construction of the body made it virtually impossible to adjust the focus if the emitter were ever changed).
- Body tube is probably too narrow for a 17 or even 15mm driver. If I attempt to mod it, I’d have to break out the 10mm boards and buy a heat gun so I can reflow components onto them.
- Doesn’t tailstand.
- protruding forward clicky might turn on accidentally in the pocket.
- Despite being AAA size, it’s actually rather long. As long or longer than some of my much brighter 14500 size zoomies and only a little thinner.
- Pricy. Around $60 at Amazon. Saw it online for $25 at Zoro, but never used them before and don’t know if they are a reliable or legitimate seller.
Indeed the light has a lot of disadvantages.
I’m as well I’m doubting to buy it because of the price and the fact it has only 1 mode… The size doesn’t really matter as I like AAA lights and this is the smallest AAA light out there I think.
Actually there are lots of much smaller AAA lights. Fenix LD01, DQG tiny AAA, etc.
The P3 AFS P is the smallest AAA zoom light using LED Lenser’s optic though. And since there are so few AAA zoomies out there, it might be the smallest AAA zoomie.
I purchased a P3 ASF a few weeks ago which was ok but not very bright and not a lot of throw. I stuck a 10440 in it hoping for more lumens but within seconds the beam started dimming and turning purple :Sp - I switched it off pretty quick but the damage was done and from then on was about as bright as an incandescent Maglite Solitaire with a sick AAA.
I sent it back for a refund claiming it was defective 0:) and purchased a P3 ASFP on an Amazon lightening deal. No way I’m sticking a 10440 in this baby. It has fantastic throw for an AAA light - easily 10x further than my Thunite Ti3.
My P3 AFS P arrived today.
- Stuck a AAA primary inside. Fairly bright with good throw.
- Then I stuck an Efest 10440 inside. Considerable increase in brightness. Got noticeably hot, but did not dim. Throw is excellent for such a small light.
- Then I stuck the AAA primary back inside… still lights, but much dimmer than when I first got it.
- Then I went back to the Efest 10440. Just as bright as when I first stuck a 10440 inside.
My conclusion: If you stick a 10440 in this light you may lose the ability to run it on 1.5v AAA, but it should still run fine as a 10440 light.
A few other brief first impressions:
- Box came with a lot of accessories: keychain, pocket clip, lanyard and a nylon belt case.
- This light is tiny for a zoomie, though still much larger than a Fenix LD01.
- The head wasn’t glued on and it was easy to take off to look at the CREE XPE led.
- The LED looks like it’s on a small star, but the driver wires must be on the underside as they aren’t visible. Unlike other zoomable LED Lensers, the LED isn’t mounted on a pillar.
- I haven’t tried to remove the pill to look at the tiny driver yet. However, I do suspect that it might be possible to mod this one with a 10mm driver and small star. Maybe replace the XPE with an XPE2 or Nichia 219B, possibly dedomed.
- As a 10440 light, the AFS P would be best off with a driver swap if you can find a tiny replacement driver. The stock single-mode driver isn’t great for a light that heats up fast at max power. It would be nice if it had modes.
I have the led lenser m3r , accepts all kinds of aaa cells, not
bright on 1.5 though, i think the p3 driver is designed to
deliver more power on 1.5, using the 10440 might have
changed the driver's behavior
You’ll likely fry the driver as it’s designed for AAA’s.
I own an M3R, it’s not bad, hardly use it though.
If you’re from Aus and interested in buying it, let me know.
Been trying the light a bit more with my Efest 10440.
It’s actually quite nice with this cell.
- Even after running for a few minutes, the light gets warm, but not hot.
- Output is fairly nice.
- With the LED Lenser reflector-lens type optic there’s no noticeable difference in lumens with a ceiling bounce test when going from flood to spot. This is different from cheap aspherics which can lose 50% or more of their lumens when cycled to spot mode.
- Output on the 10440 looks pretty close to a Sipik 68 on a 14500 cell.
- This light is tiny. It’s not too much shorter than some of the AA zoomies, but it’s MUCH thinner and lighter. It’s noticeably thinner and lighter than the thinnest AA size zoomie on the market. The body tube is about the same thickness as a Fenix LD01, but the light is longer and the head is larger. This light feels light enough to use as a keychain light.
- I haven’t done a runtime test, but I can’t imagine it would be long on such a tiny 350 mAh cell.
- Throw is very good for a AAA size light. I’ll try to break out the luxmeter tonight to get some readings.
This light is growing on me. Such a cute little zoomie. I wonder if I can mod it for more output and/or modes. I don’t think this will ever take the place of one of my bigger lights for EDC though unless modding is very successful.
I think for now I won’t buy it as it is a 1 mode.
Thank you for your impressions!
Finally got around to taking out the pill on mine.
It was more difficult than I thought it would be. At first glance it looks like a conventional zoomie pill… but inscrew it (breaking the small amount of yellow threadlocker) and it turns out it’s just a cover over the actual pill.
The actual pill has threads all along it and was attached with a much larger amount of yellow threadlocker. I got it out with the hot-glue and pliers method.
The stock star is a bit unusual. The leads for it appear to traverse directly through the star so there are no bondwires up top. Both the star and driver seem to be slotted in but the wires connecting them together are very short. They aren’t pulling apart at all. I might have to force them by cutting those wires.
Second problem is it looks like I bought the wrong size driver. I have a 10mm FET driver ready to be installed, but the stock driver is actually around 12mm. OOPS! Not sure I can get a 10mm to work especially since the entire pill is anodized and the driver is not soldered to the pill (it makes negative contact through a spring loaded ring directly to the body tube).
I don’t really want to wait a month or two for RMM to get more 12mm drivers in stock though, so I’ll probably just give it a shot. My plan is to swap in the FET driver and a 4000K XPG2.
Any pics?
You can order the 12mm single sided FET boards from Ospark & reflow those components you have from the 10mm FET driver from RMM.
Got the pill apart and was able to remove the driver and star.
Instead of conventional wire leads connecting the driver to the star, there are actually 2 vertical pins in the driver. These pins are inserted into holes in the bottom of the star and the whole thing is soldered together.
Removing the star was easy. Just touch a soldering iron to the top of the star and heat. Once the solder around those leads melts, the star lifts off.
Reflowing is also easy and done in the same manner. I replaced the stock cool white XPE2 with a Nichia 219B, and then with an XPG2 5A4 tint (4000k). No need to even remove the star from the pill for the reflow.
I decided not to try to insert the 10mm multi-mode driver I had on hand, though I might change my mind and try again later. This light has a serious problem when it comes to heatsinking: the pill is not aluminum… it’s actually made of black PLASTIC. The only heatsinking is from the sides of the aluminum star to the aluminum holder surrounding it and then to the body tube. There’s almost no heatsinking through the pill.
Despite that I’m actually fairly pleased with how the mod came out. With just the emitter swap to the XPG2 5A4 and running on an Efest IMR 10400, I measured 10k lux in spot mode. Flood mode was also very bright. Blows away the spot and flood from my larger led lensers actually. I suspect it may actually be running direct drive on the 14500 cell.
Be warned that if you do try running your light on 14500, doing so damages the driver. It will still run on 1.5 AAA, but will be much much dimmer than out of the box. Basically, running on 14500 converts it to a 14500 only light.
I have really mixed feelings about this light.
Seems like almost incredibly good light:
- TIR seems very good
- looks great
- should be much better built than most other options
- a bit big though
- junk LED and driver
- at $27 it’s expensive for a light with junk led and driver, but I could swallow that
- maybe not junk as in unreliable, but missing all the niceties of BLF drivers hurts bad, just like a not-great tint and low output.
- plastic pill!
If it was possible to get a copper pill it would make the light a great host. But I don’t think there would be enough interest to make that feasible.
There’s also Led Lenser P3R. With 120 lumens output it may feature a metal pill. $43, quite a lot. It’s even bigger and not so cute…I’m not convinced.
There’s also Led Lenser M3R. 220 lumens means that it really should feature a metal pill. $88 for what’s effectively a host? Looks well, like P3 AFS-P. But it’s larger.
BLFers, what do you think?
Has anyone opened (or modded) their P3R or M3R?
Any general experiences with them that the owners would like to share?
Only their lens system appears notable in my opinion, everything else is not worth comparing to other lights of similar type. I bought thier AAA tube penlight (p2 I think?) only because I had a chance to buy one for $8 and it's okay enough for that price I guess-30 lumens, single mode, a bit long, fine otherwise. Wouldn't pay more