They also somehow manage a clean de-dome of the SST-40. Makes for a really nice punchy light with excellent power.
If i remember right a few weeks before Enogear closed their site (when they sold the AA SS light) they had a Nightwatch IRA with a copper pill pressfit to the head.
But because the site no longer is available. And other IRA models made complete out of Aluminium are available i can not find the review on BLF.
The only thing i remember is that the light ws much more heavy (with battery arround 450g).
It was this one but he never showed a picture:
Thanks contactcr. I was starting to think that i had dreamed it. To bad he did not make some better internal pics!
In the past a review was not really complete when the light was not disassembled completly and some measurements were taken.
I miss this. Especially interesting if you want to mod a light. Today you can be happy if you find the MCPCB size and driver size.
If somebody is having the Nightwatch IRA with copper pill at home please make some pics! I also contacted casi and asked if he still is having this light at home.
I like copper too but not practical to EDC for larger lights. I think the best practical combo is copper core with aluminum fins. That’s the most efficient use of copper. Won’t add much noticeable weight but you get the max benefit from copper’s thermal properties. If they make a full copper, it should be a separate version like the E07 and Olight R50. I will buy a full copper D80v2 if it’s ever made 
Here is a screenshot of the description that was on the Enogear website.
Yeah.
Designing it like a heatsink would be our best bet: copper core with aluminium fins, like you said.
That said, to get optimal heat transfer, there would need to have the copper pill filled with thermal paste, or soldered.
Vertical finning would also make a lot of sense, along with a connected lower body, like how the Amutorch VG10 21700 does it.
Yea thermal paste and preferably soldered should make a big difference in thermal conductivity through the aluminum/copper interface. Why do you prefer vertical finning? Do you get more surface area that way?
Not exactly. You get the same surface area, but better heat shedding that way.
It’s actually because vertical finning is quite a bit better than horizontal finning when passive cooling is in
That is because of a concept called unrestricted convection airflow.
When the fins are placed in a vertical manner, the air flows throughout the entire surface area of the fins exposed to ambient air, and heat convection allows for a very small air current to flow, which is good, since the air is completely unrestricted vs horizontal finning.
This is extremely useful.
But this is only in the case with passive cooling. Active cooling is always better with horizontal finning.
TLDR: We should see more flashlights with vertical fins for better heat dissipation.
There’s a good reason why I absolutely love the VG10 21700 design.
There’s vertical finning, a large head connected directly to the battery tube for additional surface area.
If it had an e-switch buck converter driver along with an LH351D 4000k 90CRI, it would be my absolute favorite light.
But that is only when you are tail standing right? When holding it in the horizontal position, circular finning should be better.
Yes, but there isn’t much difference in this case, since vertical fins are usually thinner and are more spaced apart, so the benefit isn’t as large as people might expect.
This is one of the reasons why I would’ve loved a BLF Lantern Ex with vertical finning, an 8x18650 battery tube, and 1500-2000 lumens of continuous output.
Would be awesome!
In that manner however, Amutorch did a very smart thing about the VG10.
Vertical finning on the head, and horizontal finning on the battery tube.
It’s a very efficient design, and one I would like for the D80 V3 to implement for maximum heat dissipation.
Mounted on a car bumper perhaps, but otherwise the longitudinal fins are wasted in a handheld flashlight. It wouldn’t roll off the table though, in theory…
And just so it isn’t simply an opinion, we have to look at the heat itself, it radiates away from the bottom of the emitter in an almost identical cone as the light out the top… we block it and it backs up, saturating the metal and clogging up until the fins can release it into the air. The longitudinal fins aligned with the reflector are far from the heat source, with narrow lanes or paths to the fins making this inefficient. Fin the area below the emitter, elongate it and make it deeply and numerously finned, much like the Eagle Eye X6, and you’re on your way to an efficient light.
It’s too unique a light and not a reflector but the kiriba-ru C8TT head milled out with copper spacer and 6 LEDs will get hot all the way to the bezel. The wide deep fins really keep that bottom section cooler to the touch. Way under appreciated mod light.
I took this apart and washed the tube and tail cap with detergent. Also wiped all contacts in the head with isopropyl alcohol. I saw a slight bump in lumen. Turn-on lumens is now 1,724 with P26A.
We don’t want too much thermal paste, because it is a worse conductor than the Copper. If we have a Copper core pill and a Copper MCPCB, then the closer we can get those surfaces to each other, the better.
Why can’t they have a triple thickness MCPCB made? Put sll the copper in direct contact with the emitter. Just wondering…
I’ve seen several thorough testing online of perfectly lapped cpu heatsinks tested with and without heat paste. No matter how smooth the surface, with thermal paste always cools the CPU MUCH better than without thermal paste. If there’s a way to solder the joint together it would be even better.
Of course.
Thermal paste/thermal pads fill in the microscopic gaps.
I just took some measurements of the tube diameter because it seems so large for a 18650 host. Here are my comparisons with two 21700 flashlights.
26.80mm - WildTrail D80v2
26.19mm - Acebeam EC65
25.97mm - Fireflies E07
As you can see the Wildtrail battery tube is even larger than 21700 flashlights. TheOnlyDocc, can you request Wildtrail make a 21700 battery tube for this light? It would only be a very tiny bit longer but with much better runtimes and performance along the entire discharge curve.