I will probably post the review on CPF tomorrow and see what happens. If it goes the way things did last time I was over there, I can say it will most likely be the last time I try anything over there.
Who knows, maybe they have matured. I am not one to hold a grudge but I also ain’t one to stick my hand back on the stove just for the fun of it lol.
With component changes the firmware and buck IC can handle anything from a 12V LED down to a 3V LED.
The limiting factor is that it will max out around 5A of current at any given voltage.
With some more component changes you might be able to increase this slightly but I would not expect more then 6-10A at the most with a rebuild of the buck side of the driver and that would be running pretty darn hot. Still cheaper and easier then building a driver from scratch though.
For something like an SST-40, which IIRC can take upwards of 15-20A, you would need something quite a bit beefier. A standard 46mm FET driver and a change to 1S4P would do it but you would loose regulation.
Although there is a driver in the works that might be able to handle even that but it is still very much in the works and a “might not even happen” type of thing. Just hoping that another driver I am helping with can serve double duty.
I personally wouldn’t want to run an SST-40 at more than 8 Amperes, but i assume you can get a little more by putting in a beefy inductor and FET and diode and perhaps the capacitor?
I guess we’ll see that in the coming mod threads.
But i forgot about the fact that the LED gasket and MCPCB have to be changed too when you want to run a 5050 LED (or a 7070).
I guess it would be easier to run a heavily overclocked dedomed XP-L W2.
An aluminum or copper LED gasket could be interesting for some additional heat path right from where the heat is on.
Please do post it on CPF. I am curious to see if people dump on it. I like both forums. I think that the moderators/rules are the problem for the most part, not the members. The budget thing is a difference though. I really like the budget lights, but the quality has to be there. I have no worries about that with the Q8 and the GT.
If there is a need to get reviews up where people will see them, it may be worth going to both reddit and facebook, which both have sizable flashlight enthusiast groups. From what I hear, a lot of the CPF crowd has started migrating to facebook groups… particularly this one: https://www.facebook.com/groups/396898630419281/
It’s a lot of the same people, but in a more relaxed environment.
Ah those were the days, i glad i joined this forum 6 years ago after SB got banned from CPF and made BLF a reality just see how far BLF have gone so far in term of achievements.