Smooth curves,Two zone optics and Neatly machined stainless steel
Click for full size.
This thing is essentially, a 3 x AAA cell stainless steel LED Lenser or Coast, with a Chinese manual. These lights come closest to my ideals by combining smooth compound curves with Fresnel-like optics. The stainless steel doesn’t dissipate heat as well as aluminum does, but it has an elegant look to it, partly because we all know that it is much harder to machine than hard aluminum.
Here is some information about the manufacturer: http://www.62250.tradebig.com/
It is very similar to the P632 discussed here: Classic Review and Modification: POP lite P632 steel TIR zoomy ★★★★★. The battery tube has the same diameter but is shorter. The 3 x AAA size tube must have been retained in the 632 to reduce tooling costs. The tail caps are interchangeable and appear identical.
3 x AAA is not a configuration I often choose, but, for those who don’t use lithium ion cells, it offers more output than 1 x AA and is more compact than 4 x AAA or 3 x AA.
These differ from LED Lensers in having a thread locking compound between the head and bezel ring, and at least in this case also between the pill and the battery tube. The Lensers I have opened had the threads simply screwed in hard. I was able to get it apart with long rubber strips, penetrating oil and pump pliers. Perhaps acetone or MEK would have worked better than penetrating oil.
This was the only stainless zoomy POP lite that DX still had. After I ordered a third one, it was marked sold out:
It is still listed other places, but I have not found anywhere where it is really still in stock.
There is no driver at all, just a contact plate. Current is determined by the forward voltage of the little old XR-E, the battery characteristics and stray resistances. The board has two central pads, perhaps so it could be used with resistors. In this case the LED+ comes from the pad with the vias.
Beam shots
UltraOK SK-68 with Eneloop at 1.37 V on left, POP with included Excell Alkalines at 4.47 V total on right, zoomed out and zoomed in
With a Keeppower 14500 charged to 3.81 V in the UltraOK:
Since this is an old model, the included cells are probably not new, and they have less than 1.5 V each. This is also a lot of current for AAA alkalines. It will probably do significantly better with NiMH cells (or 1.5 V disposable lithium).
Fully charged Eneloops
The spot turned blue and went out!
The pill post and the back of the LED had thermal compound spread as though they had been in contact.
I wondered whether there was simply too much current. The Eneloops were charged to 1.4 V each = 4.2 V in series. The data sheet for XR-E goes over 1 amp. well under 4 volts. A test of an Eneloop AAA shows that it can hold 1.33 V for maybe a couple of minutes at two amps. Test/Review of Eneloop AAA HR-4UTGB 750mAh (White)
On the other hand even two amps. should not have turned an XR-E blue on direct thermal. At no point was the POP much brighter than the SK, nor did it get very hot. The light was designed for alkalines, but with an engineering margin.
It seems the LED had pulled away from the pill and was no longer in contact. I have taken the resisters out of the heads of a 4 x AAA P7.2 with an XP-G2 and of a 4 x AA P14 with XP-L LED Lensers and run them on Eneloops without problems.
The LED is fused to the pressure cap. Maybe the pressure cap’s melting caused the problem?
I changed to the XR-E out of my P632 and sanded the pressure cap a bit to make it tighter. I used Arctic Silver for thermal compound.
After taking these pictures, the SK cell was down to 3.7 V and the cells in the POP to 4.0 total.
After recharging the Eneloops again, it ran continuously with no problem, so I conclude that the LED came away from the pill.
2nd example
Focused and flood with fully charged Eneloops. The brighter in each is the POP.
One element is more in focus than the other, as with some Coasts. A spacer in the head may help that.
Example 3 is the second modification described below. Example 4, from YoyCart, came in an outer box that protected the gift box, so I put it away as my pristine collection example.
Reliability
The turning blue and going out described above is a reliability problem, maybe from assembly quality control. My second example works well out of the box. The P7.2 Lenser that I took the resister out of also turned blue, and that was caused by missing thermal compound.
The intent of the design and workmanship seems to be a high degree of reliability. However, sometimes when I screw the tail cap on extra hard it won’t turn on. Perhaps there are reasons that most lights are built the way they are and not like Lensers and POP lites. The problem recurred, and I took the contact end of the battery holder apart. Like all of these, the battery holder contacts the driver with a gold plated plate, little steel probably stainless springs and brass or aluminum gold plated caps. In this case there are three negative contacts and one positive. I rubbed the parts with a paper towel and put it back together. It is maybe improved but still doesn’t work in all positions of the tail cap screw. I don’t know what is wrong, except that the design is more complex than usual. The little springs, not being gold plated and not having much pressure on them, are suspect. The contact board also appears not to be gold plated. I saw an ad. saying that a newer model Lenser had a “connector” for electrical contact, so maybe they gave up on this system. Replacing the LED did not make the contact problem go away. Replacing the contact board in the driver change described below fixed the problem. My second example has no such problem, and I intend to keep it unmodified.
My P14 stopped going into turbo. It has a three way switch, like that of the P7.2. Probably a speck of something non-conducting stuck in it.
It is possible that Lensers sold in Europe and North America have better quality control, but a member said he had had problems with switches in one with a warranty.
My third and fourth P32 examples have no problems.
My first T34 went a bit blue in turbo, because the LED cap was broken. The second one is fine.
Modification potential
As with the other POP lites and old LED Lensers, changing from the XR-E to a modern LED with a smaller package requires filing a star to fit in the pressure cap inside the optics and filing the pillar or post on top of the pill shorter to retain focus.
A simple mod. will be changing to a low resistance driver and a low forward voltage larger LED. 3 x AAA won’t over drive it. Unlike the 632, it has plenty of room for a driver. (Apparently the pill of the 632 was shortened to keep it from being awkwardly long. The difference in flashlight length is less than that in cell length.) The contact board and its groove in the pill are 19 mm. diameter.
A more radical mod. would be 1 x Lithium ion, with an ordinary switch arrangement and no battery holder, to save length. This has been done to a very similar LED Lenser P7.2 here Modifying a Led Lenser P7.2 - Pics Added 
There is a little less length in the P32, so 18650 would require pushing the new switch plate far down in the tail and very short springs. For three AAA cells, it is under 23 mm. in diameter, so 25500 is not possible. The best choice would seem to be 18500. So P632s seem a better choice, as long as any can still be found.
3 x 10440 is also possible, but 6 volt LEDs are too big for the optics and the run time would be minuscule.
Unfortunately, the scarcity of these makes them unlikely mod. hosts.
