SK68 clone upgrades?

[Fritz_t_Cat]

@Danglerb

@Fritz t. Cat

Of course heat sink compound around the pill will help. They warm up both in the head and the fins, unlike the Z8 that warms up just at the head. So heat does transfer across the gap to the head and along the thin body to the fins. But I think both could be improved with some thin copper. Probably take out the o-ring or spring that the head slides on, wrap copper, solder it maybe?, put some heat sink compound or grease.

Thermal transfer is going to be related to the cross section of the path, which is tiny in the thin part of the tube going down to the fins, but the pill is good sized so my guess is that most heat transfer is through the base of the pill near the fins.

I don’t see a practical way to keep the zoom functioning decently and transfer much heat to it.

OTOH high output for an extended time isn’t going to work with a SK68 or any small light, simple heat vs surface area.

In this thread Review: TrustFire Z8 - XM-L Flood-to-Throw there is discussion of thermal droop in the Z8, but more likely it was battery voltage droop. For a brighter SK68, it seems one could follow the Z8’s example by using an under driven XM-L. That reduces the throw but the larger led die won’t get as hog as as smaller die at the same power would, even though the star, pill and light do. Also, the efficiency is better. The cooling of the SK is definitely better than that of the Z8.