Any chance of purchasing a few of those ?
I agree, for my purpose, ONLY upgrade the driver to multi-mode as you said.
That way I could raise the price I get for these units. As well as having neato freebies to give away
What is the driver board size, I’ve been thinking it is 16mm, but someone just mentioned in another thread using a 17mm 4 mode, maybe something like this one,
Of the 3 SK68s I just received from Banggoods, one already had an XP-E emitter. It is brighter and throws as well as the XR-Es. But only one came that way. Maybe they are cheaper or something, but only the colored one (blue) had this. The rest were XR-E. I thought this thread was about that.
Thread is about anything you can do based on a SK68 clone, which includes getting variations on the emitters in new ones, not just mods.
Some of mine also are XP-E. Perhaps the XP-Es are less ringy. Perhaps the metal ring on the XR-E aids in cooling. I don’t think it makes much difference. Probably the older ones are the XR-Es. The old Sipiks are listed as Q3 while clones usually claim Q5. I don’t know how to verify which bin they really are. There is quite a variety in warmth of the white.
While talking about modding guys, how to open up a sk68 clone to take out the driver? One of the sample I have has the driver slightly tilted sideways and the flashlight won’t light up anymore.
Must have been the constant banging/falling to the ground due to my kid.
[quote=MountainKin[/quote]
- Unscrew tailcap, remove battery
- Unscrew bezel w/ lens, slide zoom head down
- Unscrew pill from body using slots at led end (I use a screw driver on one side)
- Driver is most likely press fit, use pick/hook to remove
- In severe case, carefully press out using holes from driver side
Optional, replace wire on pill with o-ring as desired - will need to be sized to allow smooth movement with lens in place
Here’s 5-mode, 0.9V~3.6V driver from FT
Looks easy to shave off one MM for fit to the sk68
Any thoughts on This driver?
[quote=GottaZoom]
How do you unscrew the bezel??
You should be able to just unscrew the bezel from rest of the sliding part. Here’s an old pic where you can see the bezel is threaded:
According to FT it will not take Li-ions, but you could try and be lucky, lots of these can take it anyway
It is hard to tell the brands apart without looking for a name, and there often isn’t one. The cheapest ones I have found were $3.50 and $3.60, supposedly depending on color but they both came silver. These cheapest ones, on close inspection have sloppier tail cap thread than the Sipiks, though those are not like TrustFire Z8s either. The lens sizes, the length of the zoom movement and the size of the flood vary. Some slide on springs and some on o-rings. In one thread here, it was concluded that there is no way of selecting what you want, you just cross your fingers. Some of the better ones I have say “UltraFire”, but I am not sure that actually correlates with anything. The worst flashlight I have bought said UltraFire on it, though that was not mentioned in the description. I ordered a Smiling Shark SK 68 clone, because I liked the build of their SS-8027 but I am not holding my breath.
I don’t like black a lot, but apparently hard anodizing comes out dark and variable, so perhaps the only way to get reliable color with hard anodizing is to make it black. I know that hard anodizing radiates infrared well, and the black color probably correlates also with good IR radiation, for cooling (because dark color implies good visible light radiation and that tends to correlate with IR). The fit of the pill, the body and the head with each other is important for cooling, though heat sink compound can partly fill the gaps. Before putting much work into one, you should probably check a few for fit.
DX has one SK68 clone that has a Cree XM-L led : http://dx.com/p/singfire-sf-117b-cree-xm-l-t6-700lm-3-mode-white-zooming-flashlight-black-1-x-aa-1-x-14500-191024
Interesting, Alcius. I ordered the one I found. It is a bit cheaper but it hasn’t shipped yet. Perhaps they need to do the emitter swap to fill my order of one item.
I move a LOT of lights, all my customers use Alkaline or NiMh’s
I’d rather not smoke a driver, so I appreciate the tip for ME :0
0.9 volt is too low to run a lithium ion cell, it might be as low as one would want to run a Ni metal hydride cell, but it is not low enough for a worn out and heavily loaded alkaline cell. For general use, an SK 68 needs to produce at least short bursts of dim light for hours after the AA is worn out, like an old acid zinc carbon dry cell light, in case there is not a spare light or a drugstore handy. Regular SK 68s from various sources can do that, so replacement drivers should also, unless one knows how the upgraded light will be used.
Maybe that driver will really work over a wider input voltage range than it was designed for.
Maybe an other improvement to consider is a forward clicky switch, especially for single mode versions.
I fitted one of these to a Balder SE-1 XM-L.
It is pretty so-so on one cell but much better on 2AA. The blinkies are mildly annoying and it has some PWM (especially on low) if that's a problem for you.
Haven't been willing to try a 14500 'cause I don't want to have to replace it again.
If you only plan to run only 1 NiMH this won't be a blinder.
I found that one of my $3.50 clones has anodized bezel thread. Probably most do. It worked fine, but all the anodized thread joints on lights I have feel sort of rough when they turn, just two hard satin finished surfaces rubbing. So I tried making it smooth. I took off rough spots with 400 grade wet and dry sandpaper, then lapped the treads together with Bon Ami, auto paint rubbing compound and silver polish. It now turns smoothly like the stainless against aluminum of the UltraFire Z8. Apparently, it did get smooth without going through the aluminum oxide coating. (Of course triangular threads are still not as strong as trapezoidal threads.)
The tail cap threads are, unfortunately, not anodized. Perhaps it is too hard to leave the coating on the threads and take it off where the ends meet when fully closed, or perhaps they want the redundancy. I filed about one extra thread off to a conical shape, sanded it with 400 and lapped it with the same abrasives. It worked more easily without cross threading but when I worked the thread with the battery in and silicone lubricant, it still felt rough and the grease became dark. Replacing the silicone with 3 in One Oil helped.
Conclusion: Silicon dioxide works well for bezel thread, but hard aluminum alloy needs a lubricant with better thin film properties than silicone grease to work without galling under moderate spring pressure.
The o-ring still has mostly silicone on it and the tail cap moves smoothly, but I know no way to make it work perfectly.
Love the Sipik SK68 and its clones.
I have a family of them in stock and modded form, including XM-L U2, XR-E , XP-G and XR-E modded ones, neutral white, warm white, cool white, some with 5 modes including moonlight mode, a 2-AA long-tube side switch SK68, the list goes on. 
here is some of my SK68 collection:
