Night shots added to the OP.
MRsDNF wrote:
I'm honestly ashamed of myself. Another day spent modding lights when its the last thing that l should be doing. At least the sheds not falling down around me. Big sigh. . . .
This happens to me too often.
Nice build. Such a good looking light that has lots of heat shedding surface area in proportion to its compact size. Totally was worth it.
You are now officially hired without pay as my PR officer. You can start immediately. The plane tickets are in the mail. One tiny question first though. Can you fight, i'm sure you know what the darling wife is.
Worth it? YES! ;-)
I like those comparison shots you do. I sure would like if I could take beam shots like that. Sigh...
EDIT: I just bought one for no other reason than I like what I see here. Does that make me weird(er)?
LOL, I know better than to fights the womans. My wife is scary brave and tough as nails. I may be able to take her in a fight, but I have to sleep eventually.
Sorry, you scared me out of the job interview. Best of luck.
Nice mod and documentation of the improvements. :)
:beer:
What a nice sized pocket torch. I must get back to building some smaller single cell lights. I’ve been going nuts with large multi emitter lights and I should get back to basics. Every light I build teaches me something and I keep moving up past my pay grade.
Yep. Back to single cell lights for while.
“Get back Jo Jo”
That is a very nice mod, and the tint is so much better now! I am all for single li-ion mods, thanks for the post :-)
I just received my F13 today and I think it is quite well constructed. I'll probably do a mod or two to it though. And that stock XM-L2 is helluva purple in my sample. Dedoming seems only kind and then I pray for a less blue tint. But thank you for the info on this light. I'll see if I can put it to any (meaningful) use :-)
I have a few here with the XML-2 but havent really used them. I did a quick reading on the light meter and I really should do this again to confirm the readings but the XML-2 was no brighter than the XML.
My hot rod light has copped a fair bit of use out walking the dogs lately and I've fallen in love with the 2C tint. Its my favorite light out of about, who knows, a heap of lights I have. A C8 just does not feel right in the hand after carrying this around.
Nice work and stuff. I have allways wondered how an xml u3 should be, compared to an xml2 u2…
I dont know what the standard led is or supposed to be except it is some sort of XML. I doubt its an XML U2.
Nice mod! Love that U3 2C - so they are out of stock now? How recent did they have them? Sounds like a pretty awesome bump, but probably expected, coming from a XML T6 on a stock alum MCPCB I assume?
It sure is a decent light - great deal at the GB price.
Found my mod details here in post #214, and then post #223: https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/26433.
I was just lucky. I wondered into Cutters and Mark was wondering around with a parcel that had just come in which had these leds in them. He got them in for a particular job so did not have many. I bought a few fell in love with them and went back to get more. I got the last six they had. l picked up 10 XML-2 U2 2C on copper stars today so hopefully these will be the same tint.
I would of kept the stock driver and tried the mod for direct drive but I prefer mode memory.
Dang! So Cutter is a real store close by you? They got a XM-L2 U2 3D listed, but on back order. I have to hit the $200 mark to get free shipping unfortunately, if under $200, the shipping is like $25. There seems to be no discount on qty's though - not sure if any discount codes either...
My hard working wife has her own F13 which has an older style XML-T6 3C led (I love the tint from this older led) with a 2.8 amp 3 mode 3175 driver. I think she liked the light. Not being able to leave things alone I thought I'd really hot it up for her. Not having cooked a light before and knowing most of you have I thought I'd give it a go. The center section was not cooked as I do not trust myself at the moment with a soldering iron (dont ask 
).
Well blow me down she loves it. It was baked at 220 for half an hour. The oven would not go any higher. After the first 15 minutes not a lot happened. I got my gas torch on the tailcap to try and get it a little more colorful but it only made it hot without doing a thing. Anyway, the wifes happy with it and that makes me happy.
I thought the background was very fitting if anyone had ideas that I was turning into a nice guy.
You rat! You've snatched a sock from every pair she owns? 
Nice job on the light. I assume that's 220 centipedes, about 430 fair-'n-hots.
Nice bronzed F13 !
but now my wife wants her SRK done too !
Nice MRsDNF, that looks pretty good!
I also done the oven type, but it didn't do much..then I just put it above the fire on the stove and it turned gold/Brown in a minute.. but very hard to match the colors of different parts if you do them separately.
Wife must be happy with you, for making that mess with your/her socks ;)
Don't tell her you first tried baking her left socks because you weren't confident this trick worked on flashlights. Now you have to try to match her right socks..maybe the white and the brown one underneath will match. Just put the white one in the oven, it might turn Brown and match the other one. It also worked on the flashlight, so why not on that sock?
There appears to be a few members here still playing with these lights so just updating this thread on my latest findings. All numbers quoted are for reference only and are the readings on my light meter at about 6 meters. I'll try and get some night shots this coming weekend.
Just out of curiosity I dedomed a standard led. Before OTF reading with a tailcap current reading of a whopping 1.75 amps was 210. Standard led dedomed with nothing else done was 400. Out of curiosity I installed the low isolator from Fasttech, https://www.fasttech.com/p/1581402 keeping in mind the reflector housing has to have about .5mm removed from the face that contacts the head area to keep the reflector in contact with the star. I also put some Kapton tape over the base of the reflector to prevent any chance of a short with the reflector now sitting lower. OTF reading rose to 480. The tint was not to bad to me with no green at all.
For the cost of a few cents this in my book is a mod well worth doing. My own light in the OP with a dedomed XML-2 U2 1A led is showing 900 in the same scenario as the above mods.
Has anyone tried an XPG-2 in this light?