We all love modding but what drives you to mod? I have more than enough flashlight at this point, but there is something really enjoyable about modding or building a flashlight. I liked building PCs and this is getting me interested in SMD electronics and circuits in a way my electronics teacher never did.
It doesn't make economical sense for me to get them as parts so I usually just get a full light and swap a few things. I did emitter swaps and dedomes recently. I have done driver swaps for 18650 lights that used the linear drivers. I hope I can use these spare parts!
There is a process, I don't know what it is but I feel like its a customization thing where you want to do stuff to the things you use. Building a desktop with the parts you want is one example I think of. Maybe where you setup your phone/computer in a way that suits you is another. Maybe replacing the bearing in a fidget spinner too.
I love the process of getting something, finding a way to make it better (or planning on doing it from the beginning) building something, putting in or swapping the parts, making sure it works, maybe playing around with the driver (in the form of a graphite mod for memory mode) and then using your newly modding light.
At this point I have way more flashlights than I need. I just like using them to justify soldering and learning electronics now. What do you think? What makes you want to do it? :)
My wife explained to her friends once “He just likes to create.”
Whether you work on your house, your car or your edc there’s something pleasing to know you’ve personalised it. Self satisfaction is grande when you see it. And when you personalise an edc you see it often and take it everywhere so you can show other people how weird you are by showing off a…. light.
I’m sure I’m like many blfer’s in that ideas sprout but are sometimes difficult to produce. The more difficult ones that make it to fruition are some of the best.
This is progress and the way forward. The cutting edge of technology. Look at the blf gt, blf q8, all the C8 fans or some of the tech gurus like Dr jones, toy keeper, Texas avenger and led4power to name a few.
Of course, I would be amiss if I didn’t mention Old-Lumens. An inspiration to many. May he and his wife rest in peace.
Very well put. The more work you put into something that doesn't exist, the more satisfying it is. The best is when something exists already, but you do not like how they are made and make your own version, the second best is when it almost exists and you change a few things and its perfect!
In a world of consumable products and crap flooding everywhere, its nice to have durable high quality goods that work well. There are some very old things that were less about planned obsolescence than it is now.
Its a bit of a problem with technology. Thankfully flashlights are simple in the way that they only have a few parts, some of them are easily modifiable with drivers, pills, LEDs and switches. :)
I think I am a perfectionist… I started modding lights because I couldn’t find lights in stock form that worked well for what I intended to use them for. It started with driver replacements, went on with flashing drivers existing firmware, then to designing my own drivers and writing my own firmware for them. Over four years on and I’m still designing new drivers with new components to make things better, even though they have been good enough for my intended usages since a long time. Somewhere along the line I got addicted to it.
Not a “true flashaholic” though, never have been. The amount of fully built and operational lights I have has always been very low, I think I have five or six now, or something like that. The amount of obsolete driver boards, components and dissected lights I have laying around shows I do have issues though
I actually don’t love modding as much as I once thought I did. I’m more pragmatic, I guess. I like making things work better than before. I like putting a new twist on old concepts. I love it when a plan comes together! But I get stuck with analysis paralysis a lot too, because I’m always second guessing what I’m doing, and usually I’m half-way through doing something when an even “better” idea pops into my head! :person_facepalming:
I have lots of extra parts lying around because I won a few of the giveaways of modding parts that some guys have had here. I also have a few things I’ve bought and haven’t yet used, especially drivers and LEDs. I’ve even got more dead hosts than working flashlights now, because of past modding failures that I haven’t gone back to fix. I often give away flashlights when I find out that somebody needs/wants one. So, it would seem I need to get back to modding soon! :partying_face:
I had every intention of becoming a modder, in order both to experiment and compare, and in order to get closer to the “perfect” light for each of my intended uses, be it keyring carry, belt carry, car light, bedstand light, or just plain wow factor light. I was also interested in making unique custom lights, something I may still do by stripping donor lights.
What stopped me is postage. Not only is it so slow (average currently in the 74 day bracket), but now a handling fee of about $2 per package means ordering individual components is impractical, as you say
So unless I have a need to do something as a batch, I cannot justify ordering components.
I like tweaking things and making them better. Especially when it’s as easy as dropping in a new LED or a driver swap. I wish I was into it enough to get into driver design and all that… maybe one day.
Soldering stuff has been something I’ve enjoyed for a while. In high school and even to this day I still take part in combat robotics competitions from time to time and there’s a few things I’ve learned there that benefit my other hobbies like RC cars, flashlights, or even working on mechanical keyboards. A lot of it is battery related, but sometimes knowledge of FET or SMD components has come in handy. In combat robotics I’ve seen and done a lot of unsavory things to A123 or 18650 cells. Really makes me appreciate the stable chemistry and feel safe while drawing 20+ amps for a hotrodded out flashlight.
My problem is I’m too cut and dry so when it comes to modding I like to shoot for a simple fix vs getting into something with grinders and drills to make way for something else. I’m getting spoiled with how easy it is to lego together electronics these days. It was probably a lot of fun doing original mods back when LEDs were fairly new and hosts that work with parts readily available weren’t in excess.
Back when drop-ins and dinosaurs both roamed the earth, I used to custom-make for people some bespoke lights from ther choices of host, pill/reflector (SMO vs OP), the LED (type/CT/tint), driver, etc., and just the parts would cost upwards of 25-30bux, and that’s zero for my time and labor. And that was done right, with threads scrubbed’n’lubed, AS5 where it counted, cleaned/lubed O-rings, you name it. So when decent lights were getting more usable out of the box, the price-point just wasn’t there anymore.
Now, with some really nice quality and inexpensive lights from Convoy, Thorfire, and especially recently Sofirn, pretty much breaking new performance barriers in tubelights (“1500 lemons from that!!?”), the days of wider-head drop-in lights was kinda coming to a close, at least as far as pocket-carry. And with 14500s belting out as much light as even a decent D26-based light from just a few years ago, who wants to carry a mini-barbell when a lipstick-tube does the same?
So now I pretty much use ’em just the way they come out-of-the-tin.
