But, when I started taking it apart, I found this:
[Note the driver is not the original one - it was one that I tried to use to replace the original driver]
As you can see, there is no “pill”. Basically, they just have a small LED mounted on a piece of PCB, and then a small piece of plastic tube that separates the emitter PCB from the driver/contact board.
I was about to trash the whole thing, but I hate to do that, so I’m looking for ideas about how I might re-build and improve this light?
Here’s some additional pics of the pill, etc.
The emitter PCB and pill separated:
So, anyone?
All ideas, including just dumping this, are welcome!
an xp-g2 running a 1w driver, as long as the mcpcb physically contacts the head it will shed heat more then adequately since 1W won’t generate that much heat
you may have to grind the mcpcb to get a tight fit though, and that might not be fun
That’s (copper cap) one of the things I’ve been thinking, which is also why I included a pic with the head diameter, but it’s like ~16.9 mm, which I guess is around 2/3”? Is there such a thing? Also, how to mount the driver to it?
It’s the diameter of a penny, made to fit into an AA MiniMag. I cut it out of a 1” bar of 6061 with an cordless drill, an angle grinder, and a dremel tool. Driver isn’t here yet, standard 17mm Qlite is what I made the pocket for.
That Noctigon was around 20mm diameter, but in the case of my light, the ID of the head is ~16.9mm, so it doesn’t seem like it’d be possible to have a driver fit into a pill, so I’m thinking that maybe permanently gluing the driver to one end of the aluminum slug may be about the best I can do?
it definitely looks liek a generic Straw-Hat led in the plastic pill. i have upgraded a fiew lights i have that had those dim bluish LEDs with better XP-E’s and Osram Dragons.
Jim, you’re right, the Noctigon WAS 20mm, now it’s about 18mm. And yes, I used Arctic Silver Thermal Compound to glue it to the aluminum pill. But you can get a 16mm noctigon or sinkpad easy enough, heck any of em save for the triple can be cut down to 10, even 8mm if need be.
To cut down a pcb, I use 3M body moulding adhesive to stick the pcb to a 1/2” bar of aluminum so I can chuck it into my drill. Then, with a zip tie around the trigger to control the speed of the drill at a slow rpm, I use a cut-off wheel on the dremel. A little TLC to get the star on the rod properly, then taking it easy on the cut, and in a few minutes the star is whatever size you need it to be. With a file or coarse sandpaper, bevel the top edge so any exposed traces can’t touch the sides of the light and ground/short.
The 14500 cell can only provide so much power. The single emitter needs more, usually, than the 14500 can provide to make over 1000 lumens. So the 3 smaller XP-G2’s can make power at lower amp levels and maybe a bit less heat, which is of course debatable.
It also LOOKS very very cool in a mini mag! Ask JohnnyMac, Match, Old-Lumens….
Not bad for a no-lathe operation if I do say so myself! This one turned out really nice, looked perfect til I let the chop wheel touch it accidentally! lol
Do you have any copper sheet or 3/4" copper pipe/tubing? You could make a pill by slicing a small strip along the length of the tubing so that you can squeeze it down to a diameter that fits your light. Then solder your copper base (Noctigon/Sink Pad) to that.
EDIT: That triple emitter pill looks real sweet DBCstm.
This one turned out really nice, looked perfect til I let the chop wheel touch it accidentally! lol