I have the same problem of the automatic turn on determined. The lamp was put into Muggle mode and turned off again. After about 15 minutes, the lamp switched of itself in a high light level.
Has there been any word of different flashlight body colors being offered in the future?
OK, I've been doing some experimenting. Now I see what's happening. If the battery is fully charged, I can turn off the light in muggle mode, and nothing happens over 3 hours (light stays off). Everything appears normal.
However, if the battery is drained a bit (undetermined how much), then turn the light off, then the light will in fact turn on by itself 15min later and start blinking. The first time this happened, I removed the battery and put it on my Xtar Dragon VP4 charger, which showed I had about 20% charge left. Without recharging, I then placed the battery back into the light, turned it off again. Then it started blinking again after about 15 minutes. This time I put the light on my Texas Ace Calibrated Lumens Tube, and the blinks were showing about 1,000 lumens. This started to heat up the light steadily. I took temperature measurements on the head until the D4V2 reached over 150F (65C). At that temp, I elected to turn it off and end the measurements.
So, summarizing the perfect storm:
(1) 18650 battery is partially drained (not sure how much is required)
(2) light is in muggle mode
(3) turn off light
(4) light turns back on after about 15 min and starts blinking (each blink approx 1,000 lumens). This is enough to start heating up the light - perhaps continuously until the light destroys itself - or burns what it's laying next to.
My runtime graphs only partially illustrated the issue here, because the battery was almost fully drained when the light turned itself back on - thus there wasn't enough battery power left to significantly heat up the light.
In my opinion, and I'm not an alarmist, this makes muggle mode not only unusable, but potentially dangerous.
There have been two reported examples of the D4V2 overheating and damaging itself here and here. I think we now know what likely happened.
I always unscrew the tailcap of my flashlights when I’m not using them
I was about to write that your earlier report regarding the full-charged cell not triggering the problem was correct, but that it could happen with a fully-serviceable cell that was only partly discharged (so not just ‘nearly depleted’). You’ve confirmed that. Thanks.
You also confirm that the auto switch on can happen at full power or close to it and that the temperature regulation then seems not to work, so the light can seriously overheat. I agree this is dangerous.
Hank should immediately inform his customers, if not recalling the product.
Please forgive my ignorance about this muggle mode issue. Would it be an issue with the Lumintop FW3A light or any other light using Anduril?
Always wanted a muggle elimination mode
I doubt he will do a recall, it is not the Chinese way unfortunately.
Certainly all customers who ordered D4v2 should receive an urgent e-mail. Like right now, today.
No. Only the first batch of D4v2.
No other lights are affected.
If anyone has a pogo pin adapter for firmware updates, a fixed version is available.
Unfortunately there isn’t much information available on how to build such an adapter and how to do a firmware update.
Thanks
The link quoted above has all the info needed to make adapters… basically get some boards from Oshpark and some pins from elsewhere, and solder them together. But it would be really helpful if someone sold assembled adapters.
As for how to reflash, the info is at the Link in my signature. A short version is:
avrdude -c usbasp -p t1634 -u -Uflash:w:anduril.hex
It also helps to have a reference for the pin mappings, to figure out where each wire goes.
Someone sent me a PM, asking if reverse polarity protection was implemented on the D4V2. I replied "yes", it's listed as a feature.
Just to prove that, I installed the battery backwards. The light started heating up immediately.
Is there a diode on the PCB that's supposed to prevent this?
Can someone else check theirs to see if this is a common problem?
FWIW I told Hank I was going to buy the equipment for flashing but might need a hand assembling the BLF HQ key, or alternatively his suggestion of how to fix the problem. Response above.
So far I have ordered the programmer, the HQ key and some connectors, but haven’t yet figured out how to order the header to solder to the vias on the HQ key.
We understand your frustration, and we are deeply sorry for the situation.
As the maufactuer, I’m afraid we are not able to update the firmware for the D4V2 that you already have.
In the meantime, I think the D4V2 can not be called “dangerous” if you do not use the muggle mode,
or to disconnect the power when the light is not used, or kept in the bag.
Regards,
Hank
Thanks for your reply Hank.
I think Emisar should really step up and sell an "official" pre-assembled firmware flashing kit (needle electrodes + USB key) so we can all fix this ourselves.
This is what I suggested in email. Happy to buy it, no problem. Having all affected owners run around and try to find the parts individually is unfortunate. If Hank can’t do this, how about a group buy? I have no idea where to even start but I presume there’s some vendor out there who would want the money.
Bring them on.
Thanks for the suggestion, we plan to do so. The hard part is how to solder all those needles into the right place and height, and it is not one or two pieces, that is why we have not supplied it so far.
However, there is also the problem that not everyone is skilled to reflash the firmware even if they have the kits.