Where to find a pill like this?

I have a light and I want to switch the emitter and the driver, but I can't get it apart.

So I would like to buy a new pill that would fit, but I don't know where to find one like this:

I can get more measurements/pictures if necessary.

Can anyone help me find where to buy a pill like the one I have?

Doesn’t look like it would be hard to get to the emitter by screwing out that brown retaining ring. Is it glued with threadlock?
Have you tried heating the whole pill with a hairdryer, that usually loosens up any glue on the threads or expands jammed aluminium parts.

You probably won’t find a replacement pill easily, this looks like it came from a zoomable ultrafire?

It is from a Zoomable, it doesn't say ultrafire on it. Looks similar to a C8.

I am not sure how a pill is assembled to know how to actually take it appart.
I don't have anything strong enough and thin enough to fit into the holes in the copper/brass part and the bottom looks like it's glued or soldered from inside the pill.

These are the holes I'm talking about:

I use scissors to unscrew that kind of retaining rings. 100% success so far (and a huge play un the scissors’ stud)

Ah ok, well there’s usually not much to taking apart a pill like this.

That brown ring with the two holes is a retaining ring that is most likely threaded into the pill to hold down the emitter pcb. You’ll need to find something that fits those holes, a set of stiff tweezers is ideal by you can usually get these things out with a small screwdriver pushing in only one hole. Just try whatever to screw it out anticlockwise, be really careful not to slip and destroy the LED though!

What could make your life a lot harder is if they used some glue on the threads or if fujik from below the emitter has been pressed into the threads during assembly, then it might take a fair amount of force and/or heating to remove it.

Under the ring you’ll find an aluminium pcb which the emitter is reflow soldered to. This is probably glued down to the pill with a silicon fujik type substance and you’ll need to remove the whole lot to replace it with a new emitter. If you’re lucky it will just be loosely mounted with some thermal paste underneath.

If the driver board is soldered into place rather than a press-fit then you’ll have to desolder it to get it out. Either way you’ll want to get that emitter out from the top first and then see if you can push the driver out from inside. Is there a brass sleeve around the driver or is it mounted into the aluminium directly? If there’s no brass sleeve then the driver will be a press fit and should come out with a bit of persuasion. :slight_smile:

Edit: Yep good idea, scissors will do the trick if you have an old pair you don’t mind destroying.

And now I feel stupid.... i've been trying to pull/lift that copper thing when it was actually screwed in. (Yay, I learned something today!)

Now the driver wont pop out, any secret to removing a driver?

And my current driver doesnt have any chips on it, just a PCBoard with solder spots and chinese writing, what type of driver is that?

Thank you!

No chips top or bottom on the driver?
Could be a direct drive light in that case, that’s when the battery is directly connected to the LED without any electronic regulation.

Could be the driver is glued into the pill. I’d remove the LED pcb and then heat the pill with a hairdryer or heatgun to try and soften any glue holding the driver in.
Then try pushing it out again.

I just finished putting the pill back together.

I take tons of pictures so I don't have to disassemble it too many times.

So, 20mm emitter and 20mm driver with direct drive?

isn’t it a press fit “driver”? If you plan to replace it, just break it (when you receive the spare parts, of course)
edit: or you can use it as a contact plate, in case you want to install a more common 105c driver or something similar, which are 17mm
But its not a good idea to drive that led very hard, in that hollow pill, its probably the worst scenario, a hollow pill into a zoomie

Hmm, that’s a very poorly design pill.
Almost no thermal pathway between the led pcb and rest of the pill combined with a direct drive “driver” makes this just about the worst possible combination.

It won’t be a simple upgrade here to get noticeably better performance.
Have you considered looking at what other cheap lights are out there instead of upgrading this one?
Your money would be better spent on almost anything else I think :slight_smile:

You're like the 4th person who has told me that, haha.

I use the zoom constantly, I like going from flood to spot all in one light. I've never had a cree that didn't zoom.
I haven't found a nicely cooled zoomable host that will get here in less than a month or two for a decent price.
I might look into some pre-assembled ones and just mod them. Problem with that is I don't know if it's a 17mm or 20mm.

Any suggestions?

That driver appears to have no components on it. Are there any on the other side (battery side)?

This is the bottom:

When the light is fully zoomed, the neck has a port for charging.
Not sure if there's something in there that is working as a pre-driver driver?

I've done a few af these low cost (cheap Smile) zoomies and most of the time, they have the "hollow pill" design, meaning the PCMCB (ie star) is not mounted on solid metal, but sits on a lip of the pill so had poor thermal contact. You cant go wrong by replacing the aluminum star with a copper one because it will keep the LED cooler even with a hollow pill. That one there is 20mm.

I use copper rounds (pre-fabbed copper disc), and file/grind them to fit nice, which will then give the star a solid place to mount, but it's a lot of work, depending on your skills and tools.

Most of the times the drivers are press fit in there. The little holes on the side of the driver board are there to pry them off. 95% of the time they pry off with a little leverage using a SS pick type of tool, or anything you got that is small tip and wont break too easy.

I stil enjoy modding these $5 or $10-$12 zoomies up to something respectable in brightness and nice simple modes, with mode memory. Many come stock with the awful 5 modes with next mode memory.

Only one component…a spring. It’s an incredibly efficient driver design… :wink:

I’m not an expert on zoomies but I’m sure someone who is will jump in here and offer some suggestions.

It looks like you might have enough space to fit a 17mm Nanjg 105c or 101 driver into this pill on top of the original driver/contact plate. But heat sinking of the driver needs to be taken into account too. They get too hot during the regulation phase to simply be left floating in the empty pill like that. So then you’d have the driver overheating as well as the led, it really doesn’t look like a straight swap mod will do the job here.

What exactly are you trying to improve about the light?

I think the ruler over the driver is off a bit. Think it's really a 17mm driver. Replacing the driver with a Nanjg or Qlite is the way to go, but you can't solder to the alum pill, so, time to get creative. I've cheated - stuck the driver in there, use a metal chisel and give it a couple of blows with a light hammer to notch the alum pill edge -- this creates some binding on the driver to secure it in place. Touch some CRC 2-86 around the contact surface of metal contacts on the driver to the pill before hand, and you are set.

If I'm wrong bout the driver size and it's really 19-20 mm, there are other options. Sandwich mounting or brass adapter ring, or other home made adapter. I've done sandwich setups on stacked Nanjg drivers and never saw heat issues. You want 3 24 or 22 gauge wires connecting the driver ground ring to the ground of the stock driver and the wires will act as a good heat path.

Is this a single mode light or does it have modes, like hi, medium, low? If it is a single mode on/off, then there is no driver. A direct drive light will give the led what it wants, if the battery can give it. In other words, if it is single mode, just put in a good battery that is rated for higher amps and you will get maximum brightness out of the light.

If the light has modes, then the driver is in the tail cap and it will be harder to do anything with it. What about just buying a better zoomie and you don't have to mess with it? If modding is what you want to do, then there's plenty of threads on how to do it already here on BLF. It just takes time to read threads and look for what you want.

It's a 3 mode, High, Low, Strobe.

I recently scored 9 unused Samsung ICR18650-30B 3000mAh 18650s from a new dell laptop pack, so I should be good be on batteries.
This light doesn't seem any brighter with the samsungs compared to my 5400mAh ultrafires(Haha) or my like 15year old 1400mAh heavly pre-used and mostly dead 18650s.

Where can I buy a zoomie host or easily moddable assembled that is decent?

Stupid questions..
If I am powering my light off of 1 18650, should I buy a driver that has an output current of 3000mAh? or can I buy a 5000mAh?