XPG R5 in Ultrafire C3

[ma_sha1]

Host is the New SS version of Ultrafire C3, it's got the new smaller Cree EZ900 Q5 in it.
The light has been cut & converted to CR2. Running 14250 Direct Drive.

From the Ultrafire Stainless "family photo". the host is the one on the left:

The Swap of XPG R5 is easy, when perfectly focused, the R5 on 10mm board is 1.5 mm away from
bottom of the reflector, which allow Room for the wires & solder pad (They are so close to the die & partially
stays in side of XRE reflector opening).

The C3 has a great reflector, in the stock light, it focused the EZ900 Q5 into a very small & perfectly even spot. Unfortunately, the XPG on the C3 reflector gave a donut effect, with beam center be slightly dimer than the edge of the hot spot. As a white wall hunter, I was not happy with the beam at all!

Another reflector I tried is IMS 17mm, it still gave donut effect, although less pronounced than the C3 reflector.

The, I stippled the IMS, hopping to smooth out the beam.
It's better but there still has a bit of donut left, This is very frustrating!

Keep trying, I swapped in an 17mm Smooth reflector from a cheap 1W nichia flashlight,
Finally! the donut is gone! There still some beam imperfections, so I stippled the smooth reflector to a light OP.

Final Result:

• Huge hot spot
• Huge amount of light
• Greatly Increased flood
• Reduced throw

The XPG R5 in C3 CR2: I used a 1.5 mm IC board to precisely gap the LED from reflector.

Huge hot spot & Crazy amount of light from the 14250 DD XPG R5:

Last, the direct side by side of before & After.


Left: XPG R5 SS C3 CR2 with 14250 Direct Drive
Right: EZ900 Q5 Ultra Fire C3 stock light on high( it has 5 modes) with 1.9V E2 Lithium battery

 

[Hack On Wheels]

Nice work! How hard was it to take the head apart? Pictures + instructions would be awesome if you have the time. I actually like my C3 SS quite a bit, but the beamshot from your modded light is stunning!

 

[sparkysko]

Taking the head apart is pretty easy.

The pill just unscrews easily. Careful not to tighten it too tight when you put it back in or you'll push the o-ring out the front.

The reflector is attached over the emitter with an adhesive tape donut. If you pull it off the tape will likely tear in half at the paper. This paper also acts as an insulator, so you'll need it.

The emitter is thermal epoxied or equivalent onto the pill. I poked at mine for a bit. You'd need to take the driver off the board and use heat or something to get the emitter off.

The driver is just held on by solder along the edges. I used copper braid to suck the solder off (with a solder gun), and then used a pick to pry the emitter up from the edge.

Careful if you resolder the driver. The driver has to sit flush as well as the solder. My solder was raised a tiny bit, and when I'd unscrew the light to replace the battery, it would also unscrew the pill. Or use some loctite or something.

 

[ma_sha1]

Nice work! How hard was it to take the head apart? Pictures + instructions would be awesome if you have the time. I actually like my C3 SS quite a bit, but the beamshot from your modded light is stunning!

yeah, like the post above, take the head apart is easy. use a needle point tool to unscrew it. I took the head apart 20- 30 times trying on different reflectors.

 

[icaruz]

Hi,
How do you make it DD? sorry for my noob question..do you wired the negative to the body? still learning...tq

 

[ma_sha1]

To make it DD, I took the board out, then drill two holes. One in the center, insert the positive wire through the hole & solder the center pad on the battery side. This will connect led + to battery + directly.

Then do similar for for negative. Drill a hole on the edge, pull the led neg. wire through & solder it flat on the battery side. Then put the chip back-in & solder the negative ring to the edge that's holding the chip, this will make the negative connection to the flashlight body once screwed back-in.

This method will make any Chip DD by bypassing all the components on the chip.
Twisty, multi-mode is annoying as you have to repeat the twist on/off several times to get to the mode you want.
DD will make it as bright as a 14250 battery can do & also is the most efficient.

Perhaps, the photo may help:

 

[ma_sha1]

The emitter was glued down pretty tight, but I was able to take it apart without removing the chip.
In case for a need to replace emitter but keeping the original chip.

De-solder the wires to led & Insert a flat head screw driver between the led board & the side wall of the led holder,
twist the screw driver really hard. You need to hold the led heat/sink holder with a plier,
it took quite a bit force to get the led board popped off.

Taking the head apart is pretty easy.

The emitter is thermal epoxied or equivalent onto the pill. I poked at mine for a bit. You'd need to take the driver off the board and use heat or something to get the emitter off.

 

[icaruz]

Thanks ma_sha1. Really appreciate it.

 

[ma_sha1]

you are welcome

 

[Hack On Wheels]

Thanks ma_sha, and sparkyso, for the detailed info! Some great work, your mods are always fun and inspiring... it makes me want to get some DX flashlights to tear apart.

 

[ma_sha1]

Thanks.

I had to take advantage of DX & Kai, even thou their lights are not respected here.
With 3 kits, I feel guilty if I tap into family income for flashlight hobby, especially,
I don't really need any flashlights.

So my Flashlight mods are completed funded by selling house-hold junks on ebay
& selling some modded lights. I like to make cools things out of tiny budget.

Make sure to check out my just finished SSR-90 Kel Light Mod, it beat out the Mag 85!
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/238232

 

[Techjunkie]

I found that the 18.5mm SMO reflector from DX (sku 5960) is a perfect fit in the Ultrafire C3 stainless and gives an awesome, perfeclty round, donut free hotspot with the XPG seated just below it and perfectly centered. I added some glow epoxy around the emitter base for effect. Now it's like a perfect big brother to the TrustFire XP-EF23 which has a gorgeous white wall beam. The same reflector also does wonders for the XR-C emitter that's now stock in the stainless C3.

 

[ma_sha1]

Nice photos Tech,

I like the 35mm DX TIR, seems pretty efficient & beam looks pretty good too

 

[wechnivag]

I'm curious, did you need to shim or trim the 35mm TIR to get the correct focus on the XP-G?

It looks a lot brighter in the photos, what are the drive currents in each picture, are they all same distance ?

 

[Techjunkie]

I'm curious, did you need to shim or trim the 35mm TIR to get the correct focus on the XP-G?

It looks a lot brighter in the photos, what are the drive currents in each picture, are they all same distance ?

I tried a few 35mm TIR (collimator optics) that I had laying around. I found that the ones from the five pack that I had purchased from DX, sku 4544, was the only one that the XPG could be focused in. I had to shim it with a very thin washer sitting on top of the glow/epoxy that I added around the emitter base on top of the star. No trimming was required. The original XR-E optics from TaskForce and RoV torches and the Lux III optics from the Professional's Favorite wouldn't focus right at all (maybe I could have trimmed their bases, I didn't try.) I don't know what those DX optics were intended for, maybe SSC P4, but in the end they were the best of the three hands down.

Same manual exposure camera settings, but the first two (XPE SMO, XPG SMO) are on low or medium mode. The last two are single mode (hi-only) drivers, each made of two OEM boost drivers in parallel. (I used the drivers that I pulled from each torch's twin to double-up with.) The 35mm TIR + XPG pulls 2A at the tail from 2 AccuPower Evolution LDS NiMH C cells. I guestimate that ~4W is delivered to the emitter, +/- 0.2W.

All shots were taken from the same distance. It was from the edge of my dining room table to the wall. I guess ~4 or 5 feet.

 

[Techjunkie]

Aren't you worried about the battery exploding? Max safe discharge for Li-Ion is 2C and those little CR2 or 14250 are only ~300mAH. That XPG must pull more like 4C than 2C.

I'm reminded of the guy on the vapor cigarrette forum who had his RCR2 battery explode (probably from a short). He had his teeth knocked in and burns on his face!

I have four new unused RCR2 (2 AW, 2 UltraFire) that I wont be using now after reading that. (I was going to do a cut-down like you did.)

I guess I could use two at a time in an uncut C3 with a buck driver, but I'm not sure what the point would be...

To make it DD, I took the board out, then drill two holes. One in the center, insert the positive wire through the hole & solder the center pad on the battery side. This will connect led + to battery + directly.

Then do similar for for negative. Drill a hole on the edge, pull the led neg. wire through & solder it flat on the battery side. Then put the chip back-in & solder the negative ring to the edge that's holding the chip, this will make the negative connection to the flashlight body once screwed back-in.

This method will make any Chip DD by bypassing all the components on the chip.
Twisty, multi-mode is annoying as you have to repeat the twist on/off several times to get to the mode you want.
DD will make it as bright as a 14250 battery can do & also is the most efficient.

 

[ma_sha1]

Not at all, there's a post somewhere discussing
tiny li-ion doesn't act the same way as bigger ones.

Many prior cases on DD with 10280/10440 Li-ion pulling several C.
I've been using 10280 DD for over a yr on a XPE,
14250 Mini aspherical DD for several month. No issues at all.

From RCR2/RCR123 & up, maybe there's more worries but 14250/10280 etc.,
it's not going to be a real issue even it they do "pop a pop corn" on me.
Plus, I am not doing cigar hold with my flashlight

14250 is 300mah but RCR2 is twice of that capacity, the RCR2 isn't DD,
I have it on the C3 board. I am DD up to 14250.

FYI,
Draco 10280 is DD at max mode.
Orb Raw, is using 14250 & is either DD or pretty darn close to DD on the 200 Lumen version.

 

[Techjunkie]

Hmm... food for thought. Maybe I'll do the cutdown after all. A LiFePO4 15270 with a boost driver could work too, I guess, and that chemistry is rated for heavier loads (more multiples of capacity than LiCo anyway).

Can you show us pictures of the way you shortened the switch to fit inside the cut-down tailcap? Did you cut both sides of the cap? I can't quite figure out what you've done there. (Speaking of the cut-down C3 that you did with the switch, not the twisty version shown here.) Thanks.

 

[ma_sha1]

Can you show us pictures of the way you shortened the switch to fit inside the cut-down tailcap? Did you cut both sides of the cap? I can't quite figure out what you've done there. (Speaking of the cut-down C3 that you did with the switch, not the twisty version shown here.) Thanks.

Tech,

The light you are questioning I believe is this?
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/247454

I made two of them, done in two different ways. This one here is shown
that I kept the screw in brass retaining ring as the "boot stop", then inside the body, just make a metal spacer to bridge the contact of switch to the wall.

The other light, which I didn't make another post but do have a picture in the link (The one with the Ti Quark Clip).
Well, I simply jammed A SS AAA light (Ultrafile A10?) whole real section (Cut section of flashlight with switch in there) inside the tail end of C3. It happens to fit in pretty well. Sort of a flashlight (just the tail) within a flashlight.
This is my fav. runs on RCR2 with 2x capacity over 14250 & with the Clip for deep pocket carry.

 

[Techjunkie]

Tech,

The light you are questioning I believe is this?
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/247454

I made two of them, done in two different ways. This one here is shown
that I kept the screw in brass retaining ring as the "boot stop", then inside the body, just make a metal spacer to bridge the contact of switch to the wall.

The other light, which I didn't make another post but do have a picture in the link (The one with the clip).
Well, I simply jammed A SS AAA light (Ultrafile A10?) whole real section (Cut section of flashlight with switch in there) inside the tail end of C3. It happens to fit in pretty well. Sort of a flashlight (just the tail) within a flashlight.

Yep, that was the one. I think I get it now. The switch PCB sits down inside of the battery tube, right? That would explain how the tailcap can be so short and still there's a switch, PCB, tailspring... they're all inside the battery tube.