milkyspit
Flashlight Enthusiast
Thought I'd finally check out one of those Dorcy Metal Luxeon lights selling at WelMart... good! Although they're larger in size than one would expect for a light this brightness, the build quality seems generally good, beam pattern and color are nice, and pricing (under $20) is right.
:thumbsup:
Then I was dismayed to see the runtime graph on FlashlightReviews.com, which made it clear this light was resistored... what the heck!?! Even Nuwai manages to install a regulation circuit in the Q3... a crummy circuit, but a circuit nonetheless. Even Dorcy manages this in their $5.94 1 LED 1AAA light. DORCY, WHERE IS YOUR CIRCUIT IN *THIS* LIGHT??? BAD DORCY!
Then I got lazy and figured a single photo of all the parts during my mod would suffice. Wrong!
As a result, my apologies for this really bad photo... though I've tried to label things to give some sense of what's going on.
Oh! Forgot to mention... we're doing a brain transplant of a SureFire L1 circuit into the Dorcy Metal here.
Anatomy of a mod, mad scientist style.
There's not much to say, really. Note the modder food... absolute requirement. Teflon wire helps me sleep at night without worrying about overdriving something or other deep in the bowels of the light, perhaps shorting something and causing overheating, or worse... a fire... or WORSE... an explosion, Li-ion style! Worth noting here that the Dorcy Metal so far has never seen a Li-ion cell in its battery tube, but someday, perhaps.
Stock clicky had the usual signature of a Chinese-made light: recessed switch and yet, nobody noticed that THE RUBBER BOOT STILL PROTRUDES BEYOND THIS, SO THE LIGHT CANNOT STAND UP. Dangit, why can't a nation of billions seemingly ever get this rubber boot thing right!?! (This is a major pet peeve, no offense intended if you're Chinese, a flashlight manufacturer, or have a congenital rubber boot dyslexic condition.)
Anyway, the switch got removed and given a little beheading of the switch post... that plus the old O-ring in the tailcap trick tamed the little bugger, finally bringing it within the confines of the recessed area so the light can at last legitimately tailstand.
The stock board is called BOARD for a reason... it's literally that, with only a single resistor on it! I'm not entirely sure why they bothered with the board at all... but glad they did, as the space it occupies is pretty much perfect for installation of a SureFire L1 regulation board... I had a few of these sitting around and figured why not? The interesting thing is that the L1 itself runs on a 3V primary 123 cell, but apparently the circuit can handle more than that... it seems to deal with 3AAA cells quite nicely.
Stock Luxeon Star was binned RX1H... not bad at all, given the nature of this light. I left it there.
Everything else was pretty much routine... I did drill holes in the threaded ring before the mod to make it easier to remove... that allowed use of a standard pair of retaining ring pliers. (Very nice and available at MPJA.com by the way.) As for the dental pick, I asked on a whim last time at the dentist's office if he had any tools he was about to "retire" and got lucky! These things are well made and GREAT for holding or moving tiny parts while soldering, gently lifting Luxeon leads while hot, etc. No, I don't practice dentistry without a license.
Hmm... girly tweezers! Compliments of the local pharmacy's beauty aisle. Ironically, I've found these stainless steel, wide tweezers so commonly sold for plucking eyelashes and such, flat-out outperform any tweezer I've ever tried that was actually sold as a "real" tool... and for much lower cost. Highly recommended! Go girly! :laughing:
That's pretty much it. Thanks for enjoying the, er, one photo!
:thumbsup:
Then I was dismayed to see the runtime graph on FlashlightReviews.com, which made it clear this light was resistored... what the heck!?! Even Nuwai manages to install a regulation circuit in the Q3... a crummy circuit, but a circuit nonetheless. Even Dorcy manages this in their $5.94 1 LED 1AAA light. DORCY, WHERE IS YOUR CIRCUIT IN *THIS* LIGHT??? BAD DORCY!
Then I got lazy and figured a single photo of all the parts during my mod would suffice. Wrong!
As a result, my apologies for this really bad photo... though I've tried to label things to give some sense of what's going on.
Oh! Forgot to mention... we're doing a brain transplant of a SureFire L1 circuit into the Dorcy Metal here.
Anatomy of a mod, mad scientist style.
There's not much to say, really. Note the modder food... absolute requirement.
Teflon wire helps me sleep at night without worrying about overdriving something or other deep in the bowels of the light, perhaps shorting something and causing overheating, or worse... a fire... or WORSE... an explosion, Li-ion style! Worth noting here that the Dorcy Metal so far has never seen a Li-ion cell in its battery tube, but someday, perhaps.Stock clicky had the usual signature of a Chinese-made light: recessed switch and yet, nobody noticed that THE RUBBER BOOT STILL PROTRUDES BEYOND THIS, SO THE LIGHT CANNOT STAND UP. Dangit, why can't a nation of billions seemingly ever get this rubber boot thing right!?! (This is a major pet peeve, no offense intended if you're Chinese, a flashlight manufacturer, or have a congenital rubber boot dyslexic condition.)
Anyway, the switch got removed and given a little beheading of the switch post... that plus the old O-ring in the tailcap trick tamed the little bugger, finally bringing it within the confines of the recessed area so the light can at last legitimately tailstand.
The stock board is called BOARD for a reason... it's literally that, with only a single resistor on it! I'm not entirely sure why they bothered with the board at all... but glad they did, as the space it occupies is pretty much perfect for installation of a SureFire L1 regulation board... I had a few of these sitting around and figured why not? The interesting thing is that the L1 itself runs on a 3V primary 123 cell, but apparently the circuit can handle more than that... it seems to deal with 3AAA cells quite nicely.
Stock Luxeon Star was binned RX1H... not bad at all, given the nature of this light. I left it there.
Everything else was pretty much routine... I did drill holes in the threaded ring before the mod to make it easier to remove... that allowed use of a standard pair of retaining ring pliers. (Very nice and available at MPJA.com by the way.) As for the dental pick, I asked on a whim last time at the dentist's office if he had any tools he was about to "retire" and got lucky! These things are well made and GREAT for holding or moving tiny parts while soldering, gently lifting Luxeon leads while hot, etc. No, I don't practice dentistry without a license.
Hmm... girly tweezers! Compliments of the local pharmacy's beauty aisle. Ironically, I've found these stainless steel, wide tweezers so commonly sold for plucking eyelashes and such, flat-out outperform any tweezer I've ever tried that was actually sold as a "real" tool... and for much lower cost. Highly recommended! Go girly! :laughing:
That's pretty much it. Thanks for enjoying the, er, one photo!
