Subterranean13
Newly Enlightened
- Joined
- Jan 29, 2008
- Messages
- 9
I do a lot of caving/potholing which, as you can imagine, requires a strong reliable light source. I am currently using a lithium ion battery that came with the light, but it is around 5 years old now and with constant use, charging and discharging, it is now giving less than 40% of its original lifetime before going too dim to cave on. This is not enough for a good caving trip.
The light itself is nothing spectacular, as you can imagine for 5 years old, it has 7 smaller LEDs arranged around the top, with a 0.85W halogen in the middle for a spot light. However there is a new light Im looking at getting sometime that will run off the same batterypack/connector but has a Cree or Seoul P4 in it so I would like to get a pack that would cope with it.
I have thus decided to 'make' my own. I can get the waterproof housing with the correct external connector easily. It is designed to fit a flatpack 4.5v battery, but from my measurements it should fit 3x 18650 cells. It needs to be 3.7V with as high a capacity as possible.
Does anyone know of anywhere in the UK I can get a pack such as this one? http://www.batteryspace.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=3120 If its not easy or cheap to get them in the UK, I have read that AW's cells are good quality, but how difficult is it to attach them together into a battery pack? What would be the best method? Also if I went the way of individual cells, would the fact that AW's cells are 2200mAh (giving a total of 6600 for 3) give significantly less light time compared to the pack I listed above which is 7800mAh.
Also if anyone has any other suggestions please let me know.
Thanks.
The light itself is nothing spectacular, as you can imagine for 5 years old, it has 7 smaller LEDs arranged around the top, with a 0.85W halogen in the middle for a spot light. However there is a new light Im looking at getting sometime that will run off the same batterypack/connector but has a Cree or Seoul P4 in it so I would like to get a pack that would cope with it.
I have thus decided to 'make' my own. I can get the waterproof housing with the correct external connector easily. It is designed to fit a flatpack 4.5v battery, but from my measurements it should fit 3x 18650 cells. It needs to be 3.7V with as high a capacity as possible.
Does anyone know of anywhere in the UK I can get a pack such as this one? http://www.batteryspace.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=3120 If its not easy or cheap to get them in the UK, I have read that AW's cells are good quality, but how difficult is it to attach them together into a battery pack? What would be the best method? Also if I went the way of individual cells, would the fact that AW's cells are 2200mAh (giving a total of 6600 for 3) give significantly less light time compared to the pack I listed above which is 7800mAh.
Also if anyone has any other suggestions please let me know.
Thanks.
