Maglite modding problems. With pictures of my failures!

LivingDaylight

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Here is my gallery of shame.

I am a total n00b, this is my first time soldering anything. Any general tips would be appreciated.

Edit: I've inserted a pic to make it easier for you.

2ktJR.jpg


I have the maglite switch modded, and it works according to my multimeter. I've been having a lot of problems getting the LED onto the circuit board. Am I supposed to solder the little metal things on the end and the middle? Or just the tiny things on the side?

Also, the LED doesn't seem to work when both the metal things on the edge are connected to the edge of the board...does this make sense? It's very difficult to hold all the wires in place to test that.

The messed up emitter/heatsink that's full of solder still works according to the multimeter, so all I need to do now is get the LED attached to it.

How can I clean off the solder and get the LED on there? I've already ruined one LED trying (as pictured), and I only have one left!

I also accidentally pulled one of the wires off one of the boards, and fixed it. Multimeter says it's good, but how does my solder look?
 
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spinkid

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LivingDaylight, Very cool to post your failures! Its good to see not everyone is perfect. For you soldering issues, one main thing to remember is that you need to heat the area (led legs and wire or pcb) before you try to melt the solder on it. If this is done correct, the solder will literally just melt over what is heated. It is kind of a tough balance with too much heat in the beginning, but once you get the hang of it, it really is easy. Here is a link to Radio Shack (http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2062744&CAWELAID=107594598) for some solder wick which is used to help desolder. You basically put this on top of the solder you want to remove and put the hot iron on top of both the wick and solder you want to remove. Once heated correctly, the wick will absorb the solder like a sponge, also try youtube for practice videos. Good luck!
 

yazovyet

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I think that LED is a P7? I'm not really famillier with them (although others are). I assume that the reverise side of it is just flat (maybe aluminum) and non electrically conductive, stuff in itallics is said based on the way I assume a p7 is connected but should be confirmed by others.

In the pic inserted, those circuit bords with the red/black wires coming off them are the drivers (althought you should only need 1 i think). The red wire connects to the posative side of the LEd and the black to the negative side (not sure which tab on the led is which as i am not familier with the p7). The led is 'glued' to the heat sink with thermal paste or therma epoxy. You do not want the side tabes of the LEd to touch the heat since (an anodized heatsink would have been better). On the driver, the outside copper ring connects to the negative wire from the batterys/switch and the inside copper circle connects to the posative of the battery/switch (this is how they normally connect, it could be opposite as i don't know what driver you're useing).

it appears as if you may have been soldering the led directly to the driver?

have you seen this?
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?238641-How-To-Mod-a-Maglite-P7-38-PICS
it has info and pics that might help.
http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/5761/img1525i.jpg
is a picture from that build. imagine cutting those wires. on the flashlight side your driver will connect to the 2 wires on teh flat side of the driver. on the headsink/LED side the wires already soldered onto the driver connect to the led through the heatsink. I don't see them but I assume there is 2 holes in the heatsink for the wires to come through.
 

LivingDaylight

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I think that LED is a P7? I'm not really famillier with them (although others are). I assume that the reverise side of it is just flat (maybe aluminum) and non electrically conductive, stuff in itallics is said based on the way I assume a p7 is connected but should be confirmed by others.

In the pic inserted, those circuit bords with the red/black wires coming off them are the drivers (althought you should only need 1 i think). The red wire connects to the posative side of the LEd and the black to the negative side (not sure which tab on the led is which as i am not familier with the p7). The led is 'glued' to the heat sink with thermal paste or therma epoxy. You do not want the side tabes of the LEd to touch the heat since (an anodized heatsink would have been better). On the driver, the outside copper ring connects to the negative wire from the batterys/switch and the inside copper circle connects to the posative of the battery/switch (this is how they normally connect, it could be opposite as i don't know what driver you're useing).

it appears as if you may have been soldering the led directly to the driver?

have you seen this?
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?238641-How-To-Mod-a-Maglite-P7-38-PICS
it has info and pics that might help.
http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/5761/img1525i.jpg
is a picture from that build. imagine cutting those wires. on the flashlight side your driver will connect to the 2 wires on teh flat side of the driver. on the headsink/LED side the wires already soldered onto the driver connect to the led through the heatsink. I don't see them but I assume there is 2 holes in the heatsink for the wires to come through.

HAHA wow, I was following this http://www.vtunderground.com/bonus/magmod.htm and thought that the driver was on the heatsink...oops. Good thing I have a spare heat sink!

That is good info, thank you.

So what I should do now is attach the LED to the heatsink directly with the epoxy, then attach the wires from the driver to the LED (how do I know which side is positive?), then solder the wires from the maglite to the driver rings?

Sorry if these are silly questions, I am a total n00b.

Edit: Do I actually need the driver?

Edit2: This was much easier!

rLw0S.jpg
 
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yazovyet

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So what I should do now is attach the LED to the heatsink directly with the epoxy,
make sure you drill any holes in the heatsink (for wires to the driver/switch) first. but yes.
then attach the wires from the driver to the LED (how do I know which side is positive?),
yep, but again i don't know which side of a p7 is posative, or even how to tell them apart. from teh website you posted:
The leads on the emitter have small tabs next to them. The tab with the hole in it indicates the positive lead, the tab with the notch indicates the negative lead.
then solder the wires from the maglite to the driver rings?
yes. put the driver on the opposide side of the HS from the LEd. so that the driver is near the switch.
Do I actually need the driver?
theres a good chance that you do need the driver. what battery(s) are you useing? basically the driver will conver the voltage to the correct level and allow the correct current to flow through the led. some times people use a single lithium battery and it works with an led, but I don't know what battery(s) you are useing so i cant say. I also don't know what driver you have. either way a driver is nice since they tend tohave hi/medium/low modes to conserve battery power.

both of those other sites seem to be running on 3 D cell batteries and no driver. so maybe that is ok but i cant say for sure
 

DKlaser

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I did not read through everything so I do not know if this has already been covered but it looks like you are having soldering issues. First of all use a good iron. Using a cheapo crappy one will make soldering seem like it takes incredible skill to get any good results. Second flux is your very best friend. Third, pre - tin your wires prior to soldering them to anything. With just good know how, decent tools, and a steady hand you can get professional results even for a first timer. As the more you do it the better you will get and will understand what the solder is going to do even before you touch the iron to it.
 

LivingDaylight

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I did not read through everything so I do not know if this has already been covered but it looks like you are having soldering issues. First of all use a good iron. Using a cheapo crappy one will make soldering seem like it takes incredible skill to get any good results. Second flux is your very best friend. Third, pre - tin your wires prior to soldering them to anything. With just good know how, decent tools, and a steady hand you can get professional results even for a first timer. As the more you do it the better you will get and will understand what the solder is going to do even before you touch the iron to it.

I have a $20 one from Canadian tire...I'm guessing that counts as a crappy one? Can you suggest a budget friendly alternative?
 

LivingDaylight

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So what I should do now is attach the LED to the heatsink directly with the epoxy,
make sure you drill any holes in the heatsink (for wires to the driver/switch) first. but yes.
then attach the wires from the driver to the LED (how do I know which side is positive?),
yep, but again i don't know which side of a p7 is posative, or even how to tell them apart. from teh website you posted:
The leads on the emitter have small tabs next to them. The tab with the hole in it indicates the positive lead, the tab with the notch indicates the negative lead.
then solder the wires from the maglite to the driver rings?
yes. put the driver on the opposide side of the HS from the LEd. so that the driver is near the switch.
Do I actually need the driver?
theres a good chance that you do need the driver. what battery(s) are you useing? basically the driver will conver the voltage to the correct level and allow the correct current to flow through the led. some times people use a single lithium battery and it works with an led, but I don't know what battery(s) you are useing so i cant say. I also don't know what driver you have. either way a driver is nice since they tend tohave hi/medium/low modes to conserve battery power.

both of those other sites seem to be running on 3 D cell batteries and no driver. so maybe that is ok but i cant say for sure

Thanks! Just making sure my thought process is correct.
 

LivingDaylight

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WE HAVE SUCCESS

I'd estimate it's about 200 lumen, which would give it a ton of runtime off 3 D batteries. Anyone care to hazard a guess?

bazxp.jpg


HIqaG.jpg
Wip6g.jpg
 
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sadtimes

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If you are using 3d batteries (or 3c) you don't need that driver. You can direct drive that led from 3 alkaline or nimh cells...
 

PapaLumen

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You got there in the end :) Oh, I would redo those wires on the back of the board, the centre + wire looks like it could touch the outer - circle and the outer wire could possibly touch the middle area if it folded up. Dont strip so much sheathing off.
 

moderator007

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Thanks for the info. Does using the driver give me any kind of benefit?
Which driver do you have and whats the bin of the P7. Bin code will tell us whats the expected forward voltage of the led. And also are you using Nimh rechargeables or alkalines. This determines input voltage for the driver. With the right set up the P7 should put out 700 or so lumens if you fill the need for more. Jtr1962 test on a P7 bin C. From jtr1962's test thats about 600ma to the led at 200 lumens.

Well I come accross your other thread and the driver you are using says in the descripition (not suitable for 1 white LED from 1 Li-ion cell). A li-ion has a max cell voltage of 4.2v and a discharged voltage of 3.4v. So with your voltage of either 4.5 alkalines or 3.75v for Nimh's are close to the voltage of a li-ion. Description also says you need to be 0.5~0.9V higher than total LED Vf. Again you can look at jtr1962's testing to see what the Vf of the P7 is at a certain drive current. At 600ma the P7 needed a 3.21Vf plus you will need a extra .9v over that 4.11v input for that driver. The lower input voltage will decrease the current. It would probably be better to direct drive with 3 D's or use 4 C Nimh's with battery sleeve and a amc7135 driver. Or maybe 4 Nimh C's with the driver you have. Alkalines can't produce alot of current and you may have hit their max.
 
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LivingDaylight

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You got there in the end :) Oh, I would redo those wires on the back of the board, the centre + wire looks like it could touch the outer - circle and the outer wire could possibly touch the middle area if it folded up. Dont strip so much sheathing off.

I actually did this after looking at the pics. Thanks!
 

LivingDaylight

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Which driver do you have and whats the bin of the P7. Bin code will tell us whats the expected forward voltage of the led. And also are you using Nimh rechargeables or alkalines. This determines input voltage for the driver. With the right set up the P7 should put out 700 or so lumens if you fill the need for more. Jtr1962 test on a P7 bin C. From jtr1962's test thats about 600ma to the led at 200 lumens.

Well I come accross your other thread and the driver you are using says in the descripition (not suitable for 1 white LED from 1 Li-ion cell). A li-ion has a max cell voltage of 4.2v and a discharged voltage of 3.4v. So with your voltage of either 4.5 alkalines or 3.75v for Nimh's are close to the voltage of a li-ion. Description also says you need to be 0.5~0.9V higher than total LED Vf. Again you can look at jtr1962's testing to see what the Vf of the P7 is at a certain drive current. At 600ma the P7 needed a 3.21Vf plus you will need a extra .9v over that 4.11v input for that driver. The lower input voltage will decrease the current. It would probably be better to direct drive with 3 D's or use 4 C Nimh's with battery sleeve and a amc7135 driver. Or maybe 4 Nimh C's with the driver you have. Alkalines can't produce alot of current and you may have hit their max.

Thanks for this info it is very informative.

I have it all glued together now, and I have another Maglite that I will be modding, will it be bad with that driver? I'm happy with the 200 lumens output, but if I understand correctly a slight voltage drop will result in it not lighting due to the Vf. Is that correct?

Anything else bad about having that driver hooked up?

Is there some way to stick a bunch of AAs in there and get a higher voltage and current?

I've ordered the same LED and this driver, how does it compare?
 

yazovyet

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AA batteries:
Yes they sell a carrier the size of a D cell that will take 3 AAs and put them in serise. So using 3 AAs (that have a voltage of 1.2 volts on their own because I assume rechargable NiMH) you get something the size of a d cell with 3.6 volts. So 3 of those carriers would be 10.8 volts (or 13.5 with alkilines). They are a little smaller than D cells so you have the option to put spaces between them and run wires along the sides and thus have them operating in parralle so that each one only sees a fraction of the current and you only have 3.6 (4.5 alkiline) volts. I modded a 2 D mag and did somehting like that here:
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?319319-2D-mag-modded-to-6AA-XM-L

As think2x noted in the D cell current question thread, you may consider useing an XM-L emitter.
 

moderator007

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As stated the xml would be a better choice with your next build. You already have the P7 working. The driver you linked will not work properly from the voltage of 3 Nimh's with a P7 at alot of current. At 1000ma the P7 will have a Vf of 3.36v. The driver wil eat up .12v and with the voltage sag of the batteries and the other voltage loss between connections and resistance of the host. Just a gues but may eat up another .20 or so. So you would need .36v over the Vf of the led. 3.36v + .36v = 3.72v. To stay in regulation you would need some where around that to stay in regulation of the driver. You also have to consider in what the voltage will be when your batteries are about drained. 3 Nimh's in series will be about gone at 3v. With 4 Nimh's they would be about drained at 4v. Even then they would still have less voltage than that when you consider in voltage sag. 4 Nimh's should work quite well with a amc7135 based driver. The xml with its lower Vf voltage would probably be in my opinoin about the best setup with the amc7135 and 4 Nimh's in series. You may get better efficiency from a buck driver and a higher voltage. But the amc7135 is still pretty good.

You can use AA's in series and a AA to D adapter and a different driver if you choose. Look at some of Taskled drivers for that. His drivers are top quality which do cost more but are about the best and most dependable you can buy. A driver is designed to keep the current the same through the run time of the batteries or your constant supply voltage. Its a current regulator. With a direct drive the light gets dimmer as the batteries are drained because as the batteries lose voltage the current goes down I=V/R. With Nimh's there is not as much voltage loss as they are drained so the voltage tends to stay constant longer than most other battery choices in a direct drive setup.
 

yazovyet

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I have to disagree with moderator007 on the idea that you need 4 NiMH cells to run an XM-L with a 7135 driver.

From the Nimh battery shoot out,
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?79302-NiMh-Battery-Shoot-Out

the eneloop AA maintains 1.2 volts at 2 amps for 1.1 amphours. I have a 2D mag running 3s2p that runs on high (2.8 amps) for 82 min (before the driver kicks it into low). So, lots of run time. (actually indicates 1.89 amphours from the batteries so that leads me to think that you only need around 3.3 volts to the driver or I got a low VF LED.)

the "AccuPower D 11500 mAh" cells maintain 1.2 volts at 5 amp discharge for 7+ amphours (and 1.1 volts at 5 amps for 10amphours). So based on how long my mag stays in regulation I would say 3 of those D cells would keep it in regulation for a large portion of the battery's dischage time.

edit:
I tested that mag with a different battery carrier set up. It had a resistance reduction mod and only used 3AAs in serise. It ran on high for 49 min before being kicked into low (a second test with a different set of batteries gave 50 min). It APPEARED to be the same brightness over the whole run time but must have been getting a little less bright as time went on since running that long at 2.8 amps would indicate 2.28 amp hours from the 2 amphour batteries and it seems unlikly that I have magical batteries that hold 14% extra power.

TL;DR: I feel 3 NiMH will run an XM-L through an amc 7135 driver well for most of the battery's chage cycle but it may not be fully regulated the whole time.
 
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moderator007

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What about a different approach? If I'm happy with ~200 lumens and good runtime from alkalines, would these two products be a good choice together?

http://www.dealextreme.com/p/3v-8-4v-5w-cree-5-mode-circuit-board-for-flashlights-16-8mm-6-3mm-26107

http://www.dealextreme.com/p/cree-7090-xr-e-p4-with-14mm-base-3475
Most drivers are either buck or boost. You are chosing a buck driver it takes the over supply of voltage and bucks it down to what the led needs to operate at that given current. The Vf of the led and drive current determines alot about when the driver will lose regulation. Once the voltage of your supply and the other voltage losses to the driver hit the forward voltage of the led then it becomes direct drive. The current the led is driven at will be determined by the voltage it is receiving after the driver loses regulation. If the batteries where supplying 3.4v with the battery sag and you had .2v of losses. The driver could put out 3.2v to the led. The Vf of the XRE R2 at 1200ma is 3.7v so its already out of regulation. To find out what it would be putting out to the led. Looking at Jtr1962 test on the XRE R2. Find where in his table at the bottom the voltage is 3.2v and read that current associated with that voltage in his table. Around 250ma would be what the led will see at 3.2v. You will need more voltage for most any buck driver to drive the XRE R2 at 1200ma with a forward voltage of 3.7v. The xml has a much lower forward voltage and would be a better choice. If the XML where driven at 1200ma it should have a Vf of around 3v. With the example I give you above the driver would be in regulation and like .2v to fall out of regulation. And I still think a amc7135 linear driver would need 4 Nimh's to stay in regulation if driven at high currents. Me and member justin case had a discusion here about a single li-ion and a amc7135 driver. Keep in mind a li-ion starts off at 4.2v and is considered dead at around 3.4v resting voltage. A xpg or xml I think would be a better choice with their lower forward voltage no matter the driver with 3 alkalines.
 
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