TrustFire TR-J1

[Doc Ed]

Joelsim, could you post a photo of your o-rings? Does it just seem like there's a faint seam? I got my 2nd light in the mail today. More or less same findings as the first: Minimal to no swarfs, same configuration of o-rings as previously noted. Did see faint seams on the o-rings though I didn't bother to remove them to check their durometer. Put the new light in the pressure pot and tested down to 75 meters with a gradual ascent up to 28 meters over a span of 30 minutes (ie there's a small leak somewhere in my pot ) - no leaks! Tissue paper I kept in the battery tube stayed nice and dry. Maybe you won't need to change out your o-rings after all.

Was also able to test out different battery types with different voltages. The findings were consistent with the notion that this is a direct drive light with PWM. On high, at 4.08v, I was getting around 1.98A for both lights, 3.8V was 1.6A for both, and at 3.6v, around 1.4A.

[JoelSim]

Joelsim, could you post a photo of your o-rings? Does it just seem like there's a faint seam? I got my 2nd light in the mail today. More or less same findings as the first: Minimal to no swarfs, same configuration of o-rings as previously noted. Did see faint seams on the o-rings though I didn't bother to remove them to check their durometer. Put the new light in the pressure pot and tested down to 75 meters with a gradual ascent up to 28 meters over a span of 30 minutes (ie there's a small leak somewhere in my pot ) - no leaks! Tissue paper I kept in the battery tube stayed nice and dry. Maybe you won't need to change out your o-rings after all.

Was also able to test out different battery types with different voltages. The findings were consistent with the notion that this is a direct drive light with PWM. On high, at 4.08v, I was getting around 1.98A for both lights, 3.8V was 1.6A for both, and at 3.6v, around 1.4A.

Usually it would be no problem to post pics, but I'm in transit on my way to Malta. So I'll have to do it in a week or so when back. Sorry about that.

Meanwhile it's going to be a little 'trial by fire/water'. I've not switched out the o-rings, so we'll see what happens.

Little bit comforting to read your results tho. Thanks for that.

To be continued......

[Doc Ed]

I'm sure they'll be okay At any rate, I forgot to include above that I also checked my 1st light, and the o-rings also had the faint seam in them as well.

[DIWdiver]

It's not unusual to be able to see the 'seam' on o-rings. Technically it's called 'flash' or 'mold flash'. Almost every o-ring I've seen has some detectable flash. It doesn't cause a problem in most applications. Apple Rubber does mention it in their book, and they can create o-rings with axial flash, but I've never seen much discussion about it. I'm guessing that only in the most critical applications is it important.

Most o-rings seal in the radial direction (between inner and outer diameter), which is right where the flash is on most o-rings. It seems to work. I would reject a ring with excessive flash, but the compression in most applications seems to overcome a small amount of flash.

[gasdiver]

Technically, this seam is called a "parting line". It's where the two halves of the mold meet. Flash is created when the polymer flows between the two halves of the mold. Parting lines are unavoidable and exist on every type of injection molded part, including o-rings. Flash, on the other hand, is a result of a poor quality or worn out mold. Flash is definitely a quality issue. It can be trimmed off and not effect the function of the part, but trimming it adds cost in the manufacturing process. If you get o-rings with any significant amount of flash, I would look for a different source.

BTW, I used to work for GE Plastics and ran a group of engineers who performed computer-aided mold filling and structural analysis. We assisted GE's customers with tool design and structural integrity of their plastic parts. My master's thesis in graduate school was entitled "Stiffness determination of hyper-elastic o-ring seals using the finite-element method". Thank god I've forgotten most of that crap!

[JoelSim]

Ok....so back to reality after a good week of diving.

Have some positive and some negative regarding this/these lights. Didn't take them below 42m, but seemingly no floods or anything like that which is good.

The positive:

Worked great as a light for travelling and not doing any seriously light craving tasks. Nice and small, bright enough to do what we asked of it.


The negative:

My light worked fine...my wife's on the other hand, not so much.
Her light decided at one point (approx. 38-40m) to no longer want to turn off. Turning it right through all settings then managed to turn it off. After this the light has never quite functioned properly again. It works, but flickers and drops in and out. A bit of a tap fixes this temporarily but the problem returns. I tried switching my battery into it, just to check, and the problem persisted

Does anyone have any thoughts about this issue???

Thinking that I am going to be sending of an e-mail and asking for a replacement.

Back to the o-ring topic.....

Seemingly even with the imperfections I noticed on the o-rings they seem to have worked just fine, so that's not all bad. The two above posts are good to know and read, although the 'seems' or 'parting lines' or even 'flash' is not what I noticed or was referring to. I noticed what looks like pieces have actually been sliced off the o-ring/s. I will break the lights down and see if I can get some pics for illustration of this (I have sick child on my hands at the moment, but will try and get it done ASAP).
Either way as I said the above posts are good info and good to know.
@gasdiver: Sorry for dragging up those painful memories for you, lol.

To be continued......

[JoelSim]

Not completely off topic but a little......

Upon breaking down one of these lights again and doing some measurements I got to thinking. Off the top of my head it seems that one of the aHorton aspheric lenses could fit quite nicely in this light head with very little modifying at all!?!?

Does anyone have one of these lights and an aspheric laying around that they would be willing to experiment with?? (Unfortunately I have only one of these aspheric lenses here and it's in my can light head which I'm in no hurry to pull apart again.)

Would there be any point in this??

[Doc Ed]

A user on a different board encountered similar problems. He traced the fault to a possible inadvertent loosening of the front bezel allowing some water to come in and dampen the electronics. Perhaps disassembly and proper drying might rectify the issue.

Also checked my photos... there is a small shelf within the head that you could rest an aspheric on and still maintain the air gap in front Not sure if the distance is enough to focus the beam properly though... An interesting project

Any photos/shots of the light in action in Malta?

[DimitrisV]

Hi

I 'm thinking to remove the lense an use this light for video light. Like this set http://www.dirdirect.com/GoPro-Hero2...ng-System.html
that use triple xre without the lense.

Dimitris

[jeffkruse]

I bought one of these. On the first dive to 40' it flooded. I got my money back with no hassel and was able to keep the light. Bummer though the battery was toast! I rinsed the light and tried it again. I think the lense was loose the first time. No leaks and it worked. But it is unreliable. It sometimes turns on and sometimes turns off. It may be a good backup light if you get a good one. I love the size. It's bright but I think I will have to put up with the size of the DRIS 3C cell "1000" lumen light. Damn, I so wanted this light to work.

[Doc Ed]

Was the light malfunctioning (sometimes on, sometimes off) prior to getting flooded?

[jeffkruse]

The light seemed to work fine for just the few minutes I played with it before the dive.

[Doc Ed]

Here's what another reviewer did when their light started malfunctioning after it got wet inside:

I decided to give me light a "rice bath" last night. ( Heat rice in the oven until hot and then put the rice and light in a sealed container overnight to draw moisture out of the light. )

Success! All of the positions of the bezel ( low, med, high, strobe ) now work. Since I understand the cause of the leak (user stupidity) I feel comfortable taking it on a dive today. I'll let you know what I think of it.

[gbert]

Ok....so back to reality after a good week of diving.


The negative:

My light worked fine...my wife's on the other hand, not so much.
Her light decided at one point (approx. 38-40m) to no longer want to turn off. Turning it right through all settings then managed to turn it off. After this the light has never quite functioned properly again. It works, but flickers and drops in and out. A bit of a tap fixes this temporarily but the problem returns. I tried switching my battery into it, just to check, and the problem persisted

Does anyone have any thoughts about this issue???

I picked up at TR-J2 and noticed similar issues after playing around with the light. I think it has to do with a bad or high impedance connection between between the head and the body, resulting in a bad return path, probably resulting in a bad bias on some of the FETs on the board. Usually, a little twist of the head fixed it. A little too much silicon grease on the o-rings didn't help either.

Speaking of o-rings, the TR-J2 only came with 1 o-ring on the head, 2 in the tail cap, both soft. I ended up adding a 3rd to the tail cap, replacing the other two, and adding a second to the head, all of which were harder. Didn't notice any inperfections on the stock o-rings at the time.

[Darker View]

Just ordered and received two lights, mostly based on this thread. The package arrived today from Deal Extreme.

Dismantled and inspected the lights before getting in the water... O-rings looked good, cleaned and re-greased. Only one o-ring in the middle sectional joint on either light, not counting the one used for the mode ring. I had a couple the right size that I installed. Tightened everything up and charged the batteries, expect they are ready for the water.

The packages included a battery and charger, even though the listing claimed extra lubricant and o-ring that were not present. Not really an issue since I have both on-hand. The 18650 cell claims to be a Trustfire 2400mAh. I have not yet used the supplied charger, as I have a good one already.

In general I like what I see. The lights are easily twice as bright as a UK Super Q eLED. We will be diving next week, to reasonable depths, 100' plus. Post again then?



I included a photo for scale, I did not realize the proper size of the lights until I held one, a bit larger than I expected. The background is a one inch grid, one of my wife's cutting mats.

[Darker View]

On a side note I also examined the charger supplied with the TR-J1 discovering a couple interesting things. Call me paranoid, but I have some suspicion of anything produced cheaply in China that plugs into line voltage. I have seen some truly scary things when I take this stuff apart.

I did order two lights thus ended up with two chargers, if one suffered destruction in tear-down I was OK. I also have a couple other 18650 chargers about. There are two screws under the label that hold the clamshell case together, in the end it went back together just fine aside from two neatly excised holes in the label.

What I found inside the TR-J1 charger was pleasantly surprising. The charger is cheaply built, but properly so, with a reasonable design. There are all of the required components, a fuse, proper filtering, the power transformer is insulated correctly. There is a decent voltage isolation barrier between the input and output stages and workmanship was acceptable. The design is a switcher that can be plugged in anywhere in the world.

The charger appears to simply regulate the output voltage, there is no proper LiIon charge control IC present. With a TL431 voltage reference the output voltage should be reasonably accurate. Charge state is determined by an op-amp circuit driving the LED.

The only troubling item was the battery connections. The supplied charger is a dual cell charger despite being supplied with a single cell flashlight. The two battery slots are connected in parallel. I would think twice about plugging two batteries into the charger simultaneously. If there was a substantial difference in the state of charge of the two batteries things could be less than good.

The manual for the TR-J1 is a humorous example of Chinglish, poor English translation from Chinese. While for the most part understandable there are a couple phrases that are pretty cryptic. One of the better examples of this are the words "Forbids to Invert" molded into one of the battery bays in the charger

[jeffkruse]

I used my "flooded" Trustfire J1 the other night on a night dive. Aside from having to bang it against my weight belt every few minutes to make it work, it was an impressive light. Much brighter than my other backups but not as bright as my old Diverite 10W HID. I feel it would be good enough as a primary light in clear water. That says a lot coming from someone who’s primary is a 24W HID.

I just wish it hadn’t flooded on the first dive. The lenses was loose and ever since I tightened it it hasn’t leaked. I would say this is a good light.
The price can't be beat!

[Darker View]

Three dives and no trouble, 90 feet max. Seems the thing to do is fully inspect the light before going under. Explored several small caves today, plenty of light from these inexpensive units.

[JoelSim]

Well sorry folks for the extreme delay in finally getting back here to post pics of o-rings and so on. Between sickness in the house and then being away on holidays (again...I know it's a tough life) I've not had a chance to do anything about this until now.

@ DimitrisV I've had the same thought about lens removal and trying these lights out as video light lights for my GoPro. I honestly think that if I were sticking to just the single XML for it though that the driver would have to be switched out to push the XML to it's full ability. Then in doing that I have no idea how much time I'd get out of the battery...I expect not much. Could be interesting to test though.

@Doc Ed- I'm not sure if I got any decent pics or video showing the light in action. I'll do some sorting through when I have time and see what I find. Bit silly of me not to think to do a comparison while I was at it. Maybe sometime soon. Although while we were in a little cave we did do a quick side by side test with a TR-J1 and my other back-up (UK SL4 with a (C5/7??) LED drop). I was quite impressed to see that the TR-J1 easily held it's own, especially considering what we have all found in our current tests (ie. that the XML is under driven).

Now to some o-ring pics. Sorry about the quality I had to be quick about it while the little man is sleeping, haha:

The first 3 pics are all 1 o-ring...it to say the least has seen better days. Not quite what you expect of a brand new product, but oh well:




This one isn't as easy to see, but it is a slice out of the o-ring from 2 different angles:



I was quite sure I had another one that was just completely mangled, but I guess I replaced it and ditched it without thinking as I cannot find it again now.

Still good reports on the other light though. It was with me on the weekend over 3 days of diving with students and has survived just fine (even with the mis-treatment of no rinsing day to day and so on).

I have also been in touch with Kaidomain regarding the faulty light. The first offer so far has been to send me a new driver for it, as they are guessing that is the issue. I have of course asked what they mean by 'new driver' and what would be involved for the installation. Naturally if they do indeed mean just the driver, which will mean soldering and so on, I don't believe that's a good solution. Not because I can't do it, but because I believe that's not acceptable on a new product.

To be continued......

[Doc Ed]

Those look pretty chewed up. Lucky my o-rings didn't look like that when I got them!

[JoelSim]

Well after another e-mail from Kaidomain simply saying that they would send me a new driver as it would save me time (???) with no explanation as to what would need doing and so on....I decided it was time to pull this light apart just a little more.

So...dropped the pill forward turned it so I could push the white disc out of the bottom, a little push and sure enough white disc went flying. Seems it wasn't very well soldered to the white wire at all. This naturally made me wonder if that was in fact the cause of the flickering.

Little bit of solder, some re-assembly and voila no more flickering

Fingers crossed that this little bit of dodgy workmanship was the cause of our flickering issue.

[JoelSim]

(I don't know if I should've started a different thread for this post, but here goes anyway)

Now what you've been waiting for- the driver:

Hi again folks,

This is a question to you driver building/modifying folks on here.

Previously (with a different driver in a different XML project) I was informed by the builder of the driver that it was possible to boost the output of the driver from 2800mAh to 3000mAh by soldering and extra 1ohm resistor on top of an existing one. Do any of you know or have an opinion on whether something similar could be achieved with the driver in this light?

Cheers, Joel.

P.S. @Suncip- I needed to borrow your picture for this question. I hope this is ok!?

[jspeybro]

if you can read the text on the chip, can you post it, then we can have a look in the datasheet. the chip often uses a sense resistor to regulate the current, so it is often possible to do this. The max output depends on the chip and possibly some other components, but going from 2.8 to 3A shouldn't be a problem for the driver.

Johan

[JoelSim]

if you can read the text on the chip, can you post it, then we can have a look in the datasheet. the chip often uses a sense resistor to regulate the current, so it is often possible to do this. The max output depends on the chip and possibly some other components, but going from 2.8 to 3A shouldn't be a problem for the driver.

Johan

Oh no....here comes my ignorance/inexperience again!!

Which chip do you mean that you would like the text off?? Are you referring to the black chip(?) almost in the centre with the 8 legs/arms coming off it?

I don't expect to be able to achieve 3A from this driver (the 2.8A-3A was an example from a different driver). I have measured this/these drivers putting out around 1.8A (with a fresh battery. So it would be nice to be able to push this a little higher and closer to what the XML can handle.

Cheers, Joel.

[DIWdiver]

I think that resistor marked R220 is certainly the current sense. That's 0.220 ohms (the R is the radix location). To get to 3A you'd want to parallel a 0.33 ohm on top of it. Unfortunately, there's no telling how close to the edge of oblivion this thing is already. Pushing it to 3A might well burn up something, most likely the FET, which is that thing just to the right of the red wire in the picture. If you're willing to try, here's a nifty formula for calculating the resistor you need to add X amount more current:
R = 0.4/X.

That's assuming the posted measurements were accurate, and my guessing is acccurate.

Also, you could improve the ability to handle higher current some by providing some heatsink on the FET. Keep in mind that the heat generated by the FET is proportional to the square of the current. So if you jack the current 40%, you double the heat!

[JoelSim]

That's assuming the posted measurements were accurate, and my guessing is accurate.

Thanks for the advice and info DIWdiver.

After your above comment it got me to thinking again about an earlier post that mentioned using some shortened wires between the multi-meter and the light whilst taking the current readings. So I thought I would give that a go and see the result.

The result was a bigger difference than I had expected. This time around I got approx. 2.2A on both my lights (instead of around 1.8A).

Starting to think that messing with the driver is going to result in nothing but a bang (or at least something burning up).

Perhaps it is wise for me to leave them as they are (more or less....aside from removing the optic and moving the led forward closer to the lens on a heatsink).

Cheers again, Joel.

[DIWdiver]

After your above comment it got me to thinking again about an earlier post that mentioned using some shortened wires between the multi-meter and the light whilst taking the current readings. So I thought I would give that a go and see the result.

The result was a bigger difference than I had expected. This time around I got approx. 2.2A on both my lights (instead of around 1.8A).

Starting to think that messing with the driver is going to result in nothing but a bang (or at least something burning up).

Perhaps it is wise for me to leave them as they are (more or less....aside from removing the optic and moving the led forward closer to the lens on a heatsink).

Cheers again, Joel.

I rarely argue with caution.

You improved the leads, but that does nothing about the meter itself, which may have as much impact as the leads, or even more. The meter measures current by putting the current through a resistor and measuring the voltage across it. The resistance is low, but not trivial. So your caution may be wise indeed.

[Antonseli]

Blindeye, I hope you don't mind me adding my input to your review.

CONSTRUCTION:

I Got mine in the mail today First impressions: Seemed relatively well built - nice and solid. On removing the head, there were one or two swarfs, but otherwise it looked great. The cooling ridges on the head are not overly-done as seen on some other dive lights. The removable stainless steel attack crown was the first to come off. Granted, it looks like it could do some serious damage if ever used for its intended purpose..............................!

Hello everyone, I'm a happy owner of this flashlight with Doc Ed your review. Thank you for letting me know, and then I'd ask you as you disassemble the steel crown ... I'm not very experienced and I would not do damage ...


Hi


Andy

[Doc Ed]

Hi Antonseli,

The crown just rotates off. Rotate it counter-clockwise, and it should come off easily. Just make sure that all you remove is the stainless crown, and not the underlying front bezel. Another user did that inadvertently before and ended up flooding their light.

Oh, and if indeed you're experience level with lights is still wanting, I suggest you browse through the section on proper handling of lithium ion batteries:

Smoke and Fire, Hot Cells and Close Calls - The dangerous side of batteries

[andrew_t]

Hi,
I had a light tr-j1 and it was working correctly. However due to a bad choice (i used my led at my dive buddy's tr-j2 body) I burned the driver. I want to replace the driver but I can't find anywhere the custom driver they use with the hall switches. So I thought to replace the driver completely and use a reed switch for use with the magnet the tr-j1 has.

I was thinking to use a driver that could give me 2A - something like this http://dx.com/p/5-mode-led-driver-ci...-106796?item=1
However all these drivers are the multi mode thing and I don't know how to make them work with the magnet. They seem to use a click type switch. Can I use a driver but make it always on the high mode since the high is what I usually use? Also a driver that could give more amps from a single battery would be great!

Any ideas?