Mysterious paranormal activity: High Output light turned on by itself! H O T.

[Captain Spaulding]

I recently constructed a shelf to have a central location to keep my Surefire collection. It was a cheapish and on sale shelf that uses the wood with that "woodgrain" looking laminated stuff over it. Its not that big, but it has been great and is capable of holding at least a dozen lights as long as they are stored bezel down. I mostly have my C/Z/P pieces with a few e-series as well on it.

The biggest light I have on the shelf is my Z3 that currently has a KT2 Turbohead on it and is sporting a Lumens FactoryIMR-M3T driven by 2X18500 IMR cells... To anyone unfamiliar with this setup, its a high performance incand that gets HOT. And it does it fast. Not just hot like a Triple LED drop in, but actually burn-your-hand-hot within just a few seconds of use. You literally cannot hold your hand over the lens of the light for more than a few seconds after turn on.

Anyway, I really cannot determine how it happened and it is boggling my mind, but I went to climb in bed and turned off the overhead light and in the dark, I just happened to notice an evil glow from my shelf full of lights. I jumped over the bed, freaking out my GF, and started grabbing lights. The Z3 body was hotter than the sun itself, causing me to drop it immediately. I rolled it around on the carpet with my foot to try to keep from melting the carpet as I grabbed a couple of dirty socks to use to grip the light and turn it off. I then unscrewed the tail cap and poured out two incredibly hot IMR cells. Like far too hot to hold IMR cells. The laminated wood grain stuff on the shelves was all bubbled up. I looked the light over and cannot find any damage to it however. I just left the cells to cool on their own and havent put a multimeter to them yet to see if I over-discharged them or not. Probably ruined a set of AW cells. I have no idea of knowing how long that light was on. Im glad I caught it when I did. Possible fire or worse.

The light uses a standard SF Z41 tailcap and I know that before shelving any light, I make a habit of "locking out" those tailcaps. I love the Z41 and have them on pretty much all of my C/Z/P builds as there is pretty much nothing in them to fail. Now, I am guilty of "playing flashlight" sometimes in bed and have been known to lego and swap parts, drop ins, etc while watching TV just for fun. (Who here doesn't do that?) I know though, that I hadn't touched this light though for 4 days. I am having a hard time believing that I would put a light, (especially THAT light) lens down on a shelf with the Z41 tailcap just barely twisted off. I haven't yet had a chance to reassemble and troubleshoot the light and cap, but really, there isnt anything that can fail that would cause the light to just come on.

Im going crazy trying to figure out what happened. Just thought Id share.

[TooManyGizmos]

~

I would suspect a failure of the "Lock-out" feature .

Time for a complete inspection and investigation .

Until you know the reason .... don't leave cells in it while you're away.

~

[HotWire]

It is a good thing you went to bed early! I have several similar incandescent lights like that, and I just locked them all out after reading your post! They will burn newspaper or skin! Check your batteries and keep them out until you are sure what the problem is. Be safe!

[kelmo]

Don't tell me you live over an old Indian grave yard!

[chanjyj]

Something similar has happened to me in the past - but in my pocket. I thought I was out of my mind (my skin was burning) until someone told me "there's a light coming out of your pocket" or something to that effect. Clickys, rotaries.. they all seem to have an affinity to my pocket.

But yours is on a.. shelf?

[bstrickler]

That's why I have a PVC pipe with a small cutout in a section, and hose clamps around it, covering the switchon my hotwire. I don't want to know the kind of damage 7 IMR 26650's can do!

It's ugly, but it's foolproof. I have yet to be able to accidentally turn it on (got the idea after having it turn on in the car while driving at night! 16,000+ lumens in the face makes you slam the brakes on and pull over FAST! Pulled the cells after that. until I made the sleeve).

Spaulding, maybe get some 1/8" or 1/16" thick glass, mirror or plexiglas, and put it on each shelf, so you can tell immediately whether a light is on or off.

I think I'm going to borrow your idea, and combine it with a shotgun rack type thing for my Mag Lites!

[DUQ]

My Surefire 9P with a P91 recently did the same thing. Loaded it up on a Saturday morning and not long after I could smell burning plastic. It was the paint on the wooden shelf inside my bedroom closet. Luckily I was there. Now I loosen the caps until I cannot turn them on.

[Cataract]

Wow, I'm glad the only thing I forgot to check was my IFE2 (with a protected cell) I left on low when I fell asleep 2 days ago. Good thing you saw it and reacted fast.