3 Watt Fenix ??

I have 2 new Fenix LIPs and I gave my friend Owen the better tinted of the 2 in trade for a sweet TW4. I have finally got the heatsink out of the bezel and it seems a pretty easy matter to swap the emitter for a better tinted one.
My question is does anyone know the specs of this circuit in order for me to choose the best emitter?
I have a TYOK however do not think this circuit will do well with a K forward voltage. Any suggestions or better yet any one have a nice TYOH...hehe
I would like to have a 3 watt Fenix and am seeking any advice before I remove this emitter.
The tint is pretty good on both however the one I kept has a more creamy yellow color where the other is crystal white with a little hid blue look.
Thanks....

Whether it's a 3.1 volt ***H , or a 3.6 volt ***K emitter shouldn't be a huge difference imho.
The ***K 3 watt is probably in the ***J range when underdriven as a 1 watter.
It should be quite ok.

I sometimes wish I was not so picky with tint however I have became spoiled after years of playing around with better lights.
I did not want to end up with a 3 watt that was shifting to a worse color due to the lower powered circuit however I have many 3 watters that are great tint even at lower levels.
The problem is that I was not sure what this circuit was designed to put out and I know there have been many debates as to an over powered 1 watt VS an underpowered 3 watt.
I think I will try it anyway and if I do not like it I can always change it back now that I can remove the circuit with ease.

On a side note I know see why Warren had to cancel his offer for the custom emitter versions of this light.....man that circuit does not come out easy at all and had to be one of the most stubborn lights I have seen. I have many blisters now as a result but I finally won...hehe

Robo,
u got a TW4 for a fenix. wow you are one heck of a horse trader, I want you on my team next time I want to trade a light....:naughty:

on a side note us know how the 3w works in the Fenix body and the run time it sounds awsome, although I'm not skilled enough to do it myself.

doug

I am working on the swap now however my hands are so sore from messing with this thing all night that I may call it quits for now. I really had to grip this thing tightly and turn the heatsink a little and then rest. After about an hour I was done but very sore palms.
I may try some pics as soon as I can and get some before and after beamshots. I am now picking through all of my T bins to find the most white tinted ones.
As far as the TW4 goes Owen is a great friend and fellow member here. He uses his lights each day and uses them very hard I might add. He no longer used the TW4 and knew I always wanted one. I actually traded the Fenix and an Expedition M1 pack for the TW4 however he is also letting me use the FB1 single cell body.....What a sweet deal however I still owe him a few lithium cells or maybe something else however for now we are ok with the trade.
Wish me luck and I will keep you posted as to the results.

nice trade robo! TW4 is one of my fav's. works great with a Mce2s two stage switch.

when using single alk AA cell, don't think it's possible to deliver much more current to lux.

li-ion would change everything. 14500 would be able to sustain enough current to support higher current to luxeon.

don't have a L1-P, but do have L1+ which runs 14500 most excellently. only draws 550 milliampst at cell. barely warms up after long runs. brightness at least doubled. this is using stock board and emitter.

I am still not very up to date on the tech stuff so I am not sure how these circuits work. I assumed that this circuit is designed to deliver a certain amount of power using the AA power supply and that this amount was designed for the 1 watt factory luxeon.
I also thought that the LIPs most surely had a low VF luxeon to better take advantage of the smaller power supply and limited circuit ability. Now this is where I get a little confused.....I am not so much worried about run time as I am with tint. I am thinking that with the only better tinted luxeon I have available right now (TYOK) may not work as well as the one already in my light. I do know that when I use the TYOK on my QIII it is very nice in tint however that is a much different circuit...or is it??
I am wondering if the Fenix circuit will be able to increase the current enough to match the VF required by the TYOK or if it will only put a limited amount of power and not use the full ability of the better tinted 3 watt.

When dealing with this Fenix board does it somehow know what the VF is and supply just enough to the Luxeon or is it designed to power a 1 watt of lower VF only. If it is simply just a matter of increasing the power to the circuit I will do the swap and run a Li-Ion or maybe only the higher voltage Lithium AA cells. I have some of the BatteryStation AAs that show 1.8 volts when new and this may also be an option.

luxlover, let's start in the ideal world (the same place massless, frictionless pulleys come from).

So we have a perfect lossless converter (efficiency = 100%) and a perfect battery (No internal resistance)

Power out (Pout) = Power in (Pin)

(in reality Pout = Pin - Efficiency losses)

Pin = voltage in (Vin) x current in (Iin)
Pout = voltage out (Vout) x current out (Iout)

If you want to run a 1 Watt emitter at 350mA with a Vf of 3.3Volts you have:

Pout = 3.3 x 0.350 = 1.155 Watts

Pin = 1.5V x Iin = Pout (remember that this is a perfect converter)

1.155 Watts = 1.5V x Iin

or

Iin = 1.155 W/1.5V = 0.77 Amps (or 770 mA)

So you can convert the lower voltage to a higher but it will cost you more current.

Now for some reality.

These single cell converters converters will likely run at about 70% (or lower).
The battery has an internal resistance so its voltage will sag under a load. So Vin will be less than 1.5V (probably down to 1.2-1.3V under that load).

So, for a 70% efficient converter at the same Pout (1.155W) the Pin would have to be 1.65W to cover the converter losses.

Now let's assume that the battery voltage sags to 1.2V.

Iin=Pin/Vin
1.65W/1.2V = 1.375 Amps

That poor little AA will now have to supply over 1.375 Amps to run the emitter at 350mA.

HTH,

Paul

Quick update on this as I believe I will just leave my Fenix as it is. I worked hard to get the circuit out and have sorted through a few luxeons to find the whitest tint in the H range of forward voltage. Well all was going good with having the emitter de-soldered and ready to transplant.
That is where I got stuck on this.....the emitter does not seem to want to come away from the PCB board and appears to sit down inside a small hole. I learned a hard lesson early on about trying to force an emitter and destroyed many domes by prying up on them. I think I may try to make another pill or somehow fit another circuit in order to have the ability to just swap them at random.
I plan on using another circuit and the Li-Ion 3.7 volt batteries or maybe even some salvaged 3 volt lithium AA size from some cut up battery packs.
Now to find a circuit that I can retrofit into this head.

Robocop,
Do you have a pic of what the heatsink looks like after you got it out of the head? Also, do you think it was just loctite holding it in, or something else (epoxy?)?

Bucken the heatsink is identical to the other photos in this thread that I have found on here http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=95019&highlight=fenix
I do think it has some form of epoxy and the way it is recessed into a little hole makes it hard to pry it out. I learned that it is very easy to pull the dome from a luxeon so this time I may leave this light as is as I do not want to destroy it.

I put a wiz2-530 (from the shoppe) into one of my fenix's. The converter
board fits right in. From a li-ion 14500 (AA sized) rated 850mah, it runs
1 hour 50 minutes fully regulated! QUITE impressive!

I do plan to possibly make a seperate sandwich type circuit for my spare Fenix. This would allow me to keep the factory one intact as I do not wish to damage it. I was playing around last night and placed a 3 watt sandwich from a FF2 in the Fenix head. I had to power it with a AA size 3 volt cell and simply held a wire to the body for contact.
I was attempting to just see what it would look like and the result was very nice. The LIP reflector does a very good job with higher power luxeons and gave me many ideas for future mods. This is really an incredible light for the cost and when you get a look at one from the inside you can see just how well thought out this light is.
My friend Owen recently got almost 4 hours of brightness from a single 2500 rechargeable cell. This is incredible and seems to be consistent with other Fenix lights.
In my opinion this is one factor that makes these lights such good bargains and it is the fact that they are all similiar in performance and brightness. The Pelican PM6 LED was famous for their consistant beams and brightness of all their lights. The Fenix seems to be falling into this trend as well with almost everyone who has one is happy with the performance.