Maglite SSC P7. How to. A sort of guide.

[ashrakki]

Can Emitter Bin do something like that if its "J"? Although I ordered CxxxI bins from Kai...

Plz, someone?

Or then My the protected D lion is piece of crap. Cant imagine anything else. Stefan, what KD D lions you have? Protected or unprotected?

E: ah, new page.

 

[StefanFS]

Still waiting on DX for my emitter and driver (they are being even slower than usual, 4 weeks and still haven't even shipped).

When I get my stuff though I'll try to post pics.

I'm still not sure about how exactly I should do the spring mod.

For the spring/tailcap mod, see post #1 as I added this to the end of that post.

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ashrakki and others here,

I'm checking the apparent driver problem, I have some of the new varieties with the Atmel PIC. Please keep cool, it may take a few days. Could be programming.

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ashrakki,

I have all kinds and colours that they have sold. I don't think this is about your cells. And it's not about the binning either, that would be really strange. The C bins you ordered are from the first binning so they tend to perform as the current D bin, at least the ones I got from that source are good for D bin performance.

 

[sn0wBLiND]

Those black protected D-cells seem to either work or die completely, one protection circuit on the two cells I have would not accept charge at all after a few charges, after removing the PCM it works just fine.
I just have to be really careful when using them

And thanks for the great tutorial, StefanFS.

 

[StefanFS]

Ok,

I have tested all the new varieties of multimode drivers I have. 2 mode with one unpopulated AMC7135 position and Atmel PIC, new 16 mode with Atmel chip, new 5 mode with Atmel PIC. They all check out, up to spec.

Here's a pic of one of my 1A drivers with Atmel PIC and one extra AMC7135 chip to make it 1.4A. It even outperforms it's own spec considering the extra resistance of the multimeter:

Update. New wiring pics with one of the new driver variations in end of post #1.

 

[ashrakki]

Hmm, I tried DD the Led, got little more amperage, about 1.7A. Again I used the D lion (4.18V). What hell can be wrong. :duh2:

 

[sn0wBLiND]

Do all the dies get lit? A welding mask is very useful if you need to look directly into the p7.

 

[ergotelis]

Hmm, I tried DD the Led, got little more amperage, about 1.7A. Again I used the D lion (4.18V). What hell can be wrong. :duh2:

I had the same problem, even though i had a DSWOI bin P7. I saw that the problem was the small cables,they had enough resistance.

 

[StefanFS]

I had the same problem, even though i had a DSWOI bin P7. I saw that the problem was the small cables,they had enough resistance.

I always presume that people use adequate wire. With good silver coated teflon wire or other high quality wire it's possible to use very thin gauges with the currents used in these P7 Mag mods. For resistance from even medioker wire to have an impact I think very long pieces would have to be used, not a few decimeter in total. However, this problem isn't new as there have been difficulties reported now and then with these builds. I have helped some to resolve it, others never got it right and gave up. I have used several hundred of these driver boards in about ten or twelwe different builds and configurations without incident, mostly with 24 or 26 gauge wire and with currents up to 8-9A in total.
About this particular case of ashrakki's build I just don't know why it's not working. I'd have to see it/measure it physically to give an opinion.

 

[ergotelis]

If it isn't made clear, when i say small cables, i mean small in diameter!I used some fatter cables and now it works better!

 

[T_A_X]

Hey there everyone, Im new to modding, infact havent done one yet but i have a 3C and 3D mag that i would love to put together. Reading Stefan's stuff is amazing! If i can get some info as to where i can purchase the P7 SSC and heatsinks as well as the reflectors (if i need to buy a new reflector?im not sure?) that would be awesome. Stefan do you have a step by step post that i could read? Thanks in advance! PS: i seen that i can purchase the LED on litemania.com (but its korean). I also seen it in extremedeal.com . any suggestions would be appreciated!
I'm chris by the way.

 

[737mech]

Welcome! Hope this helps, all these are US sellers...
user photonfanatic has P7 leds
http://www.photonfanatic.com/ComponentsFS.html
user FiveMega has aluminum reflectors
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/207494
4sevens.com has heatsinks and P7's
https://www.4sevens.com/index.php?cPath=25&osCsid=2072bc2699f8f78915de4760ae183442

 

[Justin Case]

For other heat sinks besides the 4sevens.com product, do a CPF search for H22A and britelumens. You've apparently already found LITEmania. For English, search the CPF Marketplace Dealer's Corner for his ads.

LITEmania also sells P7 emitters.

If you plan to use AA NiMH cells in your 3D Mags, check out the AA to D holders from FiveMega and mdocod on CPF.

Kaidomain sells both a smooth and an orange peel finish metal reflector for the Mag (get the 15mm opening reflector, not the 8.3mm opening).

However, the stock smooth Maglite reflector provides an adequate beam quality with the P7 when you focus the beam to its optimum. It won't be perfect on a white wall, but against any real-world background, you will never notice any defects. If you get the Kaidomain orange peel reflector to clean up the minor defects, the beam will look excellent when focused, but you will sacrifice beam intensity in the hot spot when compared to the smooth Mag reflector. If you defocus the beam thinking you will get more of a flood, you will get a donut hole in the center of the beam.

Kaidomain also sells a pack of glass windows for the Mag for a very low price. Alternatively, flashlightlens.com sells glass windows for about $6 and change. You have a choice of borosilicate or ultraclear float glass.

 

[ashrakki]

I always presume that people use adequate wire. With good silver coated teflon wire or other high quality wire it's possible to use very thin gauges with the currents used in these P7 Mag mods. For resistance from even medioker wire to have an impact I think very long pieces would have to be used, not a few decimeter in total. However, this problem isn't new as there have been difficulties reported now and then with these builds. I have helped some to resolve it, others never got it right and gave up. I have used several hundred of these driver boards in about ten or twelwe different builds and configurations without incident, mostly with 24 or 26 gauge wire and with currents up to 8-9A in total.
About this particular case of ashrakki's build I just don't know why it's not working. I'd have to see it/measure it physically to give an opinion.

I used wire from DX's jst cables set, (http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.15234) That could be the reason indeed. Just ordered some teflonwire (gauges 20&26), lets see how it works.
Anyways, thanks a lot stefan for all the help and the awesome thread. :candle:

 

[fxstsb]

I have built one 3D maglite with a P7. It has no regulator and seems to work fine. I am getting ready to build another 3c P7. Has anyone had a problem running the P7 (D coding) with 3 c batteries?

 

[sami_voodoo]

I have built one 3D maglite with a P7. It has no regulator and seems to work fine. I am getting ready to build another 3c P7. Has anyone had a problem running the P7 (D coding) with 3 c batteries?

There was a bit of a discussion on direct drive P7 Mags in this thread:

https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/227077

You might find something of interest. On a side note, It's the last character of the LED bin that you're looking for. If I'm not mistaken, J-bins are 3.5 to 3.75 Vf while I-bins are 3.25 to 3.5 Vf. The first character, which will be C or D will give you the lumen output range.

I hope this helps!
Sami

 

[Eirik]

hi.
where can i get the AMC7135 VDD leg?

 

[StefanFS]

hi.
where can i get the AMC7135 VDD leg?

Here is the pdf data sheet:
http://www.micro-bridge.com/data/ADD/AMC7135.pdf

 

[Eirik]

:thumbsup: thx

 

[powerup93]

I have a question about the amc7135 chips that I couldn't quite get an answer for.

I wanted to see how hot my mag would be on full power in my setup:
1xP7
Shiningbeam's MCE/P7 board sku#1217 (8xamc7135 and an atmel pic)
4xC NIMH

And after about ~25min it started to blink the led moderately like on/off/on/off/etc.... then seemed to drop to a lower brightness/output.

Is that thermal heat protection or low battery warning? Another cpf thread said it was too much voltage???

 

[StefanFS]

I have a question about the amc7135 chips that I couldn't quite get an answer for.

I wanted to see how hot my mag would be on full power in my setup:
1xP7
Shiningbeam's MCE/P7 board sku#1217 (8xamc7135 and an atmel pic)
4xC NIMH

And after about ~25min it started to blink the led moderately like on/off/on/off/etc.... then seemed to drop to a lower brightness/output.

Is that thermal heat protection or low battery warning? Another cpf thread said it was too much voltage???

With the builds I use (I have no experience of the specific driver you mention, although I have used AMC7135 based multimode drivers with an Atmel PIC to build sandwiches) there have been no oscillations from overheating or too high voltage. 4 NiMH cells should be OK.