Can anyone help with a K-106 Problem?

[RedForest UK]

Well, I've had my Akoray K-106 for a while now but havent really used it much, I find the D10 much more useful in general. However this is mainly down to one problem, the runtime is really poor, I have only just realised just how bad it is today looking at others runtime graphs, so I was just wondering if anyone here could give me any advice on what might be the problem?

The light should run on high for about 40mins before dimming, however mine dims after about 7-8mins to a very low output. Which I believe is the low voltage warning. I have tested the current draw to be 1.10-1.15A on high, and the cells all rate roughly 3.8v when taken out of the light.

I am using Blue Trustfire 14500 cells from DX and so wasnt expecting much, but other owners seem to get a good half an hour or 40mins from even these cheap cells. My best guess at the moment would be that the cells voltage is sagging under load and this is triggering the low voltage cut-off.

However, the runtime still seems incredibly bad even if this is the case, so if anyone has any other ideas then they would be appreciated.

Thanks for your help,

RF

 

[brted]

My K-106 draws about 600mA on a fresh battery (same protected blue Trustfire it sounds like) and I get 45 minutes down to 3.6V (when it is drawing 770mA) so mine is only giving me about 500mAh instead of the nominal 900mAh. Even if your light draws twice the current you should get 20 minutes. I have heard the K-106 has thermal protection, so that may be triggering. You could try to get around it by turning off the battery protection (if you have the 3-mode). Or it could just be a bad battery. People say they only last a couple of years and some are bad right off the bat.

 

[RedForest UK]

Thanks for that info, but I have tested the runtime with 5 seperate and all new cells all with results of only 6-8mins runtime. Also the light dims at the same time with low voltage protection on or off.. Although it seems a lot greener tint when it dims if it is off which is odd :thinking:

If there is thermal protection as well which causes it to dim if it gets to hot then that may explain the fact I was getting longer runtimes when holding the light in my hand as a basic heatsink.

 

[ronkar]

I believe the K-106 has low voltage protection for when using Lithium Ion 14500.

Try 1/2 clicking 3 times quickly. Look for one or two blinks thereafter.
1 blink means off, 2 blinks means on.

You want the protection off for alkalines and NiMh.

 

[RedForest UK]

Yh, I mentioned that already.. But the light dims at the same time whether the low voltage protection is programmed on or off :shrug: One interesting thing though is that when it dims and its off, even though its the same brightness, it seems a very green tint, which seems odd. :thinking: