Creed up my Gladius

[LEDcandle]

I've seen this done by another member with the 'bare' gladius and he was talking about having to get a new, deeper reflector for the Cree.

Well, it isn't absolutely necessary; with a lot of sanding (I'm sorry I don't know how much, I just did it till it worked ), a stock IMS27 would focus it pretty acceptably. Of course, being fully reflective, the beam isn't perfect, but I might try the lacquer sputtering on a spare IMS27 when I have time to start sanding the back of that one too.

But texturing would lessen the effect of my strobe! Haha...

Anyway, here are the pics :-
(Sorry, no proper camera handy, so these will have to do )

The whole setup. You can practically see how much is shaved off from the back of the reflector.

The original IMS27 is exactly the same height as the holder and has a tiny 'lip' to keep it in place. After shaving the back of the reflector, it was now shorter than the holder, but would still sit on top and not totally cover the Cree. I filed off the lip on the reflector, put some tape around the reflector, than 'pressed' it into the holder so it sat all the way in.

The assembled light.

Max beamshot at 1ft (lowest exposure on my mobile phone). My focusing of the LED is still not perfect, so a slight donut occurs within 20cm.

Min beamshot at 1ft (still uuber low and usable for die-hard map readers!! )

Max is estimated to be about 120 lumens with my DIY litebox, compared to the old one which was 70 lumens. I did not take any lux readings but shining it out the window, it seems to throw further.

Added : 12 Feb 07
Beamshot with sputtered reflector (still dialed to lowest exposure so it is not representative of absolute brightness but more to showcase beam quality)

Poor attempt to get macro shot of sputtered reflector

PAIN POINTS - In order of pain
1) Getting the old star out of the Gladius - It is practically jammed in there with some thermal adhesive and maybe there's some trick to removing it, but I definitely don't know about it. I practically destroyed my Luxeon trying to pry it off after desoldering the wires. Oh well, at least LEDs are cheap now

2) Shaving the reflector - Not that hard, but takes a lot of trial and error till you get a nice focus.

3) Looking at the destroyed, premium LuxIII

I think a SSC LED might be a better hot swap! But I read that the die is slightly lower than the luxeon? I think it would be slightly harder to try raising up a Star-based LED than to have to shave reflectors, so do some homework first

Anyway, I think I'm pretty ok with this mod... not the best workmanship, but it works for me! Saves me $$ having to buy a Cree gladius if it comes!

 

[roadie]

but hor, prying a $200 us dollars light, wow u are rich!

 

[LEDcandle]

Haha.. itchy fingers, and if I don't open it and decide to buy a Cree Gladius next time (if it ever came out), i'd be out more money. Might as well mod what I have

I measure lux at 1m to be 3750; the original was 3200. Not drastic improvement, but I suppose the focus isn't perfect, in addition to the Cree lending its output more to the sidespill than the hotspot.

I've actually spent ard S$6k on lights and related products (and I'm not rich; just a normal working guy), but in the end I only have a few 'good' lights and no collectibles like Orb or Mclux etc... dunno where all the money went Think more than half went into modding, like metal, tools, adhesive etc...

After one more ultimate expensive milky mod M6 and 1 nice AA light to replace my Jetbeam MkI as EDC, I will relax for awhile and wait for further developments. Maybe just play with some LED mods if the LED remains around $10 and if it becomes 200 lumen/w

 

[LEDcandle]

Added : Beamshot from 1ft with sputtered reflector and poor attempt to try and show the sputtered reflector (aargh, I need a good camera!!)

Sputtering ideas here :-
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/149540&highlight=sputter

 

[Bullzeyebill]

Re-do your lux measurement at 6 meters. I find that when there is a donut hole with a non lux V light that measuring lux at a greater distance and converting to one meter with inverse square law can be more accurate. It certainly worked with my BBH on VIP with Seoul P4 U bin. Measured 14,000 lux at one meter with a donut, and 1190 lux at 6 meters, converting to 42,840 lux at one meter. Math is 1190x6x6, in this case.

Bill

 

[roadie]

btw are u a regular customer at sheares?

 

[LEDcandle]

Bill, thanks for the workaround

roadie, nope, not a regular. I bought my first Surefire setup there though; then I found CPF and online flashlight vendors and it all went downhill from there :laughing:

 

[roadie]

 

[alantch]

LEDcandle, how did you manage to open up the head of the gladius? Was it difficult? I'm on the fence at the moment in getting a stock Gladius and wondering if the head is easy enough to open up to changeout the led.

 

[LEDcandle]

You can consider getting the Insight Typhoon H2x (Gladius OEM light from same factory) for less money.

My head was only very lightly glued with threadlock, so it unscrewed without a problem. Watch out for a loose ball bearing inside the head. Advice is to unscrew your light over a cloth or somewhere you can catch the ball-bearing if it falls out.

I'm not sure how tight other Gladiuses/Typhoons are glued, but mine was easy to open. Its now using an SSC P4 instead of Cree and the beam quality is so much better.

 

[fisherman2]

LEDcandle,

I'm considering buying one Typhoon H2x (thx for the recommandation to save some money and modding it with a SSC P5. Also, a textured reflector would be more suitable to me, any recommandation on that? Need more flooding light than spot.

I like the UI of this H2x/Gladius. However, in my opinion it is a shame for the manufacturer, asking this high amount of money and fitting it with outdated LEDs. This is disappointing....

However, before of making the mod I want to make sure that the driver will get out the best from the new LED. Did you measure the current the driver puts out to the LED? is it about 1A in max menue?

Aother one: there is a thermal protection build in it, I would expect that this reduces the current, as soon as the LED warms a bit up. The original LED will be dimmed after some 30 mins, the upgrade will produce even more heat. Did you observe a reduction in output (or current), as described here:

http://www.flashlightreviews.com/reviews/night-ops_gladius.htm

I just fear we upgrade with a LED with a better efficiency, however we can't boost it to the upper emission limits as the driver interferes.

Has anybody done some measurement on current or even better on light output?


Thank you!
Juergen

 

[LEDcandle]

Someone measured the current at 957ma for highest mode.

Unfortunately, yes, the electronics take over when trying to run it on high mode continuously. But it's quite true that you will hardly be able to see the difference if the light has been on for 15 mins and it starts dimming down.

Also, since the new LEDs are so much brighter than the Lux, you don't need to run it on max. You can run it at about 60-70% brightness (which should still be 100+ lumens) and it will run continuously without dimming.

I've changed my LED to an SSC P4, and even with a smooth reflector, the beam is creamy. If you want uber flood, juz sputter your reflector with hairspray or the like. Plus the inherent creamy nature of the SSC LED, you'd get a floody beam.