Gatlight V3 Ti LED upgrade, polish and splash ano!

[wvaltakis2]

The problem with unemployment is now I really do have too much time on my hands. So, I got a wild hair yesterday and took apart my Gatlight. All in all, it's a relatively straightforward process. The only real item of note was the complete (and surprising) lack of thermal compound. The "heatsink" is the thickest MCPCB I've ever seen, but there was nothing at the body/heatsink interface, and the LED was glued in place with some sort of clear adhesive. So, the first thing was to replace the LED with a U2SWOH from Fred with some Arctic ceramic for good measure. This is a easy upgrade once the light is apart. Once the LE was good to go it was just only a matter of a few hours at the buffing wheel and a bit o' ano work then reassembly (with silver thermal compound at the body/heatsink joint). I have noticed that the body does get warm a lot faster now, makes me feel a bit better about using RCR's on high.

I think the high polish really brings out the beauty of this light, and the bare Ti/gold on blue really came together nicely. Questions and comments are welcome:thumbsup:

~Chip

 

[cmacclel]

Sweet!!!

You are pushing me to spin up some TI!

Mac

 

[Patriot]

That's amazing! The ano art adds a lot of character.



I owned one that CPFer Lux Lunatic polished one up a while a while back but yours takes it to another level. Awesome work.



Here is the one I mentioned:

They do look better polished out or dressed up don't they.

 

[wvaltakis2]

Sweet!!!

You are pushing me to spin up some TI!

Mac

You know I'm only doing this so I can get one of your tailcaps

Thanks for the praise guys, really helps keep me chuggin' along.

Just in case someone is interested, times being what they are (and 2 Spy 007's being up for sale), this light is available and might go up on the BST but feel free to PM me for details.

~Chip

 

[Bimmerboy]

The only real item of note was the complete (and surprising) lack of thermal compound. The "heatsink" is the thickest MCPCB I've ever seen, but there was nothing at the body/heatsink interface, and the LED was glued in place with some sort of clear adhesive.

Well that can't be very good! In all this time, this may be the first I've seen a Gatlight disassembled (quite possible I've missed others, or forgetting), and am wondering if they're all without any compound. Sounds like adding some made a noticeable difference.

Now, this may be nitpicking to some extent, and the polishing does look very nice, but since this light was designed to use the rods as the primary mechanism for heat dissipation to it's environment, it pays to be aware that thermal emissivity into free air can be (or is) dramatically reduced with polished surfaces as compared to matte, or coated surfaces. In other words, unless there's a fan blowing across the light, it's a good idea to keep it in your hand during use. However, this is likely only an issue at it's higher drive levels.

BTW, nice ano'ing! :thumbsup: