got my mag85... is there more?

I came to the light...

Flashlight Enthusiast
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Nov 4, 2007
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I've been a LED person, up until just a few days ago, when the parts for my Mag85 arrived. And boy is it bright :) My current furthest LED thrower (Tiablo MA6) is still slightly brighter in the middle, but, just as a guess, the hotspot is 1/10 the size. And the spill is far dimmer too.

But I'm wondering, is there more? I have a 3D and a 5D maglight that I could mod. Is there a fairly inexpensive mod that would be far brighter than the mag85, like 2000 lumens or more? Preferably the 5D would be modded.

Also, wondering if a mod could fit this purpose. My sister recently asked if there is a flashlight she could use to light up the ring when she is riding. I told her no, because the lumens are a bit low, but mostly because of runtime. But now I'm wondering, is there a maglite mod that will get me ~2000 lumens for a full hour? Remember, I can use a 5D if necessary. Also, I would prefer a normal beam pattern, and then to use a diffuser, because a constantly diffused flashlight that bright would just be a waste :)

Thanks.
 
My GOD. There is more! Have a look in this sub-group. Search for the numbers... 5761, 64275, 62138, 64623, 64625, 64458. Bon apetit!
 
lol, sorry. Looking back, I realize I never really elaborated on the question "is there more". Yes, I know there's a lot more. But the question is directed at myself. What I'm looking for now is most lumens for the money, or around 2000 lumens for an hour cheapest, in a 3D or 6D maglite. I'm wondering if one of you can recommend a configuration.

Also, mostly out of curiosity, I'm wondering how I can get the most lumens out of either light, regardless of price but avoiding unnecessary expenses.

Thanks for the links. Looked around the b/s/t, but honestly I can't make sense of everything yet. And I can't find a way to buy anything on LuxLuthor's list.
 
64430 in the Chinese bulb, not Osram, can go @ 2246 iirc, above 2k T-lumens anyway. I have build them with AW mode driver, best bet as you get a lot of light at 50%, 3 A123 cells in a 4C mag with a jack. You should be able to search up my project and get some ideas off it. Otherwise I love the 5761 on two KD D cells after rebuilding the PCB, theirs do not work, or on A123 or E-moli cells. You get over 850 torch lumens and reasonable run times in small lights. In a 6D with NimH D cells at 12Ah you looking at 2 hours or more run time.
 
Thanks for the information :)

The Mag85 is around 1200 bulb lumens, or 1000 torch lumens, right?

Around how much did your project cost?
 
Mag85 is around 800 torch lumens depending on resistance, battery voltage. Generally, bulb lumens multiplied my .65 will give you torch lumens .......1200X.65=780
 
The common medium sized mod lights are ROP
M85
5761
and increase in light output in that order. The ROP and 5761 have larger hot spots to the spill beam than the M85. The m85 is very white and often gives the impression of more light than the 5761 because of the center intensity. When equivalent reflectors are used side by side it is apparant the 5761 out throws and lights up wider areas than the other two.
The other aspect to this is the ROP and 5761 use 7.2 volts with the mag 85 is 10.8. So you can build 5761 in 2C lights and in larger lights obviously increase the burn time because you can stuff in more Ah.
5761 is a common projector bulb that when run at its OEM 6 volts is very bright as is and is available commonly. the Welsh Allen bulbs are specialty medical lamps and are only available from one dealer.
There is no such thing as the best mod or perfect light. The best light is the one that fits your personal needs and wants.
Search CPF using key word 5761, A123, emoli and m85, mag85 and m-85.
Here is the thread that is about the first 5761 that started me designing and building them and probably launched the craze that unseated the mag 85
Phillips 5761 WW Shots - First Attempt
most post about it come after this one.
When I started building them the lithium ion C and D batteries, A123 and emoli were not available, these opened up the world of C-cell lights for 7.2 volt mods. Only one type of 18650 made then could stand the 5 amps of the 5761. I started with those. I have used NiMh cells but my best have been powered by e-moli, 3.7 volts, A123, 3.3 volts and D lithium ion 3.6 volts, all with some different soft starts or modifications like an AW mode driver. Only the A123 (not 123A cells, those are different) can be direct drive. The 5761 gets touchy about insta-flashing around 7.1 Volts at the bulb.
 
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But now I'm wondering, is there a maglite mod that will get me ~2000 lumens for a full hour? quote]

I recently came up with a secret mod "haven't made yet need $250+ that would produce 9,500+ lumens for 2 hours. though it's not what your looking for. But what I'm saying is that you can definitely do almost anything in this hobby of ours if you put your mind to it.
 
But would it fit in a 3D Mag shell?
Do the math,
64430 is likely the lowest power bulb reaching 2k T-lumens, hence the best choice to get enought power to it in a small host.
http://www.topbulb.com/search/results.asp?REF=5009
$13 is steep but worth it.
In the HOTRATER, (try to get a copy, I got an updated version before AWR disappeared from even writing some members) and by my own measurements runs at 7.43 Ah, 7430 mAh.
D lithiums are out there, more available than from KD. KD says they are 5000mAh some folks say 3000mAh and his protction circut is useless but on a BatterySpace PCB they would be ok, I would then get the unprotected ones. The bulb works good on 3X A123 at 9.9 V battery, 2300 mAh. Emoli, or the 26700 from V28 packs is 3.7 volts and 3Ah, you need a driver at that voltage.

If you use a driver, NTC or drop the voltage some how, then we do not have a direct correlation of Amps, battery to bulb so lets use watts to get the run times.

64430 is 73.3 watts at 9.9 volts, the A123 is 22.7 watts hours, runtime = 0.30 hours or @ 18 minutes (I got 17 on mine)
64430 is 72.5 watts on a DRIVER, 3 emoli, 11.1 volts, 33.3 watt hours, runtime = 0.45 hours, or @ 27 minutes
64430 is 72.5 watts on a DRIVER, 3D lithium, 10.8 at 5 Ah is 54 watt hours, 0.74 or @ 45 minutes run time.

The problem is you need in the neighbor hood of 146-150 watt hours of battery and a driver to run the 64430 bulb at 2000 lumens for two hours. As you raise the Vbattery above bulb flash point you need a driver. It gets worse when you go to 100 watt bulbs, naturally.

Also you must have batteries that can take that kind of amperage. In 3D space limitations i doubt you will find it. The only 18650s that will take that are the safe chemistries from tool packs like V18 Milwaukees, even with side by side emoli I believe the Ah rating is too low to get where you need to be.

There is promise in "A" diameter NiMh cells. Whether 2/3 or 4/5 or full A with a bored light you can get them in 3x and those take high amps. You can do the math now. Good charts with the cells to look at at www.cheapbatterypacks.com .

Well, now you see what you have to do to fit a host to power supply. Sometimes I spend days mulling over charts of capacity, battery capacity and host sizes before I decide how I am building a hot wire. It can look like a giant tic tac toe game before I am done. Worse than shoe shopping with my wife (sorry, Greta).
 
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The common medium sized mod lights are ROP
M85
5761
and increase in light output in that order. The ROP and 5761 have larger hot spots to the spill beam than the M85. The m85 is very white and often gives the impression of more light than the 5761 because of the center intensity. When equivalent reflectors are used side by side it is apparant the 5761 out throws and lights up wider areas than the other two.
The other aspect to this is the ROP and 5761 use 7.2 volts with the mag 85 is 10.8. So you can build 5761 in 2C lights and in larger lights obviously increase the burn time because you can stuff in more Ah.
5761 is a common projector bulb that when run at its OEM 6 volts is very bright as is and is available commonly. the Welsh Allen bulbs are specialty medical lamps and are only available from one dealer.
There is no such thing as the best mod or perfect light. The best light is the one that fits your personal needs and wants.
Search CPF using key word 5761, A123, emoli and m85, mag85 and m-85.
Here is the thread that is about the first 5761 that started me designing and building them and probably launched the craze that unseated the mag 85
Phillips 5761 WW Shots - First Attempt
most post about it come after this one.
When I started building them the lithium ion C and D batteries, A123 and emoli were not available, these opened up the world of C-cell lights for 7.2 volt mods. Only one type of 18650 made then could stand the 5 amps of the 5761. I started with those. I have used NiMh cells but my best have been powered by e-moli, 3.7 volts, A123, 3.3 volts and D lithium ion 3.6 volts, all with some different soft starts or modifications like an AW mode driver. Only the A123 (not 123A cells, those are different) can be direct drive. The 5761 gets touchy about insta-flashing around 7.1 Volts at the bulb.

Thanks for the information :)

It seems like I should start with the voltage, then battery pack. If I understand correctly, it is not currently possible to take full advantage of 10.8v of battery power, and in fact the 10.8v mag85 is outperformed by the 7.2v 5761? And because of the lower voltage I will also get more runtime (assuming I fill up the same space with batteries) out of the 5761? Also, if the mag85 is 1200 bulb lumens, how many is the 5761 at 7.2v? (that's what I would run it at under load, right?)

Most of the comments I read about battery packs basically say that the huge discharge limits are not necessary for our hotwires. So I could basically choose whether I want NiMh, A123, Emoli, or regular li-ion? Which of those will give me the longest runtime?

Thanks again.
 
But now I'm wondering, is there a maglite mod that will get me ~2000 lumens for a full hour?

I recently came up with a secret mod "haven't made yet need $250+ that would produce 9,500+ lumens for 2 hours. though it's not what your looking for. But what I'm saying is that you can definitely do almost anything in this hobby of ours if you put your mind to it.

Wow, that sounds so good, I have to ask anyway. How did you do this? I had thought 8000 lumens was considered high even here, and you generally wouldn't get anywhere near 2hrs runtime with that many lumens.
 
Yes, you understand what I was saying. The relationship to the amount of light put out by a filament and voltage is an arbitrary assignment by the manufacturer. It has to do with the physical properties of the filament wire.
Too bad there are not any copies of the hotrater calculating spread sheet around. It was developed by a member who fell from grace but it worked good. You plugged in the manufacturers bulb specs and what voltages you wanted to play with and it calculated everything, amps, watts, lumens, torch lumens, color, burn life etc.
 
if the mag85 is 1200 bulb lumens, how many is this? thanks :)
Ever hear there is nothing new under the sun? :eek: CPF has all of this in it and the search function works, but if you must. '623 can be found in this thread whereas Lux has done us all a great favor.
Destructive Incan Bulb Tests - Updated 6/22/08 (Info Added)
you can see what bulb lumens are predicted under what voltages, just remember torch-lumens is what you get out the front, anything else is hype. Torch lumens are 65% of bulb lumens. At this moment I am at a computer with filters that will not allow me access the picture:mecry:s that give the bulb data, so you need to click on the link and page down to the bulb of your choice:twothumbs
Lux's work and copies of the hotrater...btw, did you check your PM's as you have a PM that will get you a copy of the hotrater...will get you all the information you need to begin designing hotwires.
There seems to be two types of lights out there those that get a WOW and those that do practical functions. Burn time I guess is the deciding factor. For me 15 minutes or more with the ability to quickly recharge can be useful although the longer run times the better.
Next build for me is a tri-P7 LED, in theory it will give 1 hour at C bin,at I bin Vf or produce 2700 lumens, :popcorn: but only if my two stage heat sync works otherwise, runtime is likely 10 minutes on high as the sync could get hot enough to shut it down.
BTW LED lumens do not fit the hotwire formulas,

I mentioned that as it is exciting that as you move towards hotwires I like Missionaryman are moving towards LED.

Lots a room in this hobby, I keep peaking at the spotlight threads, can't wait to build my Vector HID for 8000 torch-lumens!!;)
 
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OK, so Lux's chart that NL referenced for the 64623 shows Predicted lumens @15.5V at 6858 bulb lumens and Predicted Lumens From Measured Lux @15.5V as 5554 bulb lumens.

It's a lot of lumens. Very nice and white light too, which, if I understand correctly, is the result of a very favorable filament temperature at this overdrive level.
 
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