Malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

LEDBE
exodus125

exodus125

Enlightened
Joined
Oct 29, 2008
Messages
333
Location
Miami, FL
Man am I bummed.

I had a malkoff 4-6D drop in I had in a 6d mag. It was working fine. I was using the D adpaters that come with the eneloops and using 6 eneloops with no problem.

I got a mdocod adapter yesterday and popped 6 eneloops in it. voltage was tested and it was at 8.14v.

I turned on the light and it worked GREAT.

Today I take it outside to see how it looks and it was working fine, then all of a sudden the light started to flicker real bad like a strobe. I turned the light on an off several times to see if it would stop, but it didnt. Then, the bulb turned a blue tinge and then I turned it off. I took the head of the maglite off and the red terminal on the LED looked fryed and it had black residue from waht seemed like burned plastic from the wire. what could have caused this? I rechecked the voltage and it was at 8v again. :confused:
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

Any chance it short circuited on the reflector?? It's either a short circuit or the driver went :poof: I'm thinking short circuit myself, I imagine a bad driver wouldn't burn the wire like that.

Edit: I know this is sort of obvious, but you didn't put the battery adapter in backwards did you? I don't know if gene uses reverse polarity protection, but if he doesn't it would probably fry the module in a hurry.
 
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Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

exodus125 said:
the red terminal on the LED looked fryed and it had black residue from waht seemed like burned plastic from the wire. what could have caused this?
Click to expand...
Is the solder intact, or is the wire just sitting there against the terminal? It does sound like a short. Maybe a bit of a leap(and several thousand times the total wattage), but I see this kind of thing with fuses that have replaceable filaments that aren't properly placed or tightened down. Intermittent operation followed by :poof: something's burning:candle:
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

I'm pulling this from some limited incan/hotwire knowledge....so i may or may not be pulling this out of my butt....

Some hotwire bulbs will work just fine with a crappy battery adapter and an unmodded mag.

Put those same batteries in a good holder, do all the low resistance mods, and that bulb will instaflash every time.

You may have lowered the resistance to right above the threshold and fried the led. The mention of it turning blue is usually the sign. Color shift=fried led.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

color shift = blue light is overpowering the white light converting phosphor.

yeah.. it sounds like its running either too high, or not getting proper heatsinking?
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

You have to rule out everything you did after receiving the new 6AA adapter. Previously you were using the drop in in a 6D Mag. Then you got the new battery adapter and must have moved the drop in to a 2D Mag. You installed the batteries in the adapter and placed it in the 2D. Maybe not in that exact order, but you were running the drop in differently than previously with the 6D. Something must have happened when you made the conversion, and I would guess that it had nothing to do with the drop in, as it was working fine in the 6D. The low resistance of the 6AA holder has nothing to do with the problem compared to running 6D's if you were using NiMh D cells. The drop in is made to handle 9 volts easily, and people use 6D NiMh's with that drop in all of the time.

Bill
 
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Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

no aluminum reflector, plastic.

I contacted Gene and he thinks its a short.

The drop in didnt work PERFECT all the time though.

One time I was using the d adapters that come with the eneloops int he 6D mag and it started to flicker too, it didnt flicker as hard and it would only do it right at the beginning, then it would stop.

I had asked Gene about that before and he seemed to think it might be a poor connection or resistance in the battery adapters.

the batteries arent installed wrong and the adapter isnt backwards. It was working fine 2 days ago.

By the way, when I contacted Gene last night he emailed me and said he would send a replacement. What a nice guy. Id still like to know what went wrong though, id hate to run the drop in again and have it fry.

I made sure the voltage wasnt any higher that the 9v. I dunno what else I could have done. Best bet would be to send it in to Gene so he can see what may have gone wrong.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

By the way , just so its clear, I am in no way blaming Gene or Eric for anything. I am merely trying to brainstorm with all of you what could have caused the problem.

I had a hard time going to sleep last night after that happened, what a bummer.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

ill take a picture of it tonight, but this is what it looked like, right where the red wire comes out of the heatsink, theres a brown blackish stain that looks to be residue from the burnt wire. It also smelled burnt and the head of the light became warm.

dropin.jpg
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

That's interesting,

If it fails again with the new module, I'll certainly be looking into any possible way my battery adapter may have caused this problem. If another module is needed and it is somehow determined that the adapter is at fault, a replacement module and adapter will be on my dime.

-Eric
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

I will take a few pics for you guys tonight.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

By the way, I put a regular 6D bulb last night after that happened and it worked fine. I know an incan bulb doesn't have circuitry though.

I wonder if it could be the maglite itself causing the problem? Ive had the drop-in in a 2d 4d and 6d mag before with no problems.

Maybe I will take the maglite switch assy apart tonight and see if anything is toast in there?
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

If the batteries are installed with the correct polarity, and there wasn't a short on the reflector, then it was probably a defective component on the driver module. Not anyone's fault but the component manufacturer, if this were a common problem we'd be hearing alot more about it here. When you get the new module just make sure the reflector is tight in the head and make sure there aren't any possible shorts between the LED tower and the reflector. If the reflector is a bit loose it may have been able to jiggle around and cause a short.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

the reflector is plastic though, that couldn't cause a short could it?
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

The aluminized/silvered surface is highly conductive, it's just a matter of if it makes contact between pos/neg somewhere on the LED tower.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

never really thought about that. Although after the thing started to flicker and then turn blue, I took the head off and it would still do it without the head on I could smell the burning too. Unless maybe it melted some of the paint with the heat and the paint fell on the housing causing the short. I will take a look at the reflector when I get home too.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

update:

I din't get a chance to take some pics (really busy nowadays) but i did inspect the reflector, i find it impossible for that to have caused the short. there is at least a 1 to 1.5mm gap between the drop in tower where the bulb is placed and the rim of the reflector. No way that is what caused it.
 
Re: sad news: malkoff 4-6D drop in with mdocod adapter

Any updates on getting your flashlight back up and working?

:)

-Eric
 
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