Mini Maglite AA bulb falling out

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Newly Enlightened
Joined
Mar 13, 2013
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before you go screaming at me, yes, I am stupid. I saw the "questions" forum subdivision and immediately thought "I will put my question in there." sorry if this becomes a second post, I hope it doesn't and that the moderator/administrator will delete my post from the questions section. now onto my problem...
Also, this is not a modded torch thread, just a little back story.

I recently acquired a Mini Maglite AA, for use with a TerraLUX MiniStar2 E TLE-5EX
to use this, I had to remove the original bulb, which I then placed in a torch that belonged to one of my sisters, but did not have a bulb. (one of the older maglites, must be 5 years+)
My problem is that the bulb keeps falling out of the old Mini Maglite AA, and I was wondering whether anybody knows a way to keep it in place without damaging/destroying the light (e.g. not glue, insulation tape might melt)
I tried with a small piece of tin foil, which worked for about 5 minutes, but then came out when I changed the matteries
 
The easiest way to fix this is to contact MagLite CS and have them send you a new switch. You can, of course, fix the contacts yourself quite easily if you like working with really small parts. The pins from the Terralux drop-in are of a larger diameter wire than the stock bulb and the contacts are now out of tolerance. You have to take apart the switch and bend the contacts back to shape. The entire switch assembly consists of just four parts: two contacts, the switch body and the retaining plate (the one you press the bulb into). To disassemble the switch you carefully pull the retaining plate straight up to remove it. It's just held on with friction. Don't pry on one side only and twisting wont do any good. Once the retaining plate is out the switch body falls out the other end of the body. The upper contact, the one that makes contact with the body, falls out easily so watch for it. Once the switch body is out carefully pull out the contacts and you'll see that there's a pinched section in the middle section, this is the area that needs to be pinched back into shape. Once both contacts have been reformed and verified to grab the bulb pins, reassemble. I usually install two batteries and the tail cap after sliding the switch body into the body (resist tilting the body down, allowing the switch to slide in using gravity as the grounding contact will probably fall out and onto your floor, never to be seen again. The retaining plate just snaps in and you're done.
 

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