New components in the background

[McGizmo]

Hi guys,
I have some new components I had made that I am using in addition to some new LED's and it seemed like a good idea to share and mention them somewhat independent of specific applications they may end up in.

Some of you have seen the dumb can I am using for the SF L1 mule heads. There is an additional can I designed a while back and finally received some production pieces of. I think I call it the 083-D Can. I think I need to back up a second too.

I have been working with a new MCPCB which I call the 083-D MCPCB because I designed it to have the ability to be host to either the Nichia 083 series LED's or the Dragon LED from Osram. You have seen this MCPCB in the LunaSol 20 as one application.

Below, the dumb can on the left and the 083-D can on the right:

Both cans are nickel plated aluminum and both use a contact PCB I had made. The contact PCB can be soldered into its pocket in the can prior to adding LED and converter if there is a converter.

Below are both cans but with MCPCB dropped into the top:

Note the Cree shown is not going beyond the bench due to the delamination of its dome goo. The 083-D can has for castle pillars which fit in the notches of the 083-D MCPCB. These notches were designed with this in mind as well as screw or rivet mount referencing in other applications.

Below are the 083 and Dragon shown on the cans:

The castle pillars are short of the top surface of the MCPCB and this was to insure that when the LE is screwed into an appropriate head that the MCPCB itself will be clamped between the head and can with surface contact and thermal paths under pressure between can and head.

The 083-D can was designed with hosting of .550" diameter converters in mind and in fact I left adequate room below the converter so that the GDuP would be viable within. As it turns out, this is likely a moot point.

Below, a LE assembly "break out":

and assembled:

These 083-D LE's are viable in the Mule Heads and share the same can height as the XR-Can. I plan to move forward, personally with these cans, because I have them and I think they will provide some modular advantages as well as assembly features I will appreciate.

For nominal retention of the MCPCB while the LE is outside a head, I stake the MCPCB at four points adjacent to the castle pillars. You can see the staking dimples from the center punch. in the completed assembly above.

These components will be showing up in stuff I am working on and I thought that since they are new that it would be best to introduce them on their own and have a reference thread to fall back on. This is basically just a FYI type post.

 

[roguesw]

Hi Don, great idea on having two notches on the bottom of the can to assist screwing into the head via pliers. Excellent. I always thought looking at the E-can design that why wasnt this implemented earlier.

Don, will you be offering these for sale in the future?

Thanks for coming up with innovative ideas Don.
Cheers
Des

 

[yaesumofo]

Very cool Don.Busy making life better for flashlight builders worldwide.
Yaesumofo

 

[starfiretoo]

Nice! I'm guessing there's a MCPCB for the Rebel also?

 

[McGizmo]

Hi guys,

I wanted to resurrect this thread with some comments and information regarding the 3 Speed Light engine I am now using in the SunDrop 3S.

Below is a shot of the 083-D can, Nichia 083 MCPCB and the 3S converter:

As I stated above, I designed the can originally to serve as a host to the GDuP converter but I have never confirmed the compatibility. The 3S converter I am using is a double sided PCB with components mounted on both sides. The can has a recessed shoulder that the board can seat down on. There is room both below and above the converter to allow space for both the lead wires and components. The key to installation and assembly is in providing the input lead wires with extra long stripped ends as you can see in the image. I can feed the input anode and cathoed leads through the contact PCB easily before the converter is seated down into the can. I pull both leads through the back end of the contact PCB to insure that I have taken up the slack in the stripped portion of the leads and have the insulation up agains the vias of the contact PCB.

I then solder the leads to the contact PCB. I can then rotate the converter in addition to pushing it down and it seats down in the can. I then fold the LED lead wires and make sure they can drop into the can as I seat the MCPCB down on the top of the can.

At this point while holding the MCPCB down on the can, I stake the MCPCB at the points adjacent to the cans pillars.

If there is any need or desire to take one of these light engines apart, you would first need to pry the MCPCB up from the can which is quite possible. You would then want to either use a pair of soldering tweezers if you have them to free both the input anode and cathode leads from the contact PCB or bridge the two vias with a piece of wire so that a single iron can melt both lead solder joints at the same time. With the solder melted, you can pull the MCPCB and converter out of the can.

The reason I have brought this up and hopefully illustrated how the assembly is made is because some of you might wish to mod these LE's. As a sometimes modder myself, I know i appreciate a peek into how something is made prior to breaking into it on my own! :green:

There are other .550 converters out there and it is conceivable that they can be used in these LE's. I don't know this for fact and frankly it is beyond my personal interest.

I have had a number of e-mails regarding folks upgrading or modifying their single speed SunDrops and I want to be reasonable in responding to these desires even if I don't offer a solution myself. It is quite likely that at some point I will be offering some complete light engines separately but at the moment, my focus is on using components I finally have on hand in complete lights to be offered up.

There was a time when some of my components were available to you through other sources for the DIY approach. To a great extent, times have changed. I have to be very careful in what I do these days and the projects I take on. I design and order up components for my personal use but am not making provisions beyond that. I have no plans or desires at present to get into the supply of DIY components.

One additional comment I want to make on the 3S converter is in regards to testing it. I have to test these assemblies a number of times as they come together. For some reason, beyond my understanding, the 3S converter is not safe to be powered up by one of my bench supplies. I have not confirmed that there is a problem here but after destroying a couple other proto converters provided by the same designer, I have decided to heed his warning of not using a bench supply for power!! There is something about his controller chip not being able to handle the spikes or noise of the bench supply. A battery is fundimentally different than a AC to DC bench supply and some of you EE's probably know what this is all about.

In order to test these LE's at the various stages of their asembly, I had to come up with a battery powered supply. I cobbled together a single CR123 power supply with a modded McClickie switch that I use in conjunction with a clamp on amp meter. This power supply has two alligator clips for attaching to the long input lead wires seen above and I can test the LE when it is fully assembled prior to trimming these leads off as well as prior to the insertion into the can. Fortunately there has been no DOA's as of yet.

I also wanted a simple means of testing this LE as well as other heads drivin on a single CR123 so I finally made a rig I have been considering now for a couple years. I took an Aleph 2x123 battery pak with McClickie and modified it to host a single CR123 as well as a break out "dummy" cell. The Dummy cell is a delrin cylinder milled out on one side to allow a length of silicone insulated, tinned wire to loop out and away. The wire is silver soldered to a silver anode and cathode button. I milled a side window in the battery tube to allow easy access of this wire loop. The rig really works well with the Extech clamp on meter and I highly suggest other modders to consider such a bench tool! :thumbsup:

In the picture below, a SunDrop 3S head is mounted and I have set the drive level to medium.

I realize that most of you have no real interest in this information but for the few that might, I hope it is of some value.

 

[McGizmo]

Nice! I'm guessing there's a MCPCB for the Rebel also?

Oops! I never responded! Yes, the very first MCPCB I designed and had made was for the Rebel. I still have a slew of Rebels mounted on these MCPCB's. However, the notches in the MCPCB for anti rotation considerations is a detail I added after the Rebel MCPCB. The Rebel MCPCB was designed specifically for the LunaSol 20 which does not need the notch feature. When I had to switch over the the Dragon, I felt I should take a look at as big a picture as possible and try to allow for some modularity and alternatives in any components I designed and ordered up. I realized I could do a MCPCB that could host both the Dragon and the Nichia 083. One of these (083) needed the anti rotation notches and the other could live with the notches even if the primery design didn't require them.

This new LE design has some real advantages over the previous LE designs of mine even at the expense of potential incompatibility with other E series components. The battery contact PCB now is enhanced by the compression forces against it from the battery train. In previous designs, the battery force wants to break the contact (back side of the converter or contact board) from the can by virtue of where this contact plane between board and can are located. In the new design, this is not the case.

 

[octaf]

Thanks Don, for these infos. :twothumbs