HarveyRich
Enlightened
- Joined
- Oct 5, 2006
- Messages
- 434
Just received two "Elite," or Cree 3W "Ellys" from Kaidomain and thought the old lengthy thread could use a new one for people who actually have one of these. I'm expecting a couple of what appear to be the same or very similar light from DX and will compare when they come in.
First, the quality control is still an issue as it was with the Elly. Both of the arrivals had slight flickers. I soldered the negative terminal to the tube, but the flicker continued on one of them. Eventually I soldered a piece of wire to the negative terminal and then screwed it to the tube edge with one of the star screws. I also applied a little solder to secure it. The flicker then ceased.
One of them had a perfectly centered led, the other one was clearly off center. The centered one had a very nice narrowly focused beam which was clearly much brighter than the original Elly (light outputs below). The off centered one was taken apart and a wire place in it (as done with pictures in the original Elly thread) through the hold at the bottom of the bezel, below the star, and the other end to the positive terminal. This bypassed the boost circuit, thus making the flashlight direct drive. There is some focusing ability by twisting the head a little. You would need to tighten the reflector and head down with some teflon tape or the like, though. The hot spot doesn't spread hugely, however. The reflector is smooth, not OP–some thought Kai had an OP type.
I used this with a 14500 li-ion battery–exceptional results. Because the led was off center, the hot spot resembled a slightly lopsided sun with solar flares rather than a perfectly rounded hotspot with an abrupt dropoff to the spill. Since the hotspot was larger than on an earlier direct drive Creed Elly (mod done by me) and the spill was very large, I decided to leave it alone rather than attempt to file down the star to recenter (it was the placement of the led that was off center, not the reflector). My approximate light outputs (hand held for optimum numbers), in lux at one meter:
1. Creed Elly with NiMH battery 1475 lux
2. Direct Drive Elly (led off center), with 14500 battery; very tiny hotspot at center. Nice spill, though 3600 lux
3. Direct Drive Elly with 14500 battery (Creed from Elly earlier–led centered nicely) 4700 to 4800 lux; tightly focused beam, typical cree rings visible, but some spill (enough, though)
Conclusions:
1. Nice light with the Cree only, but some problems (e.g. flicker) may need to be dealt with. I'd agree with the tests that showed the Creed light to be 2 1/2 to 3 times as bright as the original Elly.
2. Off center led caused some dispersion of the beam and consequently more spill and less throw; still decent throw.
3. Changed to direct drive, using a 14500 battery, the light is a "monster." If the led is centered is has fantastic throw with some decent spill. If used with the off centered led, the throw is still very nice and considerably better than with the boost circuit active using aNiMH battery.
4. I'm driving the led directly from the li-ion battery and have found that the current at the led appears to be about 1.3 amps on a fairly fresh battery. Thus, I may be overdriving the led. However, so far, even with a run test on 14500 to about an hour, the led seems fine. It heats up somewhat, but is warm, not hot. This may diminish the light eventually, but it's just great in this mode right now.
5. I'm doing a run-time test of the NiMH version of the regular Creed version with a LaCrosse 2400 mah battery. So far, at 1 hr 50 mins it is still going strong. The hotspot is smaller, but the lux at 1 meter is still around 1250, which is pretty substantial.
Final conclusion: Great little light and even better on direct drive–assuming you get a decent and functional one.
First, the quality control is still an issue as it was with the Elly. Both of the arrivals had slight flickers. I soldered the negative terminal to the tube, but the flicker continued on one of them. Eventually I soldered a piece of wire to the negative terminal and then screwed it to the tube edge with one of the star screws. I also applied a little solder to secure it. The flicker then ceased.
One of them had a perfectly centered led, the other one was clearly off center. The centered one had a very nice narrowly focused beam which was clearly much brighter than the original Elly (light outputs below). The off centered one was taken apart and a wire place in it (as done with pictures in the original Elly thread) through the hold at the bottom of the bezel, below the star, and the other end to the positive terminal. This bypassed the boost circuit, thus making the flashlight direct drive. There is some focusing ability by twisting the head a little. You would need to tighten the reflector and head down with some teflon tape or the like, though. The hot spot doesn't spread hugely, however. The reflector is smooth, not OP–some thought Kai had an OP type.
I used this with a 14500 li-ion battery–exceptional results. Because the led was off center, the hot spot resembled a slightly lopsided sun with solar flares rather than a perfectly rounded hotspot with an abrupt dropoff to the spill. Since the hotspot was larger than on an earlier direct drive Creed Elly (mod done by me) and the spill was very large, I decided to leave it alone rather than attempt to file down the star to recenter (it was the placement of the led that was off center, not the reflector). My approximate light outputs (hand held for optimum numbers), in lux at one meter:
1. Creed Elly with NiMH battery 1475 lux
2. Direct Drive Elly (led off center), with 14500 battery; very tiny hotspot at center. Nice spill, though 3600 lux
3. Direct Drive Elly with 14500 battery (Creed from Elly earlier–led centered nicely) 4700 to 4800 lux; tightly focused beam, typical cree rings visible, but some spill (enough, though)
Conclusions:
1. Nice light with the Cree only, but some problems (e.g. flicker) may need to be dealt with. I'd agree with the tests that showed the Creed light to be 2 1/2 to 3 times as bright as the original Elly.
2. Off center led caused some dispersion of the beam and consequently more spill and less throw; still decent throw.
3. Changed to direct drive, using a 14500 battery, the light is a "monster." If the led is centered is has fantastic throw with some decent spill. If used with the off centered led, the throw is still very nice and considerably better than with the boost circuit active using aNiMH battery.
4. I'm driving the led directly from the li-ion battery and have found that the current at the led appears to be about 1.3 amps on a fairly fresh battery. Thus, I may be overdriving the led. However, so far, even with a run test on 14500 to about an hour, the led seems fine. It heats up somewhat, but is warm, not hot. This may diminish the light eventually, but it's just great in this mode right now.
5. I'm doing a run-time test of the NiMH version of the regular Creed version with a LaCrosse 2400 mah battery. So far, at 1 hr 50 mins it is still going strong. The hotspot is smaller, but the lux at 1 meter is still around 1250, which is pretty substantial.
Final conclusion: Great little light and even better on direct drive–assuming you get a decent and functional one.
