Oddest mod of all........lots of pics

[Spareair]

Well to start I would like to thank a few people for their help in getting this mod done......I have probably annoyed a few people with questions over and over.....but I must say thank to those people.
modamag, milkyspit, Mr_light, HVAC

There are a few suppliers of products that I would like to thank.....and I thank them also.

But now for the mod....

I am an avid diver and could not find a divelight that was cost effective and had enough bang for the buck...so I ran into HVAC....and he put me on to this forum...and from there we got this...

Finished product.....

I have built 2 styles....one unit has 5 x Cree5 and the other has 6 x Cree5..
so I went about to solder them together and found that putting nails in a piece of wood allowed me to solder the crees together in the proper format

With that done I had to build the bezel assembly. Now this is under water...so special attention is made to sealing the unit.
The rubber ring gasket is used as well as new glass and a home made high density gasket is all assembled using plenty of silicone.

not to ensure that it is all pressed tightly and the silicone dries fixed and solid I use an MR16 bulb...which is a perfect fit..and press it all together.....once cry a super sharp razor blade cleans off the excess silicone...one completed bezel.

During the dry fit of the LED....reflectors and heatsink I found that the heatsink was to thick to allow my extra glass and gasket to sit properly, and that the uneven height of the reflectors pressed into the bezel......so I ground down the heatsink

Once the dry fit ensured that it all fit and that there was expansion room and such without having to worry about the glass I epoxied the LED onto the heatsink with the thermo epoxy....remeber I was building a 5 and 6 LED lights...can you guess which one I did first.....a liitle messy the firat time.

Now I was told to insulate the Cree from the reflector so they would not short out....so with a paper hole punch I cut and trimmed rings out of baking parchment....yes a special wax paper used in baking....good to 500f before it deteriorates......so with those in place it was time to epoxy the bezels to the crees.

Now for the power........7 x Li-Ion batteries (Li-Ion 18650 3.7V 2600mAh 2600PCB-18650) was the choice for compact and duration of burn time.....but I found that building packs and charging packs was very tricky so I built my own packs that I can take the batteries out of and charge separately in WF-139 chargers.

The case is a stanard "otter box" that is water proof to about 160'.....after that they go pop...I know...hehehe....I like to try and test things before I go all the way with them.
now the holes for switching and power were drilled into the case, and as each switch was installed and partially wired it was surrounded with a PVC ring and filled with epoxy to make it water tight

The switches are standard mini toggle switches that have a rubber boot that was siliconed in place to give it protection.

The final assembly called for the NFlex step down chip, this was wired with an off/off toggle as well as the external optional switch for the NFlex. With it all together it looks like this....

So what does it look like powered up....WOW......now this is a light that is for under water.......

both beam shots are at night....standing 30' away from the fence. one shot is low power the other is high power as set in the basic UIB setting for the nflex.....ma do I like what I see so far.....

I expect burn time to be in the 2 hour range.....


Thanks for all the help...
looking forward to input...
possible advice.....
and comments.

I AM NO LONGER A NOOB!!!!!.......YIPEEEEEE!!!!!:twothumbs

 

[Gunner12]

:goodjob:

Looks to be a great mod,

How well does it work under water?

Have you though about using optics that might provide a narrower beam?

 

[Spareair]

I have not tried it yet underwater...that comes over Christmas and New Years Eve....when I will be diving in Truk Lagoon....Micronesia.
I am not worried about a beam as much as I like the wide spread right now...time will tell what works....

do you know of optics that fit Mags?

 

[ICUDoc]

Terrific looking mod- I hope it works great for you.
Are the switches tested as waterproof? It looks like their threads may be vulnerable...
Again, GOOD job. Nothin' "newbie" about it!

 

[Bushman5]

oh heck ya!!!! my kinda modding!

to test it for water leakage why not take it to a local diver trianing pool and submerge it with a brick on top for an hour or so?

 

[download]

Great Mod! Add a few rubber band to hold li-ion in position. :goodjob:

 

[DM51]

Wow - my hat is off to you - a very imaginitive mod, and an excellent step-by-step post showing how you did it.

I hope it lasts well underwater. Those Otterboxes are quite sturdy, but the O-ring seals are not very good on them and you will have to check that big O-ring round the rim very carefully and and renew the silicone grease on it before each dive.

The other possible weak points are where the switches go through the box. That plastic is quite brittle, and the holes you drilled may have weakened the structure a bit. Even a tiny crack could cause a failure, and a flood.

Let us know how it performs (pics too!) and always dive with a backup dive-light just in case...

 

[1 what]

Nice

 

[weed099]

Is that thing a left over prop from the old Ghostbusters movie???? :tinfoil:

 

[greenlight]

Nice pics and photo essay.

 

[data_lore]

Great pics and explanation!

One thing I found, though, with those toggle switch covers, is that they degrade quite badly with time - and they are a little flimsy. I found them quite easy to shear during normal use, which would lead to water ingress. The application I was using them for was for an outdoor switch box.

Of course, they are probably from different manufacturers, but perhaps it's one thing to look out for?

HTH,
Rich.

 

[yellow]

Have you though about using optics that might provide a narrower beam?

K, I dont like optics (because they suck), but:
what kind of optics that provide a narrower beam do You think of?
I only know one, the Mobdar. Thats a 4 dregee optic for Luxeons (= would not work for anything and especially not for the Cree) and its large (= ONE fits into a Mag-head)
... so ? :thinking:
Any other optic I am aware of is 8 degree or more, while most any reflector is 6-8 degree
does not seem like there is a choice
(its the best version now, but ...)

That mod is nice and its a very good thing the sink did not fit into. imho its built bad.
Now, without that useless "lip", it sits on the recession inside the head and thus has a WAY larger area to give the heat to the head
(should have been built like this from the beginning)

 

[DM51]

Have you though about using optics that might provide a narrower beam?

Judging by Spareair's beamshots, this looks to me like a very workable and useful beam configuration for a dive light.

You should bear in mind that the refraction that will occur at the air/water interface will reduce the beam angle by ~1/3, so you probably don't want to start off with too narrow a beam. An 8° beam will become ~5.5° underwater.

 

[Gunner12]

Judging by Spareair's beamshots, this looks to me like a very workable and useful beam configuration for a dive light.

You should bear in mind that the refraction that will occur at the air/water interface will reduce the beam angle by ~1/3, so you probably don't want to start off with too narrow a beam. An 8° beam will become ~5.5° underwater.

Thanks, I think that info would come in handy someday.

 

[Spareair]

I will have shots of the light from underwater when I return...and I willpost them so people can see what happens to a beam.......

 

[mds82]

In the 6 Cree mod, what reflectors were those?

 

[Spareair]

In the 6 Cree mod, what reflectors were those?

I believe they were 16mil reflectors
All reflectors......Crees.....and heatsinks were purchased form a memebr here....

I will have to look that up when I get home......

 

[macforsale]

...

 

[Amonra]

That is a great build but unfortunately IMHO im afraid it will leak for the following reasons:

The glass is a bit thin for that diameter and may not hold up under pressure especially if you knock it against something which WILL happen eventually.

Silicone is not a good sealant for high pressures and salt water as it will seperate very quickly especially from the gasket causing a leak.

It is not clear in the pictures but i hope that the gasket is placed under the glass and not on top of it.

I'm not sure that the single o-rings in the bezel, head & tail will hold up against diving pressures as they are quite thin.

How did you seal the stock mag switch hole ?

Did you use proper diving bladders to seal the wire ?

Maglights are not meant for diving and need to be HEAVILY modified to make them dive worthy which is not worthwhile.

The Otter case is made out of plastic and will flex under pressure, the epoxy used to seal switches & cable is not flexible when dry, so when the case flexes the epoxy will not. This will result in the epoxy seperating from the body causing a leak.

The rubber boots used to cover switches will be squeezed tightly against the lever stretching the material which may cause it to fail after a while. Silicone will not stick to rubber so the extra seal does not do much.

The set up may be good for up to a few feet depth ( maybe 10ft ) but i would not go further down. you must keep in mind that the water will be applying pressures of up to 72psi or 5 Bar @ around 160ft which will put a lot of stress on all your holes, seams, etc and you have quite a few of those ( i can count at least 12 ). The best seals you can get are with the use of carefully positioned multiple o-rings and sometines even those fail !!

I'm sorry for criticizing and maybe sounding a bit harsh but i am also a diver and i have tried to build similar lights many times but they never lasted more than 30 minutes under only 30ft deep water leaving me in the dark (dangerous) and ruining my dive.

If i where you I would not test it on your holiday. I would test it in a pool or lake (or the sea) first and test it at deeper depths than you plan on doing on your holiday to make sure that it can handle it. I would also recommend that you remove the batts, nflexes and led's for the tests just in case.

 

[hank]

I recall people have filled enclosures with nonconductive oil to use underwater.