Xcandescent
Newly Enlightened
- Joined
- May 23, 2002
- Messages
- 60
So after reading through yet another thread singing the praises of the good old ARC AAA, I decided to remind myself how lucky I am to own one with an ArcFinity adapter by taking it out and turning it on.
Before I go on, I should mention to the audience that my particular ArcFinity is somewhat jerry-rigged. I bought it brand-new, still in the plastic wrap off another CPF'er who was selling extras a while ago. Upon receipt, I quickly discovered that the ARC AAA head would NOT screw in properly at all, let alone all the way down flush. (I don't know if this is because the threads were different or what -- they really shouldn't be.) So I ended up having to throw in a couple of washers, and a piece of wire wrapped over and over itself to bridge the air gap between the AAA head and the battery caused by the foam spacer. I know at least one other person has filled that gap with solder, but since there was the possibility I'd still want to use it with the old AAA body, I didn't do that.
This arrangement (with a bit of shaking) seemed to work pretty well ... until today.
When I tried turning on the ArcFinity, I met a great deal of resistance. So I started to unscrew it -- which resulted in a loud BANG! That was maybe half-hour to an hour ago, and my ears STILL haven't stopped hurting.
Freaked out, I quickly disassembled the whole light. I examined the battery, but only noticed a slight peeling on the top of the wrapper -- no paste leakage or any other sign of battery explosion. I took a quick voltage reading, and got something like .45 V -- NOT good. Wondering if the ARC AAA head was damaged, but not wanting to risk using the jerry-rigged ArcFinity, I got out the old AAA body and battery for a quick test -- it was just fine. (Which, considering some of the things people have done to ARC AAA's in this group, really shouldn't have surprised me.)
So I ask you: what the heck happened???
My best guess right now is that, despite unscrewing it quite a bit to keep it off, the coiled wire I used to bridge the head must've shorted the battery to the casing, causing it to discharge without putting out any light. Severe discharge, of course, causes the generation of gas, which in turn causes a loud pop when ignited ... if you're damned lucky like I am.
I guess more to the point -- how do I get my ArcFinity adapter "adjusted" so that the damn AAA head fits properly, and I can avoid this ear-splitting situation in the future?
-XCN-
Before I go on, I should mention to the audience that my particular ArcFinity is somewhat jerry-rigged. I bought it brand-new, still in the plastic wrap off another CPF'er who was selling extras a while ago. Upon receipt, I quickly discovered that the ARC AAA head would NOT screw in properly at all, let alone all the way down flush. (I don't know if this is because the threads were different or what -- they really shouldn't be.) So I ended up having to throw in a couple of washers, and a piece of wire wrapped over and over itself to bridge the air gap between the AAA head and the battery caused by the foam spacer. I know at least one other person has filled that gap with solder, but since there was the possibility I'd still want to use it with the old AAA body, I didn't do that.
This arrangement (with a bit of shaking) seemed to work pretty well ... until today.
When I tried turning on the ArcFinity, I met a great deal of resistance. So I started to unscrew it -- which resulted in a loud BANG! That was maybe half-hour to an hour ago, and my ears STILL haven't stopped hurting.
Freaked out, I quickly disassembled the whole light. I examined the battery, but only noticed a slight peeling on the top of the wrapper -- no paste leakage or any other sign of battery explosion. I took a quick voltage reading, and got something like .45 V -- NOT good. Wondering if the ARC AAA head was damaged, but not wanting to risk using the jerry-rigged ArcFinity, I got out the old AAA body and battery for a quick test -- it was just fine. (Which, considering some of the things people have done to ARC AAA's in this group, really shouldn't have surprised me.)
So I ask you: what the heck happened???
My best guess right now is that, despite unscrewing it quite a bit to keep it off, the coiled wire I used to bridge the head must've shorted the battery to the casing, causing it to discharge without putting out any light. Severe discharge, of course, causes the generation of gas, which in turn causes a loud pop when ignited ... if you're damned lucky like I am.
I guess more to the point -- how do I get my ArcFinity adapter "adjusted" so that the damn AAA head fits properly, and I can avoid this ear-splitting situation in the future?
-XCN-