What's wrong with my ROP ??

[Stingray]

I decided to put together my first ROP recently. I bought a new mag 2D from walmart, an ultraclear lens and 2 sets of lamps from lighthound, a 6AA holder from mdocod, and a reflector from kai. I started off with 6 Maha Powerex 2300's that I already had but they performed very poorly and the light was dim. So I bought 6 new Eveready 2500's at the recent Walgreens sale and charged em up. I let them rest about a day and then tried them in the light with the ROP hi and without the head on for about 10 minutes. It lit up fine. Then I turned it off and put the head on (still had the plastic reflector at that time). It was fairly bright but not as much as expected, about the same as a 2nd gen tigerlight, maybe slightly brighter. After a couple of minutes the bulb literally exploded and messed up the reflector. So, I waited a week for the metal reflector to arrive before trying again. I put the second hi lamp in, first cleaning the glass with alcohol and using gloves to be sure not to get any oil on it, then let it sit for several hours while I did something else. I then turned the light on, without the head on it, and it lit up for a couple of minutes and then the second bulb blew. No explosion this time, just a dead bulb. The cells have over 10 minutes use already with the first hi bulb and they've been sitting for over a week while I waited for the new reflector to arrive, so they had plenty of "rest time". They read 7.4 V on my DMM with no load. The mag has no resistance mods at all, it's totally stock. Now I have no lamps left other than low's and I never even got to really try out the light. What could be wrong?

 

[FILIPPO]

I think that the first bulb exploded because of some oil on it, did you use gloves with it?

I can also say that you got poor performance because of batteries...with ROP HIGH you should use some very good batts like eneloops or better some high drain ones (ROP HIGH runs ant about 4,5ah if I remember right:thinking

I can't explain the 2nd bulb flash at the moment:candle:...batteries didn't push the bulb so hard...so probably you have simply get a "bad" bulb...in my 1st pack of ROP bulb the HIGH one have never worked...:sigh:

I suggest to try low bulbs using glowes and letting batteries cool down for few hours as you did fist time:twothumbs

 

[WildChild]

I've had a ROP-HI bulb fail with no apparent reason after a drop. The filament was still connected. It took the drop while it was turned off.

 

[starburst]

I'd try the low bulb's and order some new ones. I can't get a rop bulb to blow I know sooner or later they will but no trouble like you have had. I guess oil from your hand's could have been the trouble, but I'm wondering
if the potting material used wasn't baked dry enough or some how picked
up some extra humidity or something just a wild guess something caused it. be careful don't let em blow up in your face point away.

 

[Stingray]

I think that the first bulb exploded because of some oil on it, did you use gloves with it?

I used a paper towel to put the first one in, I never touched it, but maybe it had oil on it from the factory, or it was just defective.

This is really surprising since these Eveready batteries aren't exactly high current batteries and I figured they'd be more than safe for the rop in a stock mag host.

 

[mdocod]

yea, many people have even had success driving the ROP on 7 AA cells, so I doubt you are driving it too hard, my adapter can handle a lot of current but like any non-solder/welded connection, has it's own resistance. So between the adapter, the less than perfect cells, the unmodded mag, there isn't really any *reason* for the bulb failures that would be the fault of your own, I think you are simply getting bad luck of the draw on your bulbs.

 

[FILIPPO]

boght another pack of bulbs ad go with 'em...:twothumbs

 

[dmc888]

I would use the low bulbs till you get some new high bulbs.

The best way i found to install rop bulbs is unscrew the head off, remove the bulb retainer, remove stock bulb, open the wrapper carefully and pick up the bulb by the metal base, hold the bulb retainer upside down threads facing up, place the bulb in it pointing down, then grab the body of the flashlight holding it pointing downward and screw the bulb retainer with bulb slowly turning the body.

Basically install everything with the light pointing down and be careful not to touch the bulb.

 

[Stingray]

Just thought I'd update this old thread and say that I got a new ROP HI bulb and no problems so far. Apparently I got a couple of bad packs, rare as that is with these.

Kudos to Lighthound for replacing the defective bulbs.

The ROP still isn't as bright as I expected it to be based on all the threads I read, but I guess my expectations were too high. It's slightly brighter than a Tigerlight, but not as bright as an M4 with HOLA. It's still a good light, and what I like most about it is that the host is inexpensive so I don't care about damaging the finish. I can even loan it out without worry.

 

[WildChild]

Just thought I'd update this old thread and say that I got a new ROP HI bulb and no problems so far. Apparently I got a couple of bad packs, rare as that is with these.

Kudos to Lighthound for replacing the defective bulbs.

The ROP still isn't as bright as I expected it to be based on all the threads I read, but I guess my expectations were too high. It's slightly brighter than a Tigerlight, but not as bright as an M4 with HOLA. It's still a good light, and what I like most about it is that the host is inexpensive so I don't care about damaging the finish. I can even loan it out without worry.

Your Energizer 2500 mAh may be the problem! Those have a higher internal resistance than Eneloop or Duracell Pre-Charged and produce a much more yellow light... Eneloop makes the light much brighter/whiter!

 

[jwl]

Your Energizer 2500 mAh may be the problem! Those have a higher internal resistance than Eneloop or Duracell Pre-Charged and produce a much more yellow light... Eneloop makes the light much brighter/whiter!

+1 Eneloops do a much better job.

 

[Stingray]

I'll have to look around for some Eneloops then. They're kinda scarce where I live.

 

[Chrontius]

Try circuit city for the Eneloops. They're clearancing 8AA packs for 8-10 dollars, depending on where you are. Also, look carefully - I found mine hidden on a shin-level peg on a cash register that was obscured by another cash register.

Definitely made my anglehead ROP go from distinctly yellow to off-white, though I'm using the Kai $1.50 crap adapters (spares).