Dorcy 3D 1W LED overdriven?

Hi guys, DSE electronics had a nice looking Dorcy 3D 1 watt aluminium torch that seemed to follow me home somehow. :shakehead

Firing it up I noticed it's very bright, much brighter than I expected. It easily outshines my MXDL 3W. I put the amp meter inline and it's reading 680 mah on fresh energizer batts! More than what my 3W draws.:eeksign: Now I'm still a LED newbie but from what I've read this is too much for a 1 watt LED right? Could there be a 3W LED in there by mistake? The writing inside says "lumileds". Should I put a resistor inline somewhere? I don't want to fry my brand new smelly rubber and aluminium toy!

It is overdriven probably. HOpefully it's heatsinked well. The current will drop fast with alkalines and steady out though. Use it for a while and then measure again and see what it is. THe dorcy probably uses a simple resistor and no current regulation, so it will be high at first, then go to a more normal level as the batts settle in.

The MXDL isn't driving the "3watt" luxeon/luxeon clone fully because AAA alkaline have a bad voltage sag and internal resistance and just aren't up to the task of the current demand.

It is bright... even with many modified Mags, this is probably currently my favorite outdoor light.

But it is already resistored... With a 1.2 ohm resistor, I believe. I don't think it's significantly over driven... Good R-bin Lux I LEDs can be very impressive. The more recent Sam's Club Element lights mostly seem to have Rs and direct driven, they are very impressive. Also, do the MXDLs use Lumileds Luxeons or a knock off?

I haven't done any measurements on it, but I swapped in a TY0K (or maybe it was a TYAK) and it didn't get much brighter... with that resistor removed, it would have been a larger improvement.

Thanks for the replies. The 3W MXDL has "Kerui" written on it. It draws 390mah from 3 x nimh cells. I like the cheap thing as it has a nice hue and very smooth beam.

I kind of got this 3D Dorcy flashlight for the runtime, not so much for brightness so I could use it for long periods when/if a cyclone hits, although I do have other lights for that also.

Well as long as it's not at risk of burning out I'll be happy with it. I'll just put up with shorter than expected runtime?

IsaacHayes said:

The MXDL isn't driving the "3watt" luxeon/luxeon clone fully because AAA alkaline have a bad voltage sag and internal resistance and just aren't up to the task of the current demand.

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Is there a way of being able to use the 3W to its full potential on the MXDL?

I haven't done a continuous runtime test on D cells, but I put together a cheesy adapter so that I could use AA NiMH cells to give the LED about a 30 hour breakin period. I had one of the Dorcy lights out for several hours way deep in some woods. Excellent light... If the size isn't too large, I just can't praise it enough. I really love my Lux III mods built on a 2C Mag but when I have a light like that, I'm only going to have one and knowing that I have 20-ish hours of runtime is very comforting and allows me to run it with ZERO fear of the dreaded flashing starting.

Four and a half thumbs up... I mean, stars!

I must say I like the feel of the Dorcy 3D. Feels nice in the hand.

This break in period, what does that do?

Hi Skyclad, do you know how many mah your 3W MXDL is drawing? I'm honestly not sure where they peak and are safe. Being a clone they might let the smoke out before a Lumileds LED would if overdriven? Not sure. I have the "police" version with switch on the side, not the tailcap. I like it that way. I think it's a great little light, even if underdriven a little. I run mine on 3 x 900mah nimh cells with 390mah draw.

I dont have a meter so I cant say. The one I have is the non police version. MXDL V2 is the one I have, which is the same kind thats reviewed here http://www.flashlightreviews.com/reviews/mxdl_3watt.htm

Seems similar to mine except for the switch.

Have you tried nimh cells in it? Mine seems to give a very constant output for the first couple of hours with nimh cells, almost like it was regulated.

The only NiMh cells I have are a few AA's. I plan on getting some NiMh AAA's soon though.

I wouldn't worry too much about the overdrive.
There is a LOT of aluminum in there in that Dorcy to keep the led star cool enough even at 700 ma.
Not much point to a Luxeon trying to last 100,000 hours in a flashlight when all most people need is around 1000 hours at most
Nimh or nicad batteries are very much a good way to go with a Dorcy led 3D imho.
That's a good "regulation" and battery discharge consistency to have with a light like that.

On the break in thing... I'm not in any way trying to say that it actually makes a difference, but being a gun guy, I always like to run my lights for about 24 hours before figuring out what I think about them... Some say the Vf will lower with use making them possibly brighter or making them run longer on the same cells...

Thanks very much for the info guys. I shall use it without fear of burnout then.

Was just reading a review of it at flashlight reviews. I see they reviewed the plain aluminium version. Since then it looks like they've added rubber armour to them, like the one I have.

I think the rubber version looks cool and you can really get a grip with it.

I think other than the fact that they are both 1W Dorcy lights that run on 3D cells, they have nothing in common. I bought the old version (as reviewed on flashlightreviews.com) as was pretty dissapointed. The new version is so much radically better, it isn't even funny. Both of my new style lights have R-bin stars while the old style might not even have had a Q-bin. It was sad.

The heatsinks are totally different and the old light used a bare emitter while the new style uses a star.

cratz2 said:

The new version is so much radically better, it isn't even funny. Both of my new style lights have R-bin stars while the old style might not even have had a Q-bin. It was sad.

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My new style Dorcy has a QX1J, and it still greatly out-throws every other stock LED flashlight that I have. Only the Luxeon III Mag mods have more throw. I can only imagine what it would be like with an R bin.

My two new style Dorcys have an RYAK and an RY0K. The RY0K is slightly whiter, though both have very nice tints, and the RY0K seems to have a slightly smaller and slightly hotter hotspot. I swapped out a TY0K but left the resistor in and the difference was marginal... I mean, I could tell the Lux III was brighter, but only slightly and if I tried one light and then an hour later tried the other light, I couldn't tell which was which. For now, the TY0K is in a Dorcy Metal Gear with the resistor removed and it is WAY brighter than the original star that was in it.

I'll likely try the TY0K in one of the 3Ds again with the resistor removed, mostly to see if I get the same large-ish hot spot with huge spill beam that I like so much. But until then, the Dorcy 3D is great as is.

And as far as your Q-bin goes, with the lumen ranges being just that, 'ranges', it could be that yours is a borderline R bin. I've gone through eight Elements and one package had a Q and an R and before I pulled the stars, the difference seemed minimal... Again, the R-bin seemed to have a smaller but hotter hot spot but overall brightness seemed extremely comparable.

Just out of curiosity, would it be possible to drop a Lux V star into the Dorcy 3D? Would it fit and be compatable?

Depending on the Vf of your particular star, the Lux Vs usually want at least 6.5V so a direct swap would be very unimpressive at best... Or it might not even light up at all.

I just measured my two... one measured .38A and went up to .39A after about 20 seconds. The other measured .36A and didn't go up within a minute.

Sounds like one of our meters is VERY off!

Just checked the current again on a digital meter and an analogue meter - has gone down to 490mah on both meters. I've only used the torch for a couple of minutes on fresh batteries and it's coming down so I'm guessing the batteries may have just been a bit "hot" straight out of the pack.

Ok your right, just found the Lux V specs, different voltage rating. That's alright, I'll just buy a Lux V flashlight instead.