Mini-Mag 2AA LED emitter and board swap

Eariler I did a couple of mods to my Mini-Mag 2AA LED. The first was to increase the drive current from the stock Mini-Mag converter. It didn't seem to do much. I then replaced the Mini-Mag's converter with a Badboy 500ma board. The light was quite a bit brighter, but I was still dogged with the sick green emitter the light was equipped with. (I should have tried the light as
soon as I bought it from Walmart and exchanged it for another).

I finally decided to swap the emitter with a Lux III UWAJ. Now it's a light. Probably doing 50 lumens, much brighter than my B42XRGT at maximum. The B42 certainly has a much larger hotspot, however. The stock Mini-Mag emitter has a different anode/cathode arrangement. (See pic) If you do an emitter swap, take care to keep the polarity correct.







ELM

Nice work!

I am assuming that the Badboy has a proper "moon mode"? That was my main complaint about the MiniMag LED. However, now that the LED is being driver harder, have you made any improvement to the heatsinking?

Just wondering . . .

How hard is it to swap the Luxeon on the 2AA? I haven't read much about people doing it so I wasn't sure if it was very difficult or not. Also, what kind of results do you think I would get if I put in a nice UWOJ emitter and just left everything else like it was stock (no board change or anything). I like the tint in mine currently (XO I think), but I obviously wish it was a little brighter. :naughty:

jburgett said:

Nice work!

I am assuming that the Badboy has a proper "moon mode"? That was my main complaint about the MiniMag LED. However, now that the LED is being driver harder, have you made any improvement to the heatsinking?

Just wondering . . .

Click to expand...

The standard heatsinking is adequate. But there is a lot of room now between the Badboy and where the emitter sits. I suppose one could find an additional heatsink to attach inside the shell.

Yes, the Badboy has "moon mode". So does the stock 2AA mini-mag, but it doesn't come on right away. I.E., after the mini-mag has appeared to shut off for good, leave it on. After a few minutes the cells will have recovered enough for the circuit to attempt to start again. But because the cells are depleted, only the dim moon mode is achieved.

adirondackdestroyer said:

How hard is it to swap the Luxeon on the 2AA? I haven't read much about people doing it so I wasn't sure if it was very difficult or not. Also, what kind of results do you think I would get if I put in a nice UWOJ emitter and just left everything else like it was stock (no board change or anything). I like the tint in mine currently (XO I think), but I obviously wish it was a little brighter. :naughty:

Click to expand...

It's kind of a pain swapping the emitter. It's attached with a mild epoxy / thermal compound so it takes a little force to break it free. The mounting surface is not perfectly smooth. It has a honeycomb / waffle iron pattern, I guess to facilitate whatever adhesive it is that they use. If you are keeping the stock converter, you'll have to solder leads to it to bring out to your emitter.

As long as you're sure the replacement emitter is better than stock, it will be worth it. My 2AA LED had a terrible, greenish one. I knew anything was going make it better.