ProofTech said:
After looking at the picture of the BD Icon on the REI website, it appears to me that it has no way of dissipating heat from the main LED.
Yup, that's the first thing I thought of.
The second thing I noticed is the manufacturer's statements don't make sense. If you look at the REI website, it says the manufacturer estimates 15 hours of light output at high power. Let's think about this:
3 watt LED * 15 hours = 45 watt-hours required
3 AA cells @ 1.2v, 2500 maH apiece = 3 * 3 watt-hours = 9 watt-hours available
Something is very strange here.
My current guess is they underdrive the 3 watt LED quite a bit and probably have a BOOST switch like the Petzl Myo XP for intermittent bursts of full power. This would explain the lack of a heatsink and the inconsistency between the power required and power available.
Toshi