Bearcat
Enlightened
Is it possible to redesign the Freedom to have a Cree XR-E LED and still maintain its small size?
Photon Freedom Cree XR-E
- Thread starter Bearcat
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vortechs
Enlightened
Bearcat said:
Are you thinking of trying to get the higher efficiency (lumens/watt) from the Cree or are you thinking of trying to get a lot more light from the Photon microlight?
The main thing that limits the brightness of the Photon Freedom microlight (and all other coin cell microlights) is the maximum current that the two tiny 2016 coin cells can deliver. You can get some more brightness by using a rechargeable 2032 Li-Ion coin cell, but a Luxeon or Cree instead of a 5mm LED would be seriously overtaxing the tiny Li-Ion coin cell. Even if you could get enough current from the coin cell(s) to run the Cree at a decent brightness, the total lack of heatsinking would be a problem for anything other than short bursts.
If you want to give it a try, I'd suggest the microlights designed for 10mm LED's may be easier to mod with a Luxeon or Cree. I'd be interested to read about the results.
2xTrinity
Flashlight Enthusiast
I've considered something like this to take advantage of the higher efficiency of the Cree, the only problem is the amount of $$ dumped into a coin cell light could easily get ridiculous quite fast when you consider the following:vortechs said:
You'd probably need to switch to a rechargeable 2032 at the very least, so add in the cost of the batteries and charger if you don't already have these items.
You'd need to find some sort of compact optic that you could fit into the coin cell light designed for the cree.
The lack of heatsinking will be a problem if you drive this thing any brighter than the regular photon on max (which is overdriven, but usually falls fast due to the cells losing charge)
However, having a very bright coin cell with continuously variable dimming does sound like something very cool. If it were designed from the ground up, I'd like to see one of these lights that can run on two 2032 rechargeables (slightly bulkier), constructed out of aluminum so that the entire thing would "heatsink" the LED into your fingertips. You'd have to seriously underdrive the cree to keep the thing cool enough to handle, but you could run it right at the efficiency sweetspot, and annihalate any competing coin cell lights for brightness. Once you get into this level of complexity though, you might as well go to a compact CR2 type light.
Bearcat
Enlightened
It sounds like to me that the Photon Freedom is going to be left in the dust if LRI does not figure out a way to get around all those pitfalls. I love my Freedom.
vortechs
Enlightened
Bearcat said:
The LRI Photon Freedom microlight is probably the best coin cell microlight on the market (IMHO). The problem is that there are a lot of inherent limitations with keychain lights with plastic bodies that run on coin cells, including the limitations on the maximum current that tiny cells can deliver, difficulty in heatsinking, and lack of room for a good reflector or optic. The best mod I have been able to achieve with a Photon Freedom is using a 4-die LED (uncut SMJLED) and a Li-Ion 2032 coin cell (see here), which I have been quite happy with.
If you are looking for a keychain light that isn't that much larger than the Photon microlight but does have a Cree XR-E, reflector and cylindrical Li-Ion cell, try modamag's Draco/Rocket:
http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=137487
http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=144766
http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=128353
