Fenix L0D CE Battery Question

Well, somebody with some experience should know.......

Lighthound sells the Fenix L0D CE light and states in thier ad that the light has an input voltage high enough to use the unprotected 10440 rechargeable 3.7 volt lithium AAA cell for "spectacular results".

Fenix, on the other hand, sells the same light and states that the input voltage is only up to 3.3 volts.......

So, can the 3.7 volt 10440 lithium battery be safley used in the L0D CE ?????
Is the L0D CE brighter using this battery than an ordinary alkaline cell ?????
Are there any other AAA rechargeable lithion cells that are safe to use ?????

1. Using a 10440 makes the L0D CE tremendously bright, like 3x brighter than with a normal battery.

2. It also gets hot, and is running the 10440 way out of spec, and may create a safety hazard.

3. I'm in the paranoid camp that says using a 10440 in this light is a dumb idea and you shouldn't do it except possibly for occasional demonstration purposes. But some users use that config all the time. At minimum, if you do it, be very careful of overheating on the high setting.

4. Also keep in mind how one of the R/C airplane guys explained the difference between li ion batteries and li polymer: "lithium ion explodes. lithium polymer burns". There are some pretty scary photos of 18670 (etc.) explosion aftermaths and the 10440 is just a smaller versoin of the same thing.

5. Alkalines are terrible in the L0D CE because they don't handle the high current drain. Lithium L92's (1.7 volt, NOT the 10440) work quite well but are expensive and non-rechargeable.

6. Basically the most sensible battery type for this light is the good old 1.2 volt AAA NiMH rechargeable cell, available in many brands with tons of cheap chargers etc. available. It runs the light at good brightness with almost as much runtime as an L92, the cells and chargers are cheap and easy to find, there aren't anything like the 10440's safety issues, and the operating costs are near zero.

Conclusion: get yourself some NiMH AAA cells and use them.

I found the answers in another post - I guess nobody is really sure if its safe to use the 3.7 volt cell in the L0D ???????

Thanks PaulR for shedding light on the subject......

Happyman, 3X times as bright is a massive exageration. It does take it from 45-50 lumens to an honest 65-75 lumens. A very substantial and appreciated increase for sure.

It does get a little bit warmer on high with the 10440 vs. an energizer lithium if left on high for minutes at a time. A non-issue in my opinion since you can just turn it down to the next level or even to low. If you're not holding the light in your hand it will get hot. The hand acts at a heat sink and I've run it on normal mode continuously through many entire 3.7 battery cycles.

I have two LOD-CEs now and have about 20-25 full 3.7 discharges through my oldest one and the two batteries that I use with it. There has been no decrease in brightness and I've had zero problems with the LOD-CE, the 10440 batteries or the Nano chargers. Just don't continue to run the light after it dims. Install a freshly charged battery and recharge the old one.

Also as far as the exploding issue goes, if you look at your cell phone battery you'll notice a li-ion in there too and it probably hasn't exploded on you yet. Sometimes batteries do explode and it can even happen to an alkaline battery that is thrown into a fire. There is even an instance of Surefire 123 batteries (not li-ion) exploding in a Pelican M6. These things just happen sometimes and are flukes. If you're careful to not over discharge your li-ion batteries I really doubt that you'll have any problems. There are many thousands of people already using 10440s in LODs and LOD-CEs without issue.

Patriot36 said:

Happyman, 3X times as bright is a massive exageration. It does take it from 45-50 lumens to an honest 65-75 lumens. A very substantial and appreciated increase for sure.

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If the original is 50, I'd say with LiIon it's at least 100. I've compared the light on LiIon to another person's L0DCE running a moderately fresh Lithium Primary (the next brightest -- noticeably brighter than fresh NiMH). Low on mine was about the same as medium on the other, medium on mine was the same as high on the other. As the dimming is done by pulse-width modulation, and not with resistance, or some sort of feedback circuit, I'd expect the progression between each of the levels to be about the same regardless of the battery type -- as half brightness is essentially accomplished by half duty cycle. Flashlight reviews shows high producing more than double the lumens of medium.

Also consider that power consumption is more than tripled: 850mA at 1.5V vs 1A at 4V. Also, in the case of the LiIon, I expect that it's direct driving and bypassing the circuitry -- meaning it's probably operating at higher efficiency considering that the current doesn't have to be trasnformed to run a higher voltage.

This graph must be wrong then.

http://lights.chevrofreak.com/runtimes/Fenix%20L0D%20CE/10440/Fenix%20L0D%20CE%20-%20high%20-%2010440%20-%20estimated%20lumens.png

Thanks Patriot36, I just bought a L0D CE and some 10440's and the charger. From everything I've read it looks like the 3.7V cells will be O.K. and provide quite a blast on the L0D's High beam.

But I'm going to get in the habit of NOT charging the 10440's "unattended", just in case..... (when I was a kid we used to blow up D cells from 120vac just for fun...)

Patriot36 said:

Also as far as the exploding issue goes, if you look at your cell phone battery you'll notice a li-ion in there too and it probably hasn't exploded on you yet.

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Cellular phones do not discharge their batteries at 4C discharge rates which is way outside of the manufacturer's specs. They run at more like 0.3C tops, if even that (3 hour talk time). And there are have been many incidents of cell phone and laptop batteries exploding, especially from the no-name brands which are more about cost control than safety engineering. I'd really like it a lot better if Fenix made a 2AAA version of this light, or a boost converter that could run at higher power using high-current NiMH cells, than messing with this lithium ion stuff.

For the reasons PaulR listed, I don't use the 10440 cells that I had originally purchased for this light. The only lights that I use LiIon cells in are the Jetbeam MKII and MKIIx.

Not to say that I won't ever use the 10440s, but for general purpose, I prefer to use NiMH. I may pop them in for a "dog and pony" show, but for now, eneloops . . .

paulr said:

Cellular phones do not discharge their batteries at 4C discharge rates which is way outside of the manufacturer's specs. They run at more like 0.3C tops, if even that (3 hour talk time). And there are have been many incidents of cell phone and laptop batteries exploding, especially from the no-name brands which are more about cost control than safety engineering. I'd really like it a lot better if Fenix made a 2AAA version of this light, or a boost converter that could run at higher power using high-current NiMH cells, than messing with this lithium ion stuff.

Click to expand...

You're right........not the best example on my part.

paulr said:

Cellular phones do not discharge their batteries at 4C discharge rates which is way outside of the manufacturer's specs.[...]

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But we R/C guys do, and our Li-Poly batteries are designed to handle a continuous discharge of 20C. We just need cylindrical Li-Poly batteries for flashlights. They're the same 3.7VDC as Li-Ion...I don't know why they're not offered in that form-factor.

2xTrinity said:

If the original is 50, I'd say with LiIon it's at least 100. I've compared the light on LiIon to another person's L0DCE running a moderately fresh Lithium Primary (the next brightest -- noticeably brighter than fresh NiMH). Low on mine was about the same as medium on the other, medium on mine was the same as high on the other. As the dimming is done by pulse-width modulation, and not with resistance, or some sort of feedback circuit, I'd expect the progression between each of the levels to be about the same regardless of the battery type -- as half brightness is essentially accomplished by half duty cycle. Flashlight reviews shows high producing more than double the lumens of medium.

Also consider that power consumption is more than tripled: 850mA at 1.5V vs 1A at 4V. Also, in the case of the LiIon, I expect that it's direct driving and bypassing the circuitry -- meaning it's probably operating at higher efficiency considering that the current doesn't have to be trasnformed to run a higher voltage.

Click to expand...

Boy...100 lumens, I'm not so sure. I'm sitting here at my desk comparing it on the walls and ceiling to a L4, a L2 on high, and A U2 and neither of my LOD-CEs are that close. I mean..anyone would say..."wow that L4 is still noticably brighter." I'm going to have to say 80-85 lumens at the most. It's not really that much brighter than an E2E, 6P, or A2 if at all. I guess that I could be off because of the way that surefire underates their output, but I'm trying it against inovas right now and I haven't changed my mind yet....hmm

I still love the light and for the size the thing is amazing. I just think there may be some very optimistic lumen guesses about the LOC-CE on 10440s going around.

Nake said:

This graph must be wrong then.

http://lights.chevrofreak.com/runtimes/Fenix%20L0D%20CE/10440/Fenix%20L0D%20CE%20-%20high%20-%2010440%20-%20estimated%20lumens.png

Click to expand...

Well, it does say estimated. Unless my LOD-CEs are drastically different from others I'd have to say that chart is way off. I'm trying different 10440s now...my two newest ones from lighthound....

Now my Orb Ns XRE is very bright compared to both of my LOD-CEs with 10440s. I'd say it's at least 25% brighter. I think it's agreed that the Ns XRE is in the 120 lumen range. My LOD-CEs just aren't that bright. This is kinda interesting though. :thinking:

Patriot36 said:

Boy...100 lumens, I'm not so sure. I'm sitting here at my desk comparing it on the walls and ceiling to a L4, a L2 on high, and A U2 and neither of my LOD-CEs are that close. I mean..anyone would say..."wow that L4 is still noticably brighter." I'm going to have to say 80-85 lumens at the most. It's not really that much brighter than an E2E, 6P, or A2 if at all. I guess that I could be off because of the way that surefire underates their output, but I'm trying it agaist inovas right now and I haven't changed my mind yet....hmm

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One possibility is that the L0DCE on standard batteries is less than 50 lumens -- I based the 100 lumen number on the relative difference between the L0D on LiIon, and on 1.5V cells. Another possibility is that the Surefires you have are putting out significantly more lumens than advertized, which is quite common from what I've read.

When I do a ceiling bounce against my L1D CE with a 14500 (118 lm) it is noticably brighter. You have to remember it's only at 150lm for less than a minute, and the battery has to be fresh of the charger.
I get a charge out of wowing people with it. I tell the unenlightened ones it's nuclear powered.

When using 10440's you have to be carefull of over discharging them. My LODCE will easily drain a NiMH to 1.0v, a big no no with 10440's. To my knowledge protected 10440's do not exist, so make sure you don't run them under 2.5v(preferably ~3.0v)

I would estimate a 30-50% increase in output on Li-ions!

But I would doubt mine is anywhere near 150lm.

Maybe some are producing more Lumens than others on Lithium cells?

Is there anyone out there with two or more LOD-CE's and the nesessary technology to give us a comparison reading on output from LOD-CE to LOD-CE on Li-Ion???

My L0D-CE on 3.7v is just as bright as my Orb NS Cree but not for long. The L0D runs down quicker. More of a spread beam as well.

I never worried about the cells. I run them in 6 different AAA lights and they have all been fine.

Happyman: Here's what Lighthound emailed me after I asked directly about the discrepancy between the statement that the input voltage on the LOD-CE was stated as up to 4.2v while on "another" site (namely Fenix Store) the input is listed as 0.8 - 3.6v. I asked about the manufacturer's stated input too.

Yes, Fenix has stated to us that the input voltage for the L0D and L0D CE is from .8 v - 3.6 v
Further, we have used the 10440 battery extensively in these lights, as have our customers, with no problems or difficulties reported.

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As I read this, he's indicating that Fenix has stated that the input voltage is just 0.8 - 3.6V (although Fenix Store lists the upper voltage as only 3.3), but that "extensive" testing using the 10440 batteries have, to his knowledge, not produced problems.

So, to echo what a couple of members have said, we need somewhat willing to take the risk to run his/her LOD-CE on high, on 10440s, for many complete trials and report the results--any degradation of led, any burned circuits, etc. The closest I've seen is the previous post by Jay R saying he's run his and they've been fine. I'll try to find any posts for someone who may have tried this. Right now I'm still not willing to blow my nice light in the name of science.

HarveyRich said:

Right now I'm still not willing to blow my nice light in the name of science.

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I don't care about blowing the light (when it does blow, Fenix would've come up with a L0D CE v.2 anyways ).... I'm more worried about setting my house on fire, because I'm not sure whether I could tell if the light is too run down and I charge it.