Help modding a Dorcy Metal Gear with a Cree or Rebel

I have a Dorcy Metal Gear 1 Watt that is just not meeting expectations any more. I would like to replace the 1w LED with a Cree or Rebel LED. Can anyone help me with how I might do this and which parts I would need to continue running on 3AAA. I have looked at some emitters on DX but don't know which I need and if I need any additional parts.

Any help would be appreciated.

Please let me know what additional information I should provide to help out.

Thanks
Todd

I have another 1W Dorcy and failed to open the head. These lights seem to use different manufacturing processes, and they use unforgiving glues on the glass, mirrors and metal parts.

I myself was wondering how to get that head off. As I have only found one of these lights in my area, I have been hesitant about attempting to remove it's innards.

I popped mine off with a large combination wrench. The Metal Gear's head just "SO HAPPENS" to be hex in shape, so it's easy to wrench off.

Mine is about a 18 months old and it has a Lux I star screwed to the body. Looks like it would be easy to swap for any other Lux star; others will probably have a different focal point and you will have to tinker with the focus to get it right.

I'm not sure there's room in the Metal Gear for a large enough resistor once you get past the 3-watt range... in all cases it would be better to use a constant-current driver like the ones from the Shoppe, but way cheaper to simply install another resistor.

What's probably in there is a 10 Ohm resistor to limit current to the Lux I, giving appx. 450 ma with a fresh 4.5v supply. This will run a Lux III with no changes, HOWEVER, if you install another 10 Ohm resistor in parallel with the existing resistor, resistance is cut approximately in half, supplying 900 ma or 4.05 watts to the Lux III. This is a very easy and very acceptable drive current for a Lux III for high output and low cost.

I put one of the DX 5 mode boards in mine in place of the resistor it had originally and swapped the Lux I for a SSC. It works great except that I have concerns over the heatsinking ability due to the lights design.

In stock form the star is mounted on a small metal disc which is them completely isolated from the flashlight body by plastic tabs, etc. One could figure out a custom heatsink that would solve the problem if they were so inclined.

I figure for a grand total of $18 I have in the light as it is now I will be ok with shortened emitter life. Besides, I can run it on Medium and still get more light that it had in stock form.

Cypher, would you mind sharing the part numbers you used?

Sure.

Here's the star I used. It's a SSC P4 instead of a cree or rebel like you asked about. I don't know how either of those would work but you could try.

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.1445

And here's the board.

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.6190

Works fine for me. It's not a light that I would use in a life or death situation but that wasn't my purpose in modding it. It's just a fun project.

I'm still a beginner at modding but if you have any other questions about the light let me know. If I don't know it I'm sure someone here does.

I know this is an old thread, but I added another mod to it. I found some CR2's on sale at Best Buy for $2.00 a pack (I bought 10 packs) and tried to see if they would fit. If you take 2 CR2's end to end, they are actually about the same length as the standard battery pack. I rigged a way for them to stay in there without wiggling around too much, and I let-er-rip!

For comparison's sake, I have one of the new Coleman Max lights (115 lumens) and this Dorcy Metal Gear mod is considerably brighter and throws considerably farther (and also gets considerably warmer). Not bad for a light that started off at 35 lumens.

Here is what I did.
Here is the stock LED and plate.


LED removed from star


I created a pedestal from 3 copper pennies to place the XR-E deeper into the reflector.

This shows the LED centered and AA'ed in place.


Now for some beamshots! The first one is stepped down -1, the second is normal exposure.


Body and reflector shots.



Now for the suprise! I found that if you removed the plastic holder in the tailcap, 1 18650 fits perfectly inside. :rock:

What's funny is that I wanted to put an 18650 in there after seeing your mod before, but I couldn't find anyone locally that had them (or even knew what they were...). That's how I ended up looking around at Best Buy and finding the CR2's so cheap.

I will try to post some pics later.

Here are some "so-so" pics of what I was talking about. (My camera really hates the night-time). They are (in order): 1) unmodded Dorcy Metal Gear; 2) Coleman Max 3AAA; 3) Modded Dorcy Metal Gear with 2 CR2 cells. (click on pics for larger images)

Thustlewhumber - What a small world. I've had my Dorcy metalgear for a long time and have moved onto 3W Cree XR-E headlamps and felt that my Dorcy was going to be left out. I desparately wanted to mod it but couldn't get the head off and thought it wouldn't come off until this thread.

I had 2 CR123/a batteries lying around and popped them in with some paper stuffing to hold the batteries in place and BAM, the light was much brighter. I unscrewed the inner portion of the tail end switch and it safely fits the two batteries. I went to Lowe's and found a 1inch diameter rubber gromet about 1mm thick and wrapped it around the tailcap threading and now it screws on without any gaps and tightens snuggly. I feel that your pictures are a good descriptor of what happened. The intensity increased dramatically, and looked to almost rival my 3W cree in brightness. It just sucks that this light doesn't have any regulation.

I don't quite understand this but can this Luxeon 1w be driven at 6v safely?

The LED is not meant to be driven at 6v. Youare probably sending a lot of current through the LED and I wouldn't expect it to last long.

There was a how-to years ago about using 2xcr123's. It looked impressive at first, but prolonged use fried the little luxeon, ala no heatsinking. I knew nothing about modding lights at the time, except overdriving incandescents. Unfortunately it spilled over to l.e.d's. I still have the Metal Gear body set aside, waiting for a mod to put it to good use.