I'm back, and I need your help!

good afternoon, CPF!

many of you know me for my custom machining work, or as a buyer and seller of retail and custom flashlights and parts...

Well, the powers that be saw fit to deploy me outside the CONUS for about 6 months, but I'm back and I need your help!

I am looking for a vendor that can provide me 5mm LED's that will accept 1.5 V direct drive from an alkaline AA cell. IIRC, 5mm LED's need ~3V, but my memory may be off... Color is negotiable, the cheaper the better. Chinese vendors are best, but I am willing to source from anywhere. I have a flashlight that is currently incan that we want to upgrade to LED for performance and shelf presence. I need somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000 pieces.

can anyone point me in the right direction?


Thanks CPF, and expect to see alot more of me again. I have since relocated, but I will try to get 18650 boring and other machining services back up ASAP, unless some young buck has cornered the market, or everyone is buying Leef's wonderful bodies!

regards,

highorder

perhaps this could be in a better place; 95 views and no responses...

Are all the veterans gone? I used to be quite active here...how about a simple hello from any old friends?

Has anyone here seen a 5mm LED for sale, anywhere?

Thanks in advance!

highorder said:

perhaps this could be in a better place; 95 views and no responses...

Are all the veterans gone? I used to be quite active here...how about a simple hello from any old friends?

Has anyone here seen a 5mm LED for sale, anywhere?

Thanks in advance!

Click to expand...

I don't know you, but hi anyway

5MM LEDs are available all over the place. I'm pretty sure Deal Extreme sells them, and simple Google search turns up a zillion of them. I went to Digikey and found a bunch of them, since that is where I buy for my company. Vf on them is in all cases >3V, so no way you can run them from a single AA without a boost circuit. Even if it were low enough, you'd have to have at minimum a current limiting resistor unless you had enough LEDs out there to make the AA sag to the point that it wouldn't smoke LEDs.

anyone have a few hundred thousand 5mm led's they dont need for less than $.10 each?
:thinking:

http://www.hebeiltd.com.cn/?p=led.diode

http://www.elecsound.cn/LED.htm

http://mcb.en.alibaba.com/product/5...ps_and_Push_Buttons/3mm_5mm_LED_SMD_LED_.html

http://br.tradeholding.com/default.cgi/action/viewtradeleads/tradeleadid/145820/subject/LED/

The closest thing I can think of is the old style mjled... they replace the bulb in any 2xAA/AAA flashlight but increase the runtime tenfold. They are fairly available and you can probably get close enough to your price with your volume.

However, be warned that you won't find any led that'll run off of a single 1.5V cell without a converter. You'll need at least 2 cells.

outstanding! thank you for you help, guys.

Thanks to all that replied!

This project is moving forward; expect to see some great stuff on retail shelves for the 09 easter season.