Hey there. Just bought a Romisen RC-K4 and for the price it is a great budget flashlight with a good hotspot but im wondering how I can modify this to make it any brighter and get a bit more throw from it. Im new to modifying flashlights but handy with a soldering iron so feel free to shoot a few suggestions
Cheers
The easiest way to get more throw from an LED light with an orange peeled reflector, without significantly changing the light into something else entirely, is to replace the reflector with a smooth (SMO) reflector and focus it properly. The light you have would likely fit a 22600(p) Li-Ion or 22650 IMR battery if you remove the PVC sleeve that surrounds the head spring by unscrewing it from the top, after removing the light engine to get to it. That won't necessarily make it brighter, but it will increase runtime and is another easy mod that will improve the light without significantly changing it.
If you do want to completely transform it, in addition to or instead of either of the mods above, you could swap out the star and the driver with something with more oomph (for which the bigger battery will be better suited than the default options). For good examples see:
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...king-3AAA-lights-flashaholic-worthy-the-22600
"Brighter" is relative though. To some people, a light with a more intense hotspot that throws better than another may be deemed brighter, but to others, a light with increased flood intensity (or even just wider flood) may seem brighter. Aspherics throw like crazy but don't light up much else besides the small amount of the target that the die is projected onto.
Traditionally, a light with more lumens is usually expected to be brighter (with brightness often observed by way of a ceiling bounce test, where you light up a darkened room by pointing the light at the ceiling and observing the effect on the room, without observing the ceiling itself). Where throw and hotspot intensity are concerned, higher surface brightness (lumens per square mm of LED surface) usually trumps total lumens, at least where the same reflector dimensions are being used. For example, in a reflector the size your RC-K4 has, the small 150 lumen XR-E P4 will out throw a mighty 2000 lumen SST-90 because the reflector is only able to focus a portion of the SST-90 into the hotspot (the rest going to spill) and the portion it focuses is not as "bright" as the same sized portion of the tiny XR-E, which has higher surface brightness.
