Rechargables in SF 6PX or P2X Fury???

forumname05

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I'm a bit of a newbie but am interested in the newer SF lights and wanted to see if anyone has run any rechargables in the 6PX's or P2X Fury's.
If so, how was the output and runtime?
Would it be possible to have these bored for 18650's?
 

HotWire

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I use an AW 17670 li ion in my SF Fury. No problems.
 

pinetree89

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I've ran 2 AW RCR123's in my 6PX Tactical (single mode) with no problems. Gives 59 minutes runtime until protection circuit kicks in.
 

HotWire

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Just as bright, not tested run time. I would expect a lower run time on this battery.
 

jais

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I'm a bit of a newbie but am interested in the newer SF lights and wanted to see if anyone has run any rechargables in the 6PX's or P2X Fury's.
If so, how was the output and runtime?
Would it be possible to have these bored for 18650's?

Surefire has Original Charger and Rechargable Battery (SF2R-KIT01 Battery Charger + Two LFP 123A Batteries).
 

forumname05

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Would I be better off running 2x 123's or a 17670 rechargable? Or would it be possible to even bore for an 18650?...Obviously I'm not too concerned with the warranty.
Would a single cell offer less output and runtime or would it be the same as two cells?
 

Ryan83

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I wish I understood this whole battery thing better. I just got a light from local flea market that has an ultra fire knock off 18650 battery. It is labeled uitrafire 18650. Says it has protected circuit and all that. Not sure when it was last charged but it is bright now. Gonna fully charge it and see what happens.
 

sidecross

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Would I be better off running 2x 123's or a 17670 rechargable? Or would it be possible to even bore for an 18650?...Obviously I'm not too concerned with the warranty.
Would a single cell offer less output and runtime or would it be the same as two cells?

I have the Surefire 6PX Pro with a low and high of 200 lumens but the head of this light and I think too the Surefire Fury are NOT removable. This is the main reason I have not bought anymore Surefire lights.

I did buy two Eagletac G25C2 lights with many more features and so far I more pleased with these than my Surefire 6PX PRO; time will tell if these lights can match Surfire in durability.
 

tonywalker23

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I wish I understood this whole battery thing better. I just got a light from local flea market that has an ultra fire knock off 18650 battery. It is labeled uitrafire 18650. Says it has protected circuit and all that. Not sure when it was last charged but it is bright now. Gonna fully charge it and see what happens.

I watched this the other day about batteries. It's by going gear. They sell flashlights. They have a retail store in Atlanta. I've been to it once. Marshall makes good videos. There's also a podcast he helps with called gimme some lumens. Both are very informative.
Check out this video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMep9VSyLNI&feature=youtube_gdata_player
 
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Tiresius

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Don't risk frying your light with RCR's. Play it safe and either get a pair of rechargeable from Surefire with their charger OR get a LiPOFe from AW and a charger for half the price? I remember I paid less than $29.99USD from AW. It's 3v each cell so you'll be safe either way.
 

forumname05

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Don't risk frying your light with RCR's. Play it safe and either get a pair of rechargeable from Surefire with their charger OR get a LiPOFe from AW and a charger for half the price? I remember I paid less than $29.99USD from AW. It's 3v each cell so you'll be safe either way.

I actually already have a Pila charger and a handful of AW 17670's and 17500's.
Is there a way to charge the RCR's with my Pila charger?
Will I have diminished output or runtime if I use a single 17670 vs two RCR's?
 

Tiresius

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You do lose run times with both rechargeable batteries. The capacity in primaries are much higher...I can't remember which post it was but it showed the run times and capacities of the cells.
 

Swedpat

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For the first time I have recently got a bunch of 18650s and 17670s and a Pila IBC charger. Unfortunately 18650 doesn't fit in the Fury, but 17670 does. Also all the Surefire P, G, Z, and C hosts works with 17670. Therefore I now will start to use CR123 primaries only in the Outdoorsmans and Defender.
 
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pinetree89

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59 min at 500 lm..bet it gets warm!!
Naa, the 6px is a 200ish lumen light with lots of aluminum to heatsink. I would say it got warm but nowhere near hot. I think SF does lots of testing of their lights at 100% duty cycle. To my knowledge none of their lights have a thermal stepdown timed or otherwise.

I'm sure the Fury puts out a bit more heat though.
 

kyhunter1

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I run my Fury on 2 x awrcr's most of the time. About 20-25 minutes of full output runtime before the circuit trips. It see's occasional use on a 17670 or primaries. No ill effects after about 9 months of use now.
 

Robert_M

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I run my Fury on either one 17670 or two LiFePO4 cells.

SurefireP2X-BFuryAW176701600mAhLiCoO24RunTimefan.png


SurefireP2X-BFuryAWLiFePO4batteriesRCR123ARunTimesmallfan.png


I run my 6PX Pro on two LiFePO4 cells.
Surefire6PXProTenergyLiFePO4batteriesRCR123ARunTime.png
 
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Kestrel

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Would I be better off running 2x 123's or a 17670 rechargable? Or would it be possible to even bore for an 18650?...Obviously I'm not too concerned with the warranty.
Would a single cell offer less output and runtime or would it be the same as two cells?

I did a detailed analysis of energy capacity of a few different battery configurations in this thread, most of which are applicable to your above query:

OK, so here's my attempt at the most definitive answer possible for a regulated LED module which runs at or near spec from 3.7v up to 7.4v:

Reading the most recent posts for the actual tested capacities of the AW protected RCR123's, I'm going to go with 550 mAh @ 1 amp drain rate (data posted above by RTTR and HKJ, and which is probably comparable to 600 mAh @ 0.5 amp drain rate which was also posted above).

For the AW protected 17670's, I'm going to go with 0.99 x 1600 = 1584 mAh @ 2 amp drain rate, since the similarly-sized 17500's tested at 99% of their claimed 1100 mAh for that drain rate, from SilverFox's data cited in my earlier post (#9) in this thread.

For the AW protected 18650's (2600 mAh), I'm going to go with 2440 mAh @ 2 amp drain rate, from my interpolation of data cited in my earlier post (#14) in this thread.

So, again using a hypothetical wattage drain of 7.4 watts as in my Post # 9 (This was chosen for ease of amperage drain calculations - remember, we often only have capacity data for specific drain rates such as 1 or 2 amps, for example).

So for this example, we are drawing one amp from 2xRCR123 vs. drawing two amps in 1x17670 & 1x18650 to maintain the same wattage throughout our comparions:
  • AW RCR123's: (0.550Ah) x (3.7v) x (2 cells) = 4.07 watt-hours of total energy capacity
  • AW 17670's: (1.584Ah) x (3.7v) x (1 cell) = 5.86 watt-hours, a gain of ~45% for a configuration of the same length.
  • AW 18650's: (2.440Ah) x (3.7v) x (1 cell) = 9.03 watt-hours, a gain of ~120% for a configuration of the same length.
I have tried my best using data and information posted on CPF to come to a definitive comparison of the three common AW LiIon configurations for a regulated LED module which can operate at or at least near spec from 3.7v up to 7.4v. The only oversight (besides possible internal improvements to subsequent generations of LiIon cells) that I can see at the moment are slight differences in voltage drops under load - this will give the 18650 a slightly greater performance edge, as the calculated watt-hours will be slightly higher than the above (perhaps ~3.8v vs ~3.7v from the smaller LiIon cells of considerably less capacity :shrug:).


Edit: As an aside, let's see how many watt-hours we might get from 2x SureFire CR123 lithium primaries for the same wattage draw, as the OP for this thread was hoping to make that comparison:

7.4 watts / (~2.5 volts under load x 2 cells) = 1.48 amps, let's call that 1.5 amps.
Using this data from Silverfox and interpolating the total delivered watt-hours between the 1 amp and 2 amp drain rates:

3.123 watt-hours @ 1 amp, 2.073 watt-hours @ 2 amps, interpolated to 2.60 watt-hours @ 1.5 amps.
2.60 w-h x 2xCR123 = 5.2 watt - hours for 2xCR123.

Therefore, the only way to match the capacity of 2xCR123 lithium primaries in the same length host is to use 1x17670. In addition, the capacity of 1x18650 beats 2x CR123 lithium primaries by ~75% in a host of the same length, a very impressive achievement for rechargeable cells. :thumbsup:

I understand that this is for a relatively high drain condition (7.4 watts), as the Malkoff M60 generally operates at ~4.5 watts, but remember, we generally get LiIon mAh data posted for 1A & 2A drain rates in CPF, and I chose this 7.4 watts as a result of that, to facilitate comparisons between 1x LiIon and 2x LiIon. Things should be reasonably comparable for lower wattage conditions, as the above situations should still be proportional. I suppose I could re-run all this for a 7.4W / 2 = 3.6 watts condition (probably pretty close to the wattage of the OP's Malkoff M61), as we can come up with RCR123 capacities @ 0.5 amps & 18650 capacities @ 1.0 amp, but it should pretty much demonstrate the same thing.


And as 'Forrest Gump' said:

"And that's all I have to say about that."

Bottom line:
  • 2xRCR123: 4.1 watt-hours
  • 2xCR123: 5.2 watt-hours
  • 1x17670: 5.9 watt-hours
  • 1x18650: 9+ watt-hours

Expected runtimes will somewhat proportional to the watt-hour numbers above, although the end of the runs (considerably beyond the relatively flat-regulated regime) will be abrubt cutoffs or gradual declines to zero depending on the battery chemistry or electronics.
 
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benthiccracker

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I have AW RCR batteries in this Fury and carry (4) CR123 for backup. Never had a problem with running the AW batteries. I have taken the head off the Fury, no tools. The only thing is you can't really do anything after that except switch to a lower output head. So there is no sense in it. The tailcap is by Ronac. The clip is by Unique Titanium. The lanyard is by me.

Tricked Out Fury by benthiccrackerbrian, on Flickr
 
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