Dorcy 1AAA tail-switch Problems?

I'm pretty enthusiastic about the Dorcy 1AAA 1LED flashlight - as it gives very good performance for basically a realistic everyday flashlight price.

Please see these threads:

Dorcy 1AAA #2 (vs ArcAAA vs Ultra-G vs Dorcy #1)

Dorcy 1AAA vs. ArcAAA vs. Ultra-G

Dorcy 1AAA Beam adjustment

However recently I noticed that the tail-switch on my #1 Dorcy 1AAA (the blue one) started to become less reliable. Somtimes it would not switch ON when screwed all the way down - other times it may not switch on when the tail switch is pressed (even though the end cap is screwed down enough that the light should switch ON).

I did the usual stuff like cleaning the threads and end of the body tube where the contact is made. Undid the keyring clip and removed the tail-switch button and thoroughly cleaned the "X" shaped contacts and the spring end - using things like WD-40 and other cleaners.......

inside of the tail-switch cap and end of the body tube with battery -


and although the thing would seem to be working OK - eventually it would not light up. Oh, it was a simple fix just loosening the tail cap and using the keyring clip and rotate the button in the cap a little and the light would work fine.

tail-switch button and body tube


for a while the orientation of the button in the cap seemed solve the problem - see the faint ">" mark on the cap pointing to one end of the keyring-clip (I marked it red here) - if I got that to point roughly at the "Taiwan" marking, the light seemed OK - then it was unreliable this morning failing to switch ON when pressed or screwed down.

So from such a very simple mechanism - the spring is in contact with the "-"ve battery terminal which is connected to the "X" contact in the tail-switch, to turn ON - the ends of the "X" contacts make the electrical connection to the end of the body tube
- like I said simple and should be intrinically reliable.

So I am at a loss to why the tail-switch became unreliable.

Any suggestions?

Oh, BTW - in desperation - I tried a different AAA battery
and guess what?
the light now seems reliable - I've only just done this, so can't say for sure if this is the cure -
but it may be that the hole gouged by the spring on the "-"ve terminal/end of the AAA battery (shown in the image above) may be preventing a good contact?
Seems fairly UNlikely to me -
but I'm running out of ideas and clutching at straws.....

This makes me wonder if the problem was the battery. Often one or both contacts are simply pressed against the true electrodes of the cell. If it had started to leak inside it might have pushed the contact away. Did you check the voltage of the cell? With my Dorcy it needs about 0.8 V to start, but will stay lit down to about 0.3 V. Cell will recover enough voltage to start after setting for a time. The contacts on this side are just the spring, cross piece (four ears) and the back of the tube. The threads don't enter into it. The only other thing would be the other end. Contacts or the boost board itself.

But remember: lifetime warranty on un-modified. You did save your receipt?

On mine I pressed on the spring until the end of the sharp wire was facing doward, and would no longer snag or cut into the battery. That helped the light work a lot better.

See this too: link

[ QUOTE ]
gwbaltzell said:
This makes me wonder if the problem was the battery. Often one or both contacts are simply pressed against the true electrodes of the cell. If it had started to leak inside it might have pushed the contact away. Did you check the voltage of the cell? With my Dorcy it needs about 0.8 V to start, but will stay lit down to about 0.3 V.

[/ QUOTE ]

Many thanks for the suggestions -

The AAA battery was the original supplied - when the light is working - it still manges to give very good brightness - so as far as I can tell it's nowhere near depleted and no sign or hint of leakage.

Measuring with an analog multi-meter - the voltage of the "suspect" AAA battery gave a shade over 1.4V - whether with the lightest of touches, or really jamming down with the probes to make hard contact, to see if I could disturb any internal bad connections.

The replacement AAA battery measured 1.55V.

[ QUOTE ]
gwbaltzell said:
The contacts on this side are just the spring, cross piece (four ears) and the back of the tube. The threads don't enter into it. The only other thing would be the other end. Contacts or the boost board itself.


[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks, I did realize that the threads don't make any of the electrical connections - I did describe the switch ON mechanics - where I used the description of an "X" shaped contact instead of your use of "ears" - I was hoping the images would have help make it clear.

Like they say "so far so good" -
the replacement battery seems to make the flashlight work fine - I have not yet been able to make the tail-switch fail/unreliable - so far it looks like the battery - but I can't come up with a logical explanation why......

Because I tried the "suspect" battery in my #2 Dorcy 1AAA (the gold one) and it seems to work fine - I have tried rotating the tail-switch button in the cap and it still works OK.

The battery from #2 Dorcy was tried in the problematic #1 Dorcy - it was better - but can be made to become problematic - this battery has a similar hole gouged by the spring-end but not quite as deep as the "suspect" battery.

Whereas the replacement AAA battery is an Energizer which comes with a built-in depression in the "-"ve terminal/end.



Other combinations -

#1 (blue) with tail-switch #2 (gold)
"supect" AAA - unreliable
AAA supplied with #2 - unreliable
Energizer AAA - OK

#2 (gold) with tail-switch #1 (blue)
"suspect", AAA supplied with #2, and Energizer AAA all worked OK as far as I tried.

Any other suggestions?

[Edit: from my other combinations - logic seems to point at a problem of either of the supplied AAA batteries with the #1 Dorcy (blue) body - ie: the contact at the other "+"ve end? -
and perhaps NOT the tail-switch or the "-"ve battery end at all???]

Solved - NOT tail-switch

[ QUOTE ]
UnknownVT said:
Other combinations -

#1 (blue) with tail-switch #2 (gold)
"supect" AAA - unreliable
AAA supplied with #2 - unreliable
Energizer AAA - OK

#2 (gold) with tail-switch #1 (blue)
"suspect", AAA supplied with #2, and Energizer AAA all worked OK as far as I tried.

Any other suggestions?

[Edit: from my other combinations - logic seems to point at a problem of either of the supplied AAA batteries with the #1 Dorcy (blue) body - ie: the contact at the other "+"ve end? -
and perhaps NOT the tail-switch or the "-"ve battery end at all???]

[/ QUOTE ]

Well dang it! if it wasn't the combination of the #1 Dorcy (blue) body and those two supplied AAA batteries.

and NOT the tail-switch at all.

Once I thought about it - as in the quote/edit above -
all I did was to unscrew the Dorcy 1AAA head and gave the "spring" "+"ve contact a bit of a pull to lengthen the spring and a good clean with some WD-40 (and while I was at it, cleaned the body tube end, and the contact washer and circuit board "ears"/lobes - then also the "+"ve terminals/ends of the AAA batteries) - and put the thing back together.



Voila! it works fine with any of the 3 AAA batteries including the "suspect" one - I don't seem to be able to make it unreliable any more.

Amazing - I would never have suspected the "+"ve end of the battery and the spring contact - which sits really neatly on the terminal, to have any problems making good contact -
but it apparently (obviously) did...... hmmmmmm..... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon3.gif

Re: Solved - NOT tail-switch

Yes -- I've bought a good two dozen of these little gems and stretched out the tail spring on all of the ones I opened up (many I gave away to friends unopened). I found that it improved the switch action, and it's feel too. I think it does the job better than flipping over the X inside the tail button. And it only takes a second to do.

Cheers,

Dave

Re: Solved - NOT tail-switch

[ QUOTE ]
avusblue said:
and stretched out the tail spring on all of the ones I opened up <snip>.
I found that it improved the switch action, and it's feel too. I think it does the job better than flipping over the X inside the tail button. And it only takes a second to do.


[/ QUOTE ]

Just for clarity the spring I had to stretch and clean to make that Dorcy #1 (blue) reliable was the one in the front - at the head, attached to the circuit board - ie: the "+"ve terminal contact.

Although stretching the tail-switch spring and the other hint of bending the spring end away from the battery inward toward the spring (to stop the gouging) are also good ideas.

Thanks,

Re: Solved - NOT tail-switch

[ QUOTE ]
UnknownVT said:
NOT the tail-switch at all.
<snip>
Amazing - I would never have suspected the "+"ve end of the battery and the spring contact - which sits really neatly on the terminal, to have any problems making good contact -
but it apparently (obviously) did...... hmmmmmm..... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon3.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

I wonder how many have blamed the tail-switch
when it could have been a problem of bad contact between the spring connection to the circuit board in the head and the "+"ve end of the AAA battery??

What still puzzles me a bit is why the Energizer AAA battery worked, while both the supplied AAA batteries I had would cause problems.

They seem to be of the same length or close enough not to make any practical difference:


the "+"ve ends are similar - if anything I think the supplied AAA batteries might stand a better chance of making better contact as there seems to be more exposed metal -


Any suggestions?

Re: Solved - NOT tail-switch

Thanks for the input here. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif
I have 2 of these aaa dorcys that usually go with me to the nightclubs on the weekends. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
They really get some drunken abuse there as the music takes control of me on the dance floor. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/buttrock.gif
I too started noticing issues with thier on-off actions, and can now fix them thanks to eveyones input on these. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif
These really are bright for single led lights. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif