MXDL brand 3 wt Luxeon AAA on Ebay

I bought one of the MXDL 3 watt Luxeon AAA flashlight on eBay. Shipping and all it came to $16.00. I am very happy with it. Be it known that I am a surefire fanatic and I have nine of them. But for less than twenty-bucks this light is a darn good deal. It is well made, it is super bright with a great throw. The color of the bean is a slight bluish-white light. I just can't brag on the little light enough. The battery magazine thingy is plastic but the light body is aluminum. Very well made throughout. I ordered another one just a few minutes ago. Just thought I'd tell ya'll about it in case anyone is looking for an inexpensive luxeon.

The runtime on the AAA's must be pretty low. It shows 5 hours of runtime, but I bet usable light will be much less. Have you ran it for any amount of time to see how much it is dimming? Thanks!

Someone else posted that the MXDL was not a Luxeon light and the LEd would dim over use even with a fresh battery. Also they said quality was poor. Do a search for other posts.

I DD it with a LiIon 17670 and the LED was dead within 2 hours. It actually burnt out with dimming output then from a white tint to blue and then purple until nothing.

So, . . . .Junk. . . Don't buy?

I just put in a fresh set of Duracell batteries and I am turing it on for a test. I will leave it on and time it as it dims, goes out, etc. I'll post my findings later today.

I posted my first thoughts about it in another thread (with lots of clickable pics). Instead of repeating it here I'll just link you guys over.
Go on, click me

It's worth it if your planning on modding... otherwise it's a little iffy. There were a couple other threads on the mxdl, a search will turn up more info along with ppl's comments and mods done to this particular light.

Okay ya'll. I hate to eat this crow but here goes. I turned the light on to time it. Within ten minutes it had started intermittently going from bright to dim. It would go dim for a few seconds and without being touched it would get bright again. Then it would dim and stay dim for as long as fifteen minutes and then get bright again. I took it apart and checked the springs, etc. I greased the threads because they squeaked when it was being unscrewed. That made it smoother. Anyway, I have been unabel to find why it dims and brightens for no reason. I am sorry if anyone went out and bought one on my original recommendation. Maybe I just got a dud. It worked so darn good when I was just playing around with it. I still maintain that the body and the switch are pretty good for a cheap light. I also noticed a few fingerprint smudges on the reflector that are there from when it was assmbled. It looks like it would take a special tool to get into the reflector/bezel. What a disappointment. Crow chewed and swallowed now.

No, . . it's my fault. I asked you to do the test. Least I can do is to wash the plates you ate the crow off of. I hope you can discover the problem with it.

Well for one thing the emitter does not even use any thermal paste or epoxy to make contact with the heatsink. That for one will cause it to overheat and act in funny way's. Secondly i found that the negative contact of the emitter does not make proper contact with the body of the light. After i replaced the clone emitter with a luxIII i made a direct connection between the negative contact of the emitter to the metal disk that screws into the head. And lastly if your trying to figure out how to get that metal disk with the emitter out of the head, simply place two nails properly spaced out pointy end up on a vice and use that to unscrew it. Someone also suggested that you should use a brass dremmel brush bit to take the anodizing off the threads for better electrical contacts.

Needle nose pliers (sp?) is what I used to take the emitter out. Worked ok /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif