Silviron
Flashlight Enthusiast
Well, I have about a dozen barely started to halfway finished mods and scratch built lights (or their parts) sitting on my workbench. But I finally actually finished one of them last night!!!:
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I took the $12.97 (Walmart price) GARRITY 3AAA LED / single Nichia aluminum flashlight and turned it into a Li-Ion 18650 powered Luxeon 3 DD light.
Actually, a VERY easy mod, especially if you have a lathe to turn the heatsink. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
-----------------------------------------------------
First you remove the battery holder, then rip out the LED carrier. There is probably an easy way to remove it intact, but I just stuck in a big rod of steel and pounded it out.
By great good fortune, the Carclo hexagonal holders for 20 mm optics fit "perfectly" in the head. I just happened to use the CLEAR #10045 because that is what I had laying on the workbench at the time. Of course the white and black ones will fit just as well, as will the 1 watt hex holders. The Round Holders will fit, but are a little looser; they would need to be glued or shimmed in or something.
------------------------------------------------------------
(All following photos clickable for larger view)
I used one of the Carclo 6° X 25° linear optics for this light just because I wanted a "real world" application to test this optic further, but the 6°, 15° or 25° Carclo 20mm optics would fit just as well. The 6° or 15° would provide more usual type flashlight beam, and the round 25° optic would provide a better flood type light, but the properties of the linear optic provide a fairly wide, yet bright and narrow beam that could be quite useful........
(Like, walking along a forest trail at night, with the beam in a vertical orientation you can light up the path in front of you so that you can see any roots or rocks to trip you, view the trail in the middle distance ahead, and see any bare branches to poke you in the eye or knock off your hat, without having to move the light up and down.... A quick twist of the wrist, and you can orient the beam horizontally to look for the fork in the trail or search for the source of that growling noise you vaguely heard somewhere off to the side. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif )
The heatsink is lathe turned from a piece of one inch diameter aluminum rod. It is .370 inch (9.4mm) thick; .905 inch (23mm) diameter, with a .031 inch (0.8mm) thick"lip" of .963 inch (24.5mm) diameter to keep it from falling through the battery tube and provide a good negative contact between the flashlight body and the negative pole of the LED.
A SYAK binned Luxeon 3 Star board was "Arctic Silvered" to the center of the heatsink. I used a piece of Teflon rod that I had laying around to provide the positive terminal (to contact the battery) / insulated projection which was countersunk about 1/2 way into the center of the heatsink. Then, drilled an angled hole from near a positive contact on the Luxeon Star board to intersect the Teflon insulator, continued the hole straight down the center of the rod. An insulated wire was soldered to a positive terminal on the LED board then run through the center hole, then I used a "squished solder blob" on the end of the Teflon rod to make the positive battery contact
Then I drilled and tapped a hole for a brass 4/40 screw into the heatsink, right next to one of the negative contacts on the star board, screwed a proper length brass screw into the hole, and soldered the head of the screw directly to the negative solder pad of the Star board
(Sorry, no close-up photo to illustrate that...) /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
I buffed the anodizing off the very top lip of the battery tube with a unitized wheel to provide a better electrical contact to the
heatsink....
There are a couple of little tabs on the top of the optic holder that snap around the edges of the optic to keep it secure; They prevent the optic from being flush with the bezel of the flashlight head..... You could just grind them off and glue the optic in the holder or just pressure fit everything, but for ease of assembly and not having to juggle and try align a bunch of loose parts during assembly, I decided to grind a couple of little recesses into the bezel so that the little tabs fit right into them. And to rovide some water resistance, if not water proofing, I inserted an O-ring into the bezel
.
Once you assemble the complete light, the O-ring seals between the optic and the bezel, and the slots prevent the whole
assembly from rotating and changing the orientation of the linear optic.
-------------------------------------------------------
Initially, I planned to use a 20500 Lithium Ion battery (from an old cell phone battery pack) to power this light, as the diameter of that battery is just about perfect for the light's battery tube.... I'd have to make a spacer because battery is too short.... but as it turned out, the length of a 18650 Lithium Ion Cell is just about perfect, and since they are higher capacity AND more "energy dense" than the older 20500s, I went with that instead. A few O-rings around the battery, and it fits nicely into the flashlight. At the moment, I'm using an older surplus "bare" (unprotected) 18650 1400mah Li-Ion battery from an old Sony cell phone battery pack, but as soon as he gets some more in stock, I'm going to order some PROTECTED 18650s from "AW" and use them.... Not only are they higher capacity, but they are MUCH safer than using an unprotected Lithium Ion battery.
There IS enough room inside the battery tube to wire in one of BatterySpace's single cell protection circuits parallel to the cell lengthwise.... But since all of my surplus 18650s are lower capacity, I'll just wait until AW gets more in stock. No point in wasting the time AND a protection circuit when I can only get 3/4 the power out of them.
Now, if one could find a protected 20650 Li-Ion cell with about 3000mah or 3200mah capacity, that would be perfect for this light /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
-------------------------------------------------
Here is an "exploded view of all of the components of this light:
You will notice that the head of the flashlight is the silver color of bare aluminum, while the rest of the body is anodized blue. This was purely an accident. While Garrity does make a natural aluminum colored light of this model, and you could mix & match parts between them for contrasting colors, it turns out that the stuff I use for a cleaner / degreaser in my ultrasonic cleaner is almost as good an aluminum anodize stripper as is a lye (sodium hydroxide) solution. After I ground out the little slots in the bezel, I tossed the head into the ultrasonic to clean off the aluminum chips etc. By the time I got around to taking it out, 90% of the blue anodizing was gone. I threw it back in for a few more minutes, then polished it on a buffing wheel, then hand polished it with some Flitz® metal polish paste. Turned out to look pretty decent.
---------------------------------------
This particular light with the current battery (which puts out 4.03V fresh off the charger) draws 750ma of current (fresh off the charger) and produces a maximum of 256 LUX at 1 meter.
I hope I'll get at least 1 amp and at least 325 LUX when I can get some new batteries. I'm not going to do any runtime tests on this light, at least until I get some protected batteries.
----------------------------------------------------------
BEAMSHOTS????
Yep, here are a few:
---------------------------------------
Here is a beamshot of the light shining on my usual 20 X 30 inch light "target" from about 2 feet:
---------------------------
Here it is inside a dark room from about 25 feet with the beam in a horizontal orientation:
--------------------------------------------
And here it is in the same room at about 20 ft with the beam in a vertical orientation:
Sorry about the fuzziness of this shot... I didn't feel like getting out a tripod, and was not as steady as I should have been... but it will at least give you an idea.
-----------------------------------------------------------
The "throw" on this light is about 50 feet of pretty decent brightness. It will work out to about 100 feet before it gets too dim to be of much use.... But it DOES light up a pretty wide (or tall) area all at once. Using a higher bin Luxeon or especially a 6° optic would give you a much increased throw, but as this is intended as a kind of a special purpose light, I'm not sure that throw really matters, as the main use (at least as far as I have considered) is indoors or in dense woods where you rarely have the opportunity or need to illuminate more than 50 feet or so.
Once I get through tinkering with this light, I'll probably "Arctic Silver" the heatsink-LED-optic assembly into the head, or at least slather some thermal transfer grease between the sink and the body for more improved heatsinking.
-----------------------------------------------------
If there is enough interest by others in doing this mod, I might be willing to make available bare heatsinks, or complete "drop-in" heatsink - LED - optic assemblies in the shop.... PM me if you would be interested.
---------------
I took the $12.97 (Walmart price) GARRITY 3AAA LED / single Nichia aluminum flashlight and turned it into a Li-Ion 18650 powered Luxeon 3 DD light.
Actually, a VERY easy mod, especially if you have a lathe to turn the heatsink. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
-----------------------------------------------------
First you remove the battery holder, then rip out the LED carrier. There is probably an easy way to remove it intact, but I just stuck in a big rod of steel and pounded it out.
By great good fortune, the Carclo hexagonal holders for 20 mm optics fit "perfectly" in the head. I just happened to use the CLEAR #10045 because that is what I had laying on the workbench at the time. Of course the white and black ones will fit just as well, as will the 1 watt hex holders. The Round Holders will fit, but are a little looser; they would need to be glued or shimmed in or something.
------------------------------------------------------------
(All following photos clickable for larger view)
I used one of the Carclo 6° X 25° linear optics for this light just because I wanted a "real world" application to test this optic further, but the 6°, 15° or 25° Carclo 20mm optics would fit just as well. The 6° or 15° would provide more usual type flashlight beam, and the round 25° optic would provide a better flood type light, but the properties of the linear optic provide a fairly wide, yet bright and narrow beam that could be quite useful........
(Like, walking along a forest trail at night, with the beam in a vertical orientation you can light up the path in front of you so that you can see any roots or rocks to trip you, view the trail in the middle distance ahead, and see any bare branches to poke you in the eye or knock off your hat, without having to move the light up and down.... A quick twist of the wrist, and you can orient the beam horizontally to look for the fork in the trail or search for the source of that growling noise you vaguely heard somewhere off to the side. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif )
The heatsink is lathe turned from a piece of one inch diameter aluminum rod. It is .370 inch (9.4mm) thick; .905 inch (23mm) diameter, with a .031 inch (0.8mm) thick"lip" of .963 inch (24.5mm) diameter to keep it from falling through the battery tube and provide a good negative contact between the flashlight body and the negative pole of the LED.
A SYAK binned Luxeon 3 Star board was "Arctic Silvered" to the center of the heatsink. I used a piece of Teflon rod that I had laying around to provide the positive terminal (to contact the battery) / insulated projection which was countersunk about 1/2 way into the center of the heatsink. Then, drilled an angled hole from near a positive contact on the Luxeon Star board to intersect the Teflon insulator, continued the hole straight down the center of the rod. An insulated wire was soldered to a positive terminal on the LED board then run through the center hole, then I used a "squished solder blob" on the end of the Teflon rod to make the positive battery contact
Then I drilled and tapped a hole for a brass 4/40 screw into the heatsink, right next to one of the negative contacts on the star board, screwed a proper length brass screw into the hole, and soldered the head of the screw directly to the negative solder pad of the Star board
(Sorry, no close-up photo to illustrate that...) /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
I buffed the anodizing off the very top lip of the battery tube with a unitized wheel to provide a better electrical contact to the
heatsink....
There are a couple of little tabs on the top of the optic holder that snap around the edges of the optic to keep it secure; They prevent the optic from being flush with the bezel of the flashlight head..... You could just grind them off and glue the optic in the holder or just pressure fit everything, but for ease of assembly and not having to juggle and try align a bunch of loose parts during assembly, I decided to grind a couple of little recesses into the bezel so that the little tabs fit right into them. And to rovide some water resistance, if not water proofing, I inserted an O-ring into the bezel
.Once you assemble the complete light, the O-ring seals between the optic and the bezel, and the slots prevent the whole
assembly from rotating and changing the orientation of the linear optic.
-------------------------------------------------------
Initially, I planned to use a 20500 Lithium Ion battery (from an old cell phone battery pack) to power this light, as the diameter of that battery is just about perfect for the light's battery tube.... I'd have to make a spacer because battery is too short.... but as it turned out, the length of a 18650 Lithium Ion Cell is just about perfect, and since they are higher capacity AND more "energy dense" than the older 20500s, I went with that instead. A few O-rings around the battery, and it fits nicely into the flashlight. At the moment, I'm using an older surplus "bare" (unprotected) 18650 1400mah Li-Ion battery from an old Sony cell phone battery pack, but as soon as he gets some more in stock, I'm going to order some PROTECTED 18650s from "AW" and use them.... Not only are they higher capacity, but they are MUCH safer than using an unprotected Lithium Ion battery.
There IS enough room inside the battery tube to wire in one of BatterySpace's single cell protection circuits parallel to the cell lengthwise.... But since all of my surplus 18650s are lower capacity, I'll just wait until AW gets more in stock. No point in wasting the time AND a protection circuit when I can only get 3/4 the power out of them.
Now, if one could find a protected 20650 Li-Ion cell with about 3000mah or 3200mah capacity, that would be perfect for this light /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
-------------------------------------------------
Here is an "exploded view of all of the components of this light:
You will notice that the head of the flashlight is the silver color of bare aluminum, while the rest of the body is anodized blue. This was purely an accident. While Garrity does make a natural aluminum colored light of this model, and you could mix & match parts between them for contrasting colors, it turns out that the stuff I use for a cleaner / degreaser in my ultrasonic cleaner is almost as good an aluminum anodize stripper as is a lye (sodium hydroxide) solution. After I ground out the little slots in the bezel, I tossed the head into the ultrasonic to clean off the aluminum chips etc. By the time I got around to taking it out, 90% of the blue anodizing was gone. I threw it back in for a few more minutes, then polished it on a buffing wheel, then hand polished it with some Flitz® metal polish paste. Turned out to look pretty decent.
---------------------------------------
This particular light with the current battery (which puts out 4.03V fresh off the charger) draws 750ma of current (fresh off the charger) and produces a maximum of 256 LUX at 1 meter.
I hope I'll get at least 1 amp and at least 325 LUX when I can get some new batteries. I'm not going to do any runtime tests on this light, at least until I get some protected batteries.
----------------------------------------------------------
BEAMSHOTS????
Yep, here are a few:
---------------------------------------
Here is a beamshot of the light shining on my usual 20 X 30 inch light "target" from about 2 feet:
---------------------------
Here it is inside a dark room from about 25 feet with the beam in a horizontal orientation:
--------------------------------------------
And here it is in the same room at about 20 ft with the beam in a vertical orientation:
Sorry about the fuzziness of this shot... I didn't feel like getting out a tripod, and was not as steady as I should have been... but it will at least give you an idea.
-----------------------------------------------------------
The "throw" on this light is about 50 feet of pretty decent brightness. It will work out to about 100 feet before it gets too dim to be of much use.... But it DOES light up a pretty wide (or tall) area all at once. Using a higher bin Luxeon or especially a 6° optic would give you a much increased throw, but as this is intended as a kind of a special purpose light, I'm not sure that throw really matters, as the main use (at least as far as I have considered) is indoors or in dense woods where you rarely have the opportunity or need to illuminate more than 50 feet or so.
Once I get through tinkering with this light, I'll probably "Arctic Silver" the heatsink-LED-optic assembly into the head, or at least slather some thermal transfer grease between the sink and the body for more improved heatsinking.
-----------------------------------------------------
If there is enough interest by others in doing this mod, I might be willing to make available bare heatsinks, or complete "drop-in" heatsink - LED - optic assemblies in the shop.... PM me if you would be interested.
