The big LIGHTS thread 2011-2014

-Archie-

wishitwasallflat wrote:

It seems like the contact with the back of the relector was stopping some connection

Actually, it's other way around: reflector was causing electric shortage. You're lucky, BTW: in many cases, such shortage can permanently damage the LED or driver circuitry.

so I put a little bit of blue insulating tape on the back of the reflector to try that -
-snip-
Is this ok to leave as a solution or should I do something else?

Your solution is absolutely correct, but the material used is questionable: the electric tape is relatively soft, and may eventually be penetrated by sharp edges of LED base. I'd use thin insulating spacers made of teflon or similar plastic, or pieces of Kapton tape.

wishitwasallflat

-Archie- wrote:

wishitwasallflat wrote:

It seems like the contact with the back of the relector was stopping some connection

Actually, it's other way around: reflector was causing electric shortage. You're lucky, BTW: in many cases, such shortage can permanently damage the LED or driver circuitry.

so I put a little bit of blue insulating tape on the back of the reflector to try that -
-snip-
Is this ok to leave as a solution or should I do something else?

Your solution is absolutely correct, but the material used is questionable: the electric tape is relatively soft, and may eventually be penetrated by sharp edges of LED base. I'd use thin insulating spacers made of teflon or similar plastic, or pieces of Kapton tape.

Thanks Archie - where could I buy a spacer like that that would fit and/or Kapton tape

diy

Agree it should have had a spacer over the led to protect from shorting. Short term you could use a cut out section of plastic from a ready meal dish which will have thermal resistance. The swarf you removed was probably unrelated to the problem.

wishitwasallflat

diy wrote:

Agree it should have had a spacer over the led to protect from shorting. Short term you could use a cut out section of plastic from a ready meal dish which will have thermal resistance. The swarf you removed was probably unrelated to the problem.

Thanks DIY I can get a ready meal dish easy and Archie I did find some web links to order to kapton tape but for how often I may use it I will probably try to cut a spacer from a dish instead. I have another 501b where the drop in has gone (thanks again DIY for the diagnostic tips on your vid) which has a spacer so will see if I can craft something from that. Yesterday was a bad day - both torches gone on the blink and I broke a spoke on my spare rear wheel ( main rear spoke broke a few days earlier) so I am grounded until I sort it all out - departs feeling very sorry for himself ... still grateful for all the help. On the brighter side though excuse to order a new drop in and/or another torch and some new wheels :!:

diy

Cost of a drop in is almost the same as a torch. For me it's always handy to have some spares.

wishitwasallflat

diy wrote:

Cost of a drop in is almost the same as a torch. For me it's always handy to have some spares.

Good point , I've contacted the seller to see if they have any willingness on warrenty but am not hopeful will check your signature links for a new one I think.

beerglass007

Hi all

I brought one of these lights and wondering what the standard supplied battery is and run times

http://www.lightmalls.com/3600-lumen-3t6-led-high-power-bicycle-light-for-3-cree-xm-l-t6-4-mode-led-bike-light-kit

I see lightmalls do other batteries packs, does anyone know what a better ( longer runtime battery ) is from their website please?

I need a run time of about 2 - 3 hours roughly

Thanks

Neal_

beerglass007 wrote:

Hi all

I brought one of these lights and wondering what the standard supplied battery is and run times

http://www.lightmalls.com/3600-lumen-3t6-led-high-power-bicycle-light-for-3-cree-xm-l-t6-4-mode-led-bike-light-kit

I see lightmalls do other batteries packs, does anyone know what a better ( longer runtime battery ) is from their website please?

I need a run time of about 2 - 3 hours roughly

Thanks

I ordered the same light and the below battery on 25th Oct but not arrived yet. How long did your light take to arrive?

http://www.lightmalls.com/waterproof-4- ... -magic-bag

This battery appears to be the best one from lightmalls as it is visually identical (minus the branding) to the below Magicshine battery which uses good quality BAK cells, time will tell if it's better than the battery pack that comes with the light

http://www.magicshine.co.uk/batteries/r ... -6008.html

Ouija

beerglass007 wrote:

Hi all

I brought one of these lights and wondering what the standard supplied battery is and run times

http://www.lightmalls.com/3600-lumen-3t6-led-high-power-bicycle-light-for-3-cree-xm-l-t6-4-mode-led-bike-light-kit

I see lightmalls do other batteries packs, does anyone know what a better ( longer runtime battery ) is from their website please?

I need a run time of about 2 - 3 hours roughly

Thanks

On average, your going to get about 3hrs runtime on one of those battery packs with only a single T6. Divide by three if you've got all three T6's lit up (say an hour). They're a bit flawed as that light doesn't allow you to adjust the brightness of the T6, just switch them on and off. And any light with more than one T6 in it should really come with a six cell battery pack anyway, to reduce the amount of stress on each cell and give longer runtimes. So either look for a 6 cell 'endurance' pack or parallel connect two standard packs together with a reversed Y-Slitter cable (not the one that magicshine makes). Something like these...




Just look for a 2 Way DC Power Splitter Cable

Or failing that, just make one (it isn't too difficult).

diy

Didn't someone post an amp test on that light, I thought the current draw was not that high? No more than 1A per LED?

Making up a 6 or 8 pack would be fairly simple, but I'd want to go removable cells for charging.

Ouija

diy wrote:

Didn't someone post an amp test on that light, I thought the current draw was not that high? No more than 1A per LED?

Making up a 6 or 8 pack would be fairly simple, but I'd want to go removable cells for charging.

Might be the case, but reviews suggest only a 50 min runtime on all three T6's, which isn't a lot, even at a reduced ampage.

beerglass007

Hmmmm

Sounds like a bad light. Whats a better light then ?

For the same sort of money

inkz

So I used the Torchy batteries out the other night on medium because they can't do high without tripping the protection. What's funny is once they had run down a bit they started working in all modes as the current had dropped lol.

On a brighter note (see what I did there?) my Senybor batteries work great in all modes. They are a bit shorter as well so seem ideal. Same price pretty much just slightly less runtime, prob wouldn't notice it.

My mate (who has a Troute Liberator) was complaining that I was casting his shadow when behind him unless he put his light on high lol. Managed to get some serious speed up with the two torches, why buy anything else?

Just one torch on medium is plenty for dimly lit roads on the commute. I run two anyway, just to use the batteries evenly

I think they look pretty cool. I use the cateye on blink mode to make it all legal like

Ouija

Yeah, one of the advantages to those torches are that the small reflector and recessed emitter has less chance of blinding oncoming traffic if they are angled down slightly, unlike the big open faced Magicshine copies. And while there are other lights which are brighter or give longer run times those torches give the best light output for least amount of battery that needs to be lugged around (a brighter 8v light with separate battery pack would require double the amount of batteries to get the same run times, for instance). But their main advantage, as you've found out, is that the slightly better beam pattern renders the medium output mode quite useful (it's often not bright enough or too diffused to be useful on some other lights).

+1 for the Senybors. Had my four for over a year (2800 5.6a drain version) and they've been rock solid. Though they do say the lifespan of a Li-Ion battery is only three years from date of manufacture (weather you use it or not), so i'll be gutted if i can't find the exact same model to replace them with in two years time.

Ouija

wishitwasallflat wrote:

and then removed the reflector and there was a tiny little bit of what looked like crumpled up tin foil (but very very thin - gold leaf level thinness) lying over the emmiter. I flipped the torch over and it fell out -


.

You sure when you flipped the torch over the almost invisible and totally transparent protection ring didn't fall out also? It looks like a shuriken, made out of transparent plastic with a hole in the middle for the emitter and shields the emitter from shorting out on the back of the reflector. May of been too preoccupied with the silver bit to notice the ring dropping to the floor (almost invisible to find once you've dropped it).

wishitwasallflat

Ouija wrote:

You sure when you flipped the torch over the almost invisible and totally transparent protection ring didn't fall out also? It looks like a shuriken, made out of transparent plastic with a hole in the middle for the emitter and shields the emitter from shorting out on the back of the reflector. May of been too preoccupied with the silver bit to notice the ring dropping to the floor (almost invisible to find once you've dropped it).

I may very well have done - I didn't inspect this torch very closely before this cause it worked perfectly out of the box and the ring may well have dropped out on the garage floor. Ah well you live and learn and it still works so I am lucky I guess.

Ouija

beerglass007 wrote:

Hmmmm

Sounds like a bad light. Whats a better light then ?

For the same sort of money

I don't think there is at that price point. If you want 2000+ output and long run times your either going to have to go for a more expensive 2 light head with bigger battery pack or simply buy two single heads/packs and mount them either side of your stem, which also has the advantage of independent control (have the lights facing in slightly different directions for more flood off road or point one closer to your front wheel on a lower setting and one further away on a higher setting etc).

Probably the best off road one i own is the Inton 2 XML-t6 head with variable brightness control,op reflectors and a endurance six cell pack (about 2.5/3 hrs on full beam)...





.. but quite hard to find recently (used to be able to pick them up for £80).

Something like this



falls into a similar category, but i would probably feel the urge to swap out the reflectors for orange peel ones and it still only comes with a 4 cell pack (1.5 / 2 hrs), which isn't good (though it does allow independent control of both lights and as three modes).

But for that price you could pick up two cheap separate heads with two battery packs (though they'd probably only have two modes... full and pointless).

My solution is to use two four volt versions of the MagicShine copies and a four or six cell pack (doubling the run times to 3 or 4.5hrs respectively on full brightness). Brightness drops by about 15% when you use a T6 that runs at 4.2v but you double the run times with out altering the number of battery cells you've got to lug around with you. Op reflectors and diffusing lenses are quite easy to find for those models if you want more flood than throw (or a combination of the two).

supersonic

After emailing FedEx regarding their charges, they waived the fees! And the tax too.

coursemyhorse

Hi all, I have my surplus of 18650 batteries up for sale in my for sale thread HERE incase any of you need some. Cheers.

arthur_scrimshaw

Was going to get a Trustfire A8 but these seem to get a good rating - deal ships with two 26650 batteries plus charger

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350548464014

Ouija

Arthur Scrimshaw wrote:

Was going to get a Trustfire A8 but these seem to get a good rating - deal ships with two 26650 batteries plus charger

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350548464014

Looked at those but decided they were just too big. Big smooth reflectors equal spotty beams. Part of the reason i went for the A8, as it has the same head and reflector dimensions as the ubiquitous ultrafire 501/502 torches and doesn't blind oncoming traffic as much as open faced reflectors.

alfablue

I am looking for a suitable flasher for commuting, perhaps 100 / 120 lumens. I have a Lezyne Femto (only 15 lumens, not enough) and a Fenix L2D (180 Lumens) too much, and some 502b T6 torches (way too much). Ideally I would like a small single AA torch with an efficient emitter but with a modest output and good run time, any suggestions?

arthur_scrimshaw

Ouija wrote:

Arthur Scrimshaw wrote:

Was going to get a Trustfire A8 but these seem to get a good rating - deal ships with two 26650 batteries plus charger

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350548464014

Looked at those but decided they were just too big. Big smooth reflectors equal spotty beams. Part of the reason i went for the A8, as it has the same head and reflector dimensions as the ubiquitous ultrafire 501/502 torches and doesn't blind oncoming traffic as much as open faced reflectors.

Ahh great, thanks for this, I'll stick to the original plan (A8) then.

apreading

alfablue wrote:

I am looking for a suitable flasher for commuting, perhaps 100 / 120 lumens. I have a Lezyne Femto (only 15 lumens, not enough) and a Fenix L2D (180 Lumens) too much, and some 502b T6 torches (way too much). Ideally I would like a small single AA torch with an efficient emitter but with a modest output and good run time, any suggestions?

Its not the light that most will recommend you on here, but you say that you ideally want single AA and that the Fenix L2D is too much - have you looked at the Fenix L10D? Just over half the lumens of the K2D that you have and single AA - seems exactly what you have asked for. I think the flashing mode is slower on them than the other options too, which is better in my mind - the strobe is too fast for a flasher on all the chinese torches I have.

Or you could look at the blackburn mars click - a super small and very visible flasher - great in addition to a main light to be seen - has a very wide angle of visibility that you wont get from a torch.

alfablue

apreading wrote:

alfablue wrote:

I am looking for a suitable flasher for commuting, perhaps 100 / 120 lumens. I have a Lezyne Femto (only 15 lumens, not enough) and a Fenix L2D (180 Lumens) too much, and some 502b T6 torches (way too much). Ideally I would like a small single AA torch with an efficient emitter but with a modest output and good run time, any suggestions?

Its not the light that most will recommend you on here, but you say that you ideally want single AA and that the Fenix L2D is too much - have you looked at the Fenix L10D? Just over half the lumens of the K2D that you have and single AA - seems exactly what you have asked for. I think the flashing mode is slower on them than the other options too, which is better in my mind - the strobe is too fast for a flasher on all the chinese torches I have.

Or you could look at the blackburn mars click - a super small and very visible flasher - great in addition to a main light to be seen - has a very wide angle of visibility that you wont get from a torch.

Thanks Apreading, great idea (why didn't I think of that!), only downside is the price, it seems to be about £43 As you say the chinese torches tend to strobe too fast, but I guess if it is a lower output one it might do. I did get a 150 lumens (my estimate) single AA for around £7, but its still a bit powerful, what would be great is one thats "detuned" to 100 ish lumens that costs me £5

diy

For road riding I use a pair of 501bs on low in urban areas med in dark areas. I supplement this with a couple of Frog copy flashers that I bought from Aldi for about £3. Flashers don't need to be that bright. So I reckon you probably already have what you need if you have space for them.

Neal_

Neal_ wrote:

-Archie- wrote:

Neal_ wrote:

thanks, I'll stick with cheap 2s2p packs

BTW, currently I can't judge on other separate packs from LM, as I've never tried them. But if teh're made from the same cells as the battery from Triple XM-L kit, it won't worth buying even despite of price...

But one battery you've linked to, is interesting one, though:
http://www.lightmalls.com/waterproof-4- ... -magic-bag
It looks like genuine MagicShine "2nd. generation" rubber battery - and if it indeed is, then it should be fine. They're using the 18650 cells from Chinese BAK factory, of really high quality.

I'd imagine the cheapest pack is made from the same rubbish cells but it is that waterproof rubber coated pack that I was going to buy as it has a higher stated mAh and I'd already noticed it looks identical to the Magicshine pack so fingers crossed it turns out to be one with the BAK cells. I doubt it'll all arrive for a while and I've got no way of testing it all properly but I'll post up my run time findings eventually.

My 3xT6 light and spare battery pack from Lightmalls has arrived (ordered 25/10/12 attempted delivered 9/11/12!!) in very short time and does appear to be a great light but my god the batteries are poor. I used it for the first time last night as I only picked it up from the post office yesterday but before using it I unscrewed it to put some thermal paste between the body and LED pill, the LED's seemed well glued to the pill so I abandoned removing them to put thermal paste under them but the body gets hot quickly so there seems to be good heat dissipation.

I’m fairly certain the extra battery pack that appeared to be a Magicshine pack with BAK cells is just a cheap poor quality pack in a waterproof cover. At home I used this pack to test the light and it didn’t take long for the light to switch itself off due to the pack being discharged but worryingly it only took about 10 minutes before the light on the charger went green! This pack only lasted about 30 minutes on the ride and the other that came with the light lasted about an hour but neither were being used on full power for all of that period. I don’t have a multimeter yet to get a better idea of what is happening but I’m wondering if the protection circuit is cutting in too early as the light wasn’t dimming.

As it is my 3xT6 light isn’t very useful for the length of rides I do so not sure whether to try out this battery pack 8.4V 10000mAh 4x26650 Battery Set For LED Bike Light which specifically states ” it can runing more than 200minutes at 3T6 bike light on high mode” for £20ish or spend £40ish on an official UK stock Magicshine pack with BAK cells??? It’s not turning out to be the easy cheap solution I had hoped :roll:

alfablue

diy wrote:

For road riding I use a pair of 501bs on low in urban areas med in dark areas. I supplement this with a couple of Frog copy flashers that I bought from Aldi for about £3. Flashers don't need to be that bright. So I reckon you probably already have what you need if you have space for them.

Cheers DIY.

Ouija

Neal_ wrote:

My 3xT6 light and spare battery pack from Lightmalls has arrived (ordered 25/10/12 attempted delivered 9/11/12!!) in very short time and does appear to be a great light but my god the batteries are poor. I used it for the first time last night as I only picked it up from the post office yesterday but before using it I unscrewed it to put some thermal paste between the body and LED pill, the LED's seemed well glued to the pill so I abandoned removing them to put thermal paste under them but the body gets hot quickly so there seems to be good heat dissipation.

I’m fairly certain the extra battery pack that appeared to be a Magicshine pack with BAK cells is just a cheap poor quality pack in a waterproof cover. At home I used this pack to test the light and it didn’t take long for the light to switch itself off due to the pack being discharged but worryingly it only took about 10 minutes before the light on the charger went green! This pack only lasted about 30 minutes on the ride and the other that came with the light lasted about an hour but neither were being used on full power for all of that period. I don’t have a multimeter yet to get a better idea of what is happening but I’m wondering if the protection circuit is cutting in too early as the light wasn’t dimming.

As it is my 3xT6 light isn’t very useful for the length of rides I do so not sure whether to try out this battery pack 8.4V 10000mAh 4x26650 Battery Set For LED Bike Light which specifically states ” it can runing more than 200minutes at 3T6 bike light on high mode” for £20ish or spend £40ish on an official UK stock Magicshine pack with BAK cells??? It’s not turning out to be the easy cheap solution I had hoped :roll:

A 4400mAh 8v battery pack should run a t6 for three hours (or 3 T6's for 1 hour) roughly. If you've got one of those awful three in one head T6's like this...



then you're not going to get much run times from a 4 cell pack (see my post on the previous page). I've been riding for four/five hours every night this week over Dalby forest with a twin head Inton light, using a combination of a 6 cell "endurance" pack parallel connected to a standard 4 cell pack or just two 4 cell packs wired together. But at least i can vary the brightness of the inton to alter the amp draw, something that you can't do with those 3xT6 in one head type lights.

I wouldn't get the 4x26650 pack myself as they're so fat you'd have trouble mounting them on the frame or in a frame bag. You'd be better off buying two extra 4 cell packs or two 6 cell endurance packs and joining them all together with a DC Y Splitter cable.....

two splitter


Four Splitter


As soon as some manufacturer realizes that a multi-head light should run at 4v, instead of 8v, then you could half the number of batteries you'd need to run them. Running a T6 at 4v drops the brightness by 15/20% but you can get most of that back by using the brighter, more efficient XML-T6 U2 instead. Also, smooth reflectors create very bright spots that cause your pupils to contract, letting in less light and ruining your night vision. This tends to make you want to ramp up the brightness of your lights to the max to compensate, draining the batteries quicker. Orange peeled, softer focused light(s) leave your pupils dilated, letting in more light. This tends to make everything seem brighter and often has you reaching to turn down the brightness of your lights, conserving the batteries.

Needless to say, a 4v all flood, no spot multi-headed XML-T6 U2 design would make the best off road light ever. Which is why i wouldn't recommend those 3xT6 all-in-one, smooth reflector, 8v lights for anything but the bin (or someone who likes to carry a shit load of battery packs around with them).

Oh! And for road use.... uses torches instead.

Neal_

Thanks Ouija. I've seen the Magicshine 6 cell pack for £40 so may get one of them and keep the other packs as back up or use them with a splitter, thanks for posting links to them.

The 3T6 did seem to give a decent spread of light but time will tell how I feel about it with more use, it definitely did have a hot spot. In hindsight I wish I'd bought a couple more orange peel 501B torches with U2 LED's and some more cells!