Streamlight Microstream and Protected 10440 cells

I've seen a few places the Microstream seems to handle the 10440 well, and I was thinking about using them in mine instead of lithium primaries. Does anyone know if the microstream will work with Trustfire's 10440 600 mah with protection circuit?

I think you would lose capacity by switching to li-ion 10440's. Also the mAh rating of lithium primary is much greater that 10440's. Check out the Energizer L92 tech sheet.

http://data.energizer.com/pdfs/l92.pdf

Yes, there are those that report having no problems when using 10440s in a Microstream. Personally, I believe that is due to a fortunate set of stacked tolerances. My reasoning? First, you are looking at twice the voltage the driver is set up for. Second, the extra heat created by driving the LED harder than it is designed for will degrade the LED significantly faster than normal. Now, at around $20 each, if one wanted to experiment with using 10440 cells, there is not a significant downside. For me, the Microstream puts out more than enough light for what I use it for, so I am not tempted. If I used it more frequently, I would simply start using NiMH cells instead of the lithium primaries I use now. If one really needs that much light in that small of a form factor, there are other lights out there that are designed to be able to use 10440 cells, usually along with the usual AAA cell.

10440 is all I run in mine, it's been working great for over 4 years now.

Thanks for the replies, does anyone know if protected cells would be too long?

Burncycle said:

Thanks for the replies, does anyone know if protected cells would be too long?

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Protected cells vary in length, depending on the length of the original cell itself, and the length of the protection circuit. In their quest for ever more mAh, manufacturers sometimes fudge the length of their cells a little to get that last little bit of contents in.

Not sure on protected cells, my guess is that they would be too long. Microstream only works with button tops also.

I will probably buy one protected cell to see if it works, but if it doesn't are there any recommendations for quality non-protected cells that work?

After doing some looking, the Efest IMR 10440 looks well regarded, but small mAH (even for 10440) and I'm concerned there isn't a prominent enough button to be useful.

Blue efest imr button tops. Not sure if you'll find any better imr than that.

Toolboxkid said:

Blue efest imr button tops. Not sure if you'll find any better imr than that.

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Just ordered some, thanks!

EFest 350mah (Blue color) Li-Mn works

Soshine 350 mah (black color) works as well, the ebay description said they were protected but I honestly didn't see any difference externally between them and the blue. I don't see a PCB or strip like I do on my 18650s.

Still waiting on the Trustfire (grey color) 600 mah protected batteries to arrive

Burncycle said:

EFest 350mah (Blue color) Li-Mn works

Soshine 350 mah (black color) works as well, the ebay description said they were protected but I honestly didn't see any difference externally between them and the blue. I don't see a PCB or strip like I do on my 18650s.

Still waiting on the Trustfire (grey color) 600 mah protected batteries to arrive

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The Grey Trustfire (600 mah) protected came in, they are longer as expected and have the protection circuit board. I'm not sure the tailcap is screwing down all the way (it's pretty close), the light does seem to work fine with them.

I ran 10440s in mine, but I found it wasn't worth the decreased runtime and the light hot hot quick. Made the light bright though. I ran the efest cells as well.