# maglite 4d with a 3.6V bulb



## adolfhi (Jul 25, 2009)

hello,
i installed a 3.6V 0.75A bulb on my 4D maglite, maybe it's a Eveready, product of Energizer. it works well and is much brighter than the original 4.8V bulb. will the bulk gey burnt soon? and how many lumens does it give?
Thanks
Craig


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## [email protected] (Jul 25, 2009)

:welcome: and to hotwires.

It will burn faster. But the bulb is cheap and the efficent white output is worth it.

Btw have you considered building a mag623 with that nice 4D mag of yours?

:devil::devil:


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## adolfhi (Jul 25, 2009)

[email protected] said:


> :welcome: and to hotwires.
> 
> It will burn faster. But the bulb is cheap and the efficent white output is worth it.
> 
> ...


you mean the 100W osram 64623 bulb? if so...too evil! 
i am in china and not many sorts of bulbs are available, let alone the lithum batteries, i can not find them in shops, and d size ni-mh batteries are also hard to get.


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## Fichtenelch (Jul 25, 2009)

Hmm driving a bulb which is designed for working @ 3.6V at 6V might shorten it's lifetime rapidly...

However, welcome to CPF...what did you want to express with your nickname?


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## KiwiMark (Jul 25, 2009)

adolfhi said:


> you mean the 100W osram 64623 bulb? if so...too evil!
> i am in china and not many sorts of bulbs are available, let alone the lithum batteries, i can not find them in shops, and d size ni-mh batteries are also hard to get.



Pffft - 64623 isn't that good.

Take a Maglite 4D and add
AW Soft starter
Osram 64458 90W bulb
5 x AW's IMR 26500 Li-ion cells
Length of PVC tubing from a hardware store (anyone that sells plumbing supplies)
Aluminium reflector
Borafloat lens

Result - torch bright enough to start a fire, literally. From fresh batteries this thing is driven to around 200W even though it is only a 90W bulb. Sure your run time sucks, but you probably wouldn't use this thing for more than a minute or 2 at a time - it is incredibly bright and the torch feels pretty hot after a couple of minutes of continuously running.

You don't need to buy bulbs or batteries locally - you can mail order all that sort of thing.


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## [email protected] (Jul 25, 2009)

Fichtenelch said:


> Hmm driving a bulb which is designed for working @ 3.6V at 6V might shorten it's lifetime rapidly...
> 
> However, welcome to CPF...what did you want to express with your nickname?



Calling alkalines 1.5 volts under load is a gross overstatement. Even D's.


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## mdocod (Jul 25, 2009)

[email protected] said:


> Calling alkalines 1.5 volts under load is a gross overstatement. Even D's.



Average voltage under a load for alkaline cells is pretty lousy, but don't underestimate their behavior fresh out of the package, an alky D cell will deliver ~1.5V into a ~0.5-1A load for the first few seconds/minutes it is used. Alkaline cells used in these "4 cells driving 3 cell bulbs" or "5 cells driving 4 cell bulbs" etc, are more likely to flash bulbs than if NIMH cells are used instead, which will have a lower starting voltage, even fresh off the charger in most cases.


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## [email protected] (Jul 25, 2009)

My bad. 

How about the voltage under 3 amps? Like the people who use alkalines in their mag85's in a pinch?


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## KiwiMark (Jul 25, 2009)

[email protected] said:


> My bad.
> 
> How about the voltage under 3 amps? Like the people who use alkalines in their mag85's in a pinch?



3 amps? The voltage may be OK at first, but how low would it have dropped to after 1 minute? You would have to be pretty desperate to use alkalines in anything that draws a lot of amps.


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## Outdoors Fanatic (Jul 25, 2009)

adolfhi said:


> you mean the 100W osram 64623 bulb? if so...too evil!
> i am in china and not many sorts of bulbs are available, let alone the lithum batteries, i can not find them in shops, and d size ni-mh batteries are also hard to get.


You can buy batteries directly from AW, he ships from Hong-Kong I guess...


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## lctorana (Jul 26, 2009)

adolfhi said:


> hello,
> i installed a 3.6V 0.75A bulb on my 4D maglite, maybe it's a Eveready, product of Energizer. it works well and is much brighter than the original 4.8V bulb. will the bulk gey burnt soon? and how many lumens does it give?
> Thanks
> Craig


Hi Craig,
Assuming you are using NiCads or NimH, and they are putting out 1.25V each under load, and also assuming that your 4D Maglite has about 0.25 ohms of internal resistance, then a KPR103 will give you about 80 bulb lumens.


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## mdocod (Jul 26, 2009)

[email protected] said:


> My bad.
> 
> How about the voltage under 3 amps? Like the people who use alkalines in their mag85's in a pinch?



Alkaline cells fall on their face at 3 amps so fast it wouldn't be worth it. It would have to be one heckava "pinch" to really go that route. It would start dim, dim even more very quickly, and kill/overheat the cells in minutes.


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## [email protected] (Jul 26, 2009)

mdocod said:


> Alkaline cells fall on their face at 3 amps so fast it wouldn't be worth it. It would have to be one heckava "pinch" to really go that route. It would start dim, dim even more very quickly, and kill/overheat the cells in minutes.


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## KiwiMark (Jul 26, 2009)

mdocod said:


> Alkaline cells fall on their face at 3 amps so fast it wouldn't be worth it. It would have to be one heckava "pinch" to really go that route. It would start dim, dim even more very quickly, and kill/overheat the cells in minutes.



Yeah, Alkalines are really good 
.
.
.
Until they go flat and you have to buy new ones.
.
.
.
Or they leak and you have to buy new batteries & torch
.
.
.
Or you want more than a very low amount of amps from them.


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## adolfhi (Jul 26, 2009)

ha it's just easy to remember, all my name in any forum is "adolfhi" because i first registered in a forum several years ago, and mis-typed rudolfhi as adolfhi, and suddenly found it easy to remember. so never connect it with adolfph, that will lead to troubles...


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## adolfhi (Jul 26, 2009)

ok, i'll see it and try to ship some...
thanks


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