# IMPROVE THE N30 HID add a 225 Lumen R2 LED area light and GLOWING LED locators



## Northern Lights (May 8, 2008)

Improve the N30 with a *225 lumen LED area flashlight* and an always on glowing LED spot light locator. 

[















Quote: N30
Color - Light (close to Hunter) Green
35 watt HID 3200 lumen 4200K bulb driven at 30 watts.
70+ minutes run time from 13.2 Volt 3600 mAh NiMH pack
(I generally get 80+ minutes from a full charge, but we are only going to state 70+ in the manual)" Close Quote.

There are 11 cells in it; 47.52 watt hours.
The Amondotech N30 HID is a 35 watt bulb run at 30watt. It has a lamp accessory for near working conditions. The lamp is two parallels sets of a 3 and a 4 series 5mm 20mA LEDs run on appropriate resistors. And the cool thing is it is 26mm in diameter and the bezel just unscrews. 
I dropped in this Cree R2 module for 225 lumens. Great area light, huh? R2 link
R2 drop in module runs on 3.7-18.0 Volts. The R2 is close to 4 watts so that is an estimated run time of 11-12 hours.
I learned about this link: ROP w/ constant glowing switch membrane 












I stuck three 5mm LEDs in series and again in series with two parallel 100K ohm resistors in the back end which are on all the time, are there to locate the light in the dark. They draw 0.05 mAh together. That is 4.79 years of run time at 100% efficiency so let’s be real and say 3.11years run time at 65% efficiency. It will be easy to find the light.
3 in series works out like this: Vf=3 (3.2)=9.6 at 20mAh.
In series with two parallel 100k Ohm resistors is 2/100K =1/Rtotal; Rtotal = 1/0.00002 = 50k ohms. 
Ohms law: E/R=I
13.2volts – 9.6 volts = 3.6 volts 
R= 50k ohms
I = (3.6/50000) = 0.000072 amps or .072 mili amps ~ round that to 0.1 mili amps
Now then;
3600 mAh divided by 0.1 mA is the run time in hours, 3600/.1=36000
36000/24 =1500 days; divide by 365 is 4.1 years, at 100% efficiency. Realistically, even at 65% efficiency the glowing LEDs do not drag down the performance or shelf life of a maintained light.
Easy way to do this is down load from one CPF member the LED PRO calculator:
LED PRO
It will figure your run times too at different efficiencies.
To put in the three LEDs the three were soldered onto a piece of copper wire and the parallel resistors put in series, two long leads were secured to it. Using a template the whole pattern was figured and drilled into the back end of the handle. The three LEDs were put into the outside of the handle and a piece of cardboard was secured in the middle with duct tape to hold the position. Using a pencil they were then set into the handle and pushed into position. Super glue holds them there. The black straps come off easy, the feet pull off and then the straps can be released to get to the switch and wiring. A ground wire goes to the area lamp and hot goes to one side of the switch; tap into these. 
All I need now is to add a diffuser to it for closer high intensity work.

One night recently out in the boonies fishing, I dropped the light from the top of a Forest Service dumpster to the hard concrete. It was on when it took the fall and there I stood in darkness, considering how I would replace the bulb as I figured it was now deceased. No hot wire incan would have withstood that fall. I picked it up and slapped the back end… LOL!! The battery was loose and it seated with the slap and I had light again. What a good product, nice and rugged, small and realistically useable. The new area lamp module makes it available for all circumstances that I encounter for a light; it makes a good “boogey man repellent” night light with the constant glow too.

Thanks to 
SALE: AmondoTech TITANIUM N30 HID search light 3200+ LM, rechargeable! $132.95 AC 
Jtice and his posse
2xTrinity 
mtbkndad
MattK


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## BVH (May 8, 2008)

I love that 225 Lumen mod! May have to do that myself, three times. Thank you for sharing.


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## Pumaman (May 8, 2008)

all right! i am convinced. 
ordering the N-30 and a drop-in
looks like a great combo


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## daveman (May 8, 2008)

Well done. You should've snaped a few beamshots of the original LEDs before you swaped them out for the R2, that way we could see how much of a difference the mod made. Nice mod all around, quick and clean.


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## Patriot (May 8, 2008)

I love it! Good idea going with the drop in.


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## Northern Lights (May 8, 2008)

daveman said:


> Well done. You should've snaped a few beamshots of the original LEDs before you swapped them out for the R2, that way we could see how much of a difference the mod made. Nice mod all around, quick and clean.


Beam shots unfortunately are relative to camera settings. 7x 5mm key chain LEDs are puny to say the least and really most of us have seen a single double even multi-level cheap 5mm led lights. Pitiful.
I just finshed minutes ago some beam comparison. The R2 is the brightest single LED light I have around here after the P7 MTE. I have Golston variation in that same body MTE uses. The brightest I had when the P4 came out was from DAE and it was either a P4 or K5, really cannot tell but it was very bright, estimate 180-200+ lumen. The R2 does top it. Nice light. I would be putting that module in any light like that now except for one thing, P7. Yep, that MTE P7 even if it is not 900 Lumens smokes everything else. So for a 65mm light, to hide in my duty belt it is the P7, almost, not quite the output of the 2x A123 powered 5761 but back to the R2. 
This mod need a sun shade, the R2 beam does reflect a little bit off the top of the main light, but since it is not designed as the main use I can live with it but may just put a shade around it, a tent of some material just to shadow the reflection of the top of the main light bezel it can be a rectangular sheet bent along the line of the handle.

I am aslo going to put a switch on the glow locators. Not to save power but to keep the reverse glare out of my eyes. A clickie in the wall of the rear A frame to the inside of the handle will do it. 5 minute mod.


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## BVH (May 8, 2008)

I ordered 3 units to retrofit my lights. What a great and useful mod you came up with! Thanks again!


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## Border (May 9, 2008)

Thanks for sharing your experience on this project, Northern Lights.

I have been planning to upgrade the LED module on my N30 for some time. 

R2 drop-in order placed at DX.


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## Northern Lights (May 9, 2008)

Border said:


> Thanks for sharing your experience on this project, Northern Lights.
> 
> I have been planning to upgrade the LED module on my N30 for some time.
> 
> R2 drop-in order placed at DX.


 
I put in the switch and glare shade, will post pics in about 13 hours.
Remove the black bands by pulling the feet off, just friction fit here.
I did not mean to sell DX R2s, My friend who I spent some time with, fellow CPF'er, DAE of QCG also has them, plenty supplies around:
R2 link


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## MattK (May 9, 2008)

Nice!


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## Nos (May 9, 2008)

omg great idea. thanks for posting this, dropin ordered


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## Patriot (May 9, 2008)

MattK said:


> Nice!



I think the L35 needs one of these as standard.


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## 270winchester (May 9, 2008)

that's pretty cool.

does the Cree module have enough mass and thermal relief for heatsinking?


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## Northern Lights (May 9, 2008)

270winchester said:


> that's pretty cool.
> 
> does the Cree module have enough mass and thermal relief for heatsinking?


 
I think so, you could always put on some more copper tube on the back of it down the handle if you want. You see it is tapered and would accept the tube, you could use the tube to also join to a solid aluminum or copper billet. Options are unlimited so even if in its present state it needs more sinking it could be done in minutes. 

This mod was so easy, so many options it is a natural.

That thing is made for 18650 and 2x 16340 Ultrafire lights and they have little mass in the tubes. 

I ran it for a 20 minute run and could feel warmth from with in but did not see any problems. With that much capacity to the battery pack I imagine you could run it long enough to find out what the thermal stasis condition would be.


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## Patriot (May 9, 2008)

How much voltage is going to the R2? Was there a resistor or something on the 7 LED board? I haven't opened mine yet. It looks like you've got it wired directly with the old wiring right....?


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## 270winchester (May 9, 2008)

looks like the R2 drop in can take up to to 18 volts, and the R2 module has its own regulation.



Patriot36 said:


> How much voltage is going to the R2? Was there a resistor or something on the 7 LED board? I haven't opened mine yet. It looks like you've got it wired directly with the old wiring right....?


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## Northern Lights (May 9, 2008)

Patriot36 said:


> How much voltage is going to the R2? Was there a resistor or something on the 7 LED board? I haven't opened mine yet. It looks like you've got it wired directly with the old wiring right....?


follow the links, R2 can take up to 18V bat, 3.7 to 18Volts input on the R2 or one lithium or 3 NiMh up to 5 lithium or 15 NiMh cells. Wire it directly into the old lines. 

The N30 (I just had to correct a number in the burn time of the glow locators as I mixed it with the L30) is 11 cells at 13.2 volts.

The original board was cute. It has two parallel strings of series resistors, one was 4 LEDs the other was 3 LEDs so there are two different resistors on the board. One resistor is on the (+) side of one string the other is on the (-) side of the other string. Clever how the board was set up. You see a resistor on each side. On the (+) side is connected an LED of one circuit and a resistor of the other circuit. On the (-) side connection is the opposite, the ground of the string with the positive reisistor and a resistor to the string with the last LED on the (+) ccontact.

Prepare the R2, unsolder the 11 5mm LED module, the wire polarity is obvious. To the R2 take off the big spring and unsolder the (+)spring. Now connect the wires to the appropriate terminal, pop it in, put on the bezel and use the switch.

I used a pigtail so I could bend the module around on longer wires just to take a picture for you.

The Glow LEDs now are connected to a (+) line coming from the R2 hot terminal on the switch, on this line is the Glow LED clickie. The Glow LED ground connects to the R2 ground wire.

Simple.


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## Northern Lights (May 9, 2008)

Pulling the black feet off the black straps frees them and they can be lifted out. 
I put a piece of plastic sheet under the top of the strap to create the glare shade as just a portion of the R2 beam hits the bezel and is visible to the operator.
The glow locator is constant on. It uses more power than it should in theory but it still is negligible. But when behind the light that glow is glare into my eyes. I installed a clickie up forward with the other switches. Just a hole and splice into the Positive lead. The clickie is put into the hole and just about anything can be put behind it to back it against the other side of the chamber to hold it into place. Now I can turn the locator on and off too.


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## Patriot (May 9, 2008)

Perfect! Thanks NL 





*edited:*

moved my battery question to another thread


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## Pumaman (May 27, 2008)

Just got my drop-in installed and its great! Really like the N30, its well worth the price. Now with the R2 installed its that much more useful. here is a pic of the dropin running at 7.4v in a 6p body vs the 5mm leds in the N30. obviously no comparison.
thanks for the great idea Northern Lights!


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## pbs357 (May 27, 2008)

Cool idea! Plus, if you wanted to keep the flood effect you could apply a diffuser material to the lens to soften the hotspot.


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## Northern Lights (May 27, 2008)

Some of the suppliers offer real glass lens that will fit that bezel and that will transmit a bit more light. 

I am building a lantern based on 120 LED string wound on a tube and that R2 will be part of the handle because of this success too.


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## Nos (May 28, 2008)

KD's 28mm multi layer ar coated lens fits perfectly! i suggest you to bore the lens cover a bit out to gain a decent amount of spill









and the 28mm aspheric fits too.....but ......but you better stick with the lens :tinfoil:


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## Pumaman (May 28, 2008)

The honeymoon is over with the drop-in.

Had turned it on and off maybe 5 times, in like 5 minutes. not on-off-on-off rapidly. Was outside enjoying it, turned off the HID and then turned on the drop-in and flash! no more light from the R2. luckily the HID would come on fine. was not sure what happend, so unsoldered it and replace the 5mm. they worked fine. tried the drop-in in a 6P and nothing. inspected it carefully and 2 bond wires are BLACK! dont know if the driver was bad, or if the light somehow fried it. This really sucks as DX's exchange/return process is terrible. i am hesitant to order another, even from the other distributor. any opinions?

BTW:the drop-in has "SUPER BRIGHT R2" around the outside of the reflector, just like the one pictured in the original post. no indication of voltage.


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## Northern Lights (May 28, 2008)

I agree about returns, they just do not give you credit if you even get authorization to return. I consider it cost of doing business since they under sell everyone else. I have stuff returned on authorization and they ignor all correspondence afterwards. One day I will go to the appropriate thread and give CPF my review of service!! LOL

Just get anothor R2 module from somewhere else, likely made from one venodor anyway. The drive is supposed to take 3.6 to 18 V. I like mine! Likely your driver was bad. For the money you are going to get a bad one eventually, quality comes at a price but I find the quality of these imports ok, I spend $K's on this sort of stuff for fun every year. If the cost of one light is improtant to you it will bother you and take the fun out of it. I look at it like a big sky rocket. Once the fireworks are spent they are gone but was it FUN?


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## BVH (May 28, 2008)

I'm very happy with mine. Still going after maybe an hour of off and on use.


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## LukeA (May 28, 2008)

Looks like the board may have been bypassed or somehow was pushing too much current to the emitter. 

I don't know about you guys, but my experience with DX customer service has been good. 

To replace this dropin, you might want to look at the Q5 version or the P4 version. The R2 claim was probably a lie. Some of the reviews say that it's dimmer than the Q5 version.


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## Northern Lights (May 28, 2008)

LukeA said:


> Looks like the board may have been bypassed or somehow was pushing too much current to the emitter.
> 
> I don't know about you guys, but my experience with DX customer service has been good.
> 
> To replace this dropin, you might want to look at the Q5 version or the P4 version. The R2 claim was probably a lie. Some of the reviews say that it's dimmer than the Q5 version.


I have been buying quite a few lights from DX and other vendors, I sell them on the side. I mod a bit too. The R2 drop in I got from DX worked as represented and is brighter than any Q5 or P4 or Q2 I have got in the MTE, UltraFire lights or in any of my mods I poked around with. This one was not a lie. 

After using this R2 I will be buying the xenon light they sell in a UF 501 body and the R2 drop in and assembling a R2 in that body, total cost is @ $21 but the difference in brightness is worth the little effort of unscrewing a head and dropping it in.

Their service for me has been horrible, never got any of the promised credits or replacements, after a certain amount of correspondence I don't here form them. So I continue to buy and hope the discounts off set the losses.

Dae Xu, on the other hand, a CPFr you can find in members list, has two of the supply businesses we see at CPF and he was on a trip from China to the USA and actually dropped a replacement off at my home! That is service!


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## Nos (May 29, 2008)

btw, i still need to find a heat solution to the dropin. after 2 minutes the reflector becomes allmost too hot to touch. 

should i just use a resistor ( how many ohms? ) or glue the dropin on a coppertube?


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## Northern Lights (May 29, 2008)

It was designed to operate in a tube, I would work with the heat sink. My R2 is hot but does not seem to be a problem.


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## 2xTrinity (May 29, 2008)

Nos said:


> btw, i still need to find a heat solution to the dropin. after 2 minutes the reflector becomes allmost too hot to touch.
> 
> should i just use a resistor ( how many ohms? ) or glue the dropin on a coppertube?


The dropin is using a constant-current regulator, which means if you add a resistor in series, it will simply draw MORE power to compensate, and oyu'll end up with even more of a heat problem. The only way you could reduce the power would be to actually open up the drop-in, and replace one of the small "sense" resistors on the small LED driver PCB, which is not trivial mod.

IMO, you're probably best off trying to add heatsinking.


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## gchand (Jun 7, 2008)

I replaced my N30 LED "spotter" module with a DX SKU 11075 unit 
(http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.11075) This module 
was supposed to be a 0-100% variable unit, but the two units 
that I received were Low/Medium/High/Strobe/SOS 5-mode units. 
I was initially unsure that they would take 15V, but I put them on 
a Lab power supply, and they both survived quite well. For whoever 
is interested, I posted a review on DX's website.

I put one of them in the N30, and it works quite well. The 5 modes 
give good flexibility so far as output is concerned, and the N30's switch 
works well to cycle modes. I ran some long run-time thermal tests 
with the 11075 siting on my work bench - my assessment is that it 
can run indefinitely in Low mode, Strobe mode, and SOS mode, possibly 
in Medium mode, but probably not in High mode without overheating. 

Overall, in my opinion, this is a good mod for the N30.


George


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## Northern Lights (Jun 7, 2008)

gchand said:


> ...
> Overall, in my opinion, this is a good mod for the N30.
> George


 
Heck, yes, I agree to that! 

I use my N30 for outdoorsman sports and often am alone on montain tops, in Montana, or out on massive resevoirs on Colorado river systems, desert mountains in Arizona and many other places where there is no radio of phone communication. 

I like the SOS feature because that would be the light I would have with me and it would run for days.


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## Northern Lights (Jun 18, 2008)

BAD NEWs, At this moment I am up in the mountains of Montana. I wanted to do some beam comparisons. It gets dark after sunset since there is no towns around, just forested mountains. We have only about 3.5 hours of real darkness this far north this time of year.
The R2 drop in module blew the circuit board! I tested it, the board went. LED is good. 
I have been thinking of putting this into a Golston variant now. It can go direct drive on a resistor in the Golston or N30, depends what I want to do.
DX just introduced a pool of R2 stuff in the last few days and another module is a 5 mode, like the MTE P7, it has sos. I will sub that into the N30.
Before  I got some comparisons done with the Rominsen 4x cree, MTE P7, 10 watt Golston variant (probably a SCC P4), A123 powered 5761 on aspheric 254mm lens, the R2 and N30.
Up to 60 feet or so it is definitely the P7, but it has no throw. Next is the Rominsen, got some throw but the spill is puny to the p7 and the Golston variant actually lights up targets farther than these other monsters and that is where the comparison to the R2 was to be next. Now I have to wait weeks to finish this experiment.
Of course the 5761 by the nature of the huge filament is a wide hot spot, more than thos 1185s and more spill too, better than the HID for this effect and with the lens it has great throw. I was lighting up the other side of the meadow just fine with it. 
The N30, did excel at the throw contest, but I ran out of open spaces before I ran out of lumens with the A123 5761.
I think I need to get a second battery for the N30 as it is the best general light for this rural environment. It has the run time over any flashlight. Quite dependable. With the 5 mode R2, 3 brightness levels and the HID I have it all covered. The HID is quite stout too. I dropped this N30 while on off a garbage dumpster. It all went dark, I thought I blew the bulb. Any inan would have lost the filament. I slapped the back of the light, the battery had backed out! It turned on with nothing more than character marks from hitting the pavement!

Now I really agree with gchand, all those mode and I can get the 250 lumens of the R2 now! 

Well, I am off to put an R2 LED into a Golston body, see ya!


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## Northern Lights (Jul 2, 2008)

Turns out the variable mode R2 does not take the needed battery voltage.

I am running right now a very hot experiment. I have parallel two 20 ohm 5 watt resistors on the R2 led. 
The DMM reads 13.89 Volts on Vbattery and 3.46 Vforward. 
LED Pro calculates 1043 mA at the R2. 
Brother the resistors are hot, essetially burning off 10 volts or about 11 watts. Whew! Let see what happens.


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## gchand (Jul 3, 2008)

How long did you run your original R2 dropin before it failed? From the thermal experiments 
that I ran with my DX 11075 5-mode module at full power with a lab power supply, it 
reached 180 deg F after running for 8 minutes on the bench, with the temperature rising 
quickly. For my thermal measurements, I used an Omega recording thermocouple probe. 

Installed in the N30, any SF 6P compatible LED module has only low thermal conductivity 
plastic (without a specially manufactured "plug" heatsink) to conduct heat away from it, 
and there is obviously no airflow inside the handle. "High" mode on the currently available 
6P modules may just be too much in the N30 environment.


George


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## Northern Lights (Jul 5, 2008)

gchand said:


> How long did you run your original R2 dropin before it failed? From the thermal experiments
> that I ran with my DX 11075 5-mode module at full power with a lab power supply, it
> reached 180 deg F after running for 8 minutes on the bench, with the temperature rising
> quickly. For my thermal measurements, I used an Omega recording thermocouple probe.
> ...


When the driver blew it did so instantaneously the moment I turned it on, first time on a cold light. It had not been run for several days. I grabbed it and turned it on to do some beam comparisons and it instantly went out with a flash that reminded me of blowing the incandescent out of any household socket.

I do not think the driver blew from thermal problems, unless the damage was done and waiting. I had run it for short runs like what you describe before without a problem. Now with the resistors it gets the handle so hot as to be uncomfortable to hold.

I may just buy another R2 module drop in as I do like the idea. There is one that runs with several mode including an SOS which may be nice to have on a camp light. That driver has a Vmax iirc @ 8 volts. I would drop the voltage from the 14.8 on a fresh charge with a resistor to the 8 Volts for that driver. 

The combo of two drops, resistor and then driver, may help with the thermal management.

I am considering putting vent holes into the handle. That may help. 

I would like to hear from others that tried this mod, it sure looks good on paper and at first run but maybe it is to high of a voltage to drop without some heat sinking to work with.


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## gchand (Jul 5, 2008)

Well, it sounds as if the original R2 dropin (DX SKU 11836) did not perform up to 
it's rated voltage of 18V. The failure could have been a random one, or else, 
18V could be an overly optimistic rating.

The DX SKU 13658 5-mode dropin that you have mentioned probably has a switching 
type regulator. Using resistors (or a string of diodes) in series with a switching type 
regulator dropin will reduce the voltage that the dropin sees, but will actually increase 
the total power dissipation as I suspect that you are seeing with your test rig. For example, 
a "perfect" switching regulator will draw twice as much current at 6V as it will at 12V. If 
you insert series resistor(s) to drop the voltage across the dropin from 12V to 6V, the 
dropin will draw its normal 6V current, but the entire string will be drawing that current, 
resulting in twice the power dissapation that a 12V dropin would experience without 
the series resistors. The heat is shifted away from the dropin itself, but you still have to 
dissipate that heat within the N30. If the 13658 uses a linear regulator, you will still have 
the same overall heat dissapation issues.

From the one review of the 5-mode 13658 on DX's website, the reviewer stated that the 
"high" mode output was less than that of the single mode 11836 unit that you tried, so 
you may be disapointed with the 5-mode unit from that aspect.

From what I have seen offered on the DX & KD websites, the DX SKU 11075 5-mode unit 
still seems to me to be the best replacement for the N30 LED module. In "low" mode, 
it has higher output than the N30 OEM LED module, and draws 40ma as opposed to the 
OEM module's 50ma. If higher output is required, the "high" mode works quite well, 
although only for short running times. On the negative side, the 11075 is supposed to 
be a 0-100% P4 unit, but the initial two units that I received were 5-mode, with who 
knows what LED rating. Yesterday, I ordered an additional two 11075's from DX - it will 
be interesting to see what I receive. Assuming that they are the same 5-mode units, I 
may try modding one of them with a Q5 Cree. 

Note my pattern of ordering DX/KD items in pairs in order to deal with "infant mortality" 
and "random failure" situations!!!

FWIW, I would recommend that you either try another of your original DX 11836 dropins, 
or else try the DX 11075 5-mode unit. I think that you are going to have problems with 
the DX 13658 with series resistors WRT heat.

George


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## Northern Lights (Jul 6, 2008)

I will stick with the original R2 and order another if I change at all now. I can live with the hot resistor situation, I think. 

I sure appreciate the information and will abide by it. No sense in reinventing the wheel, you know what you are discussing and I will take the advice, thank you very much.

I can identify with the ordering in pairs. The things I order are for the fun of the hobby so I do not quibble the price or pinch pennies like so many. Wants and Needs often merge and are not discernable; if I want it I must need it therefore I buy it. I tend to purchase based on reported performance as opposed to brand names. I have no brand loyalty.

I have had so many things go right out of the box with KD and DX I sometimes order more than one also. If they all work, I sell off the surplus, LOL. Getting credit and shipping returns is such a nightmare with all those vendors accross the sea I often toss the suspect items into this cardboard box I have that is getting full of broken stuff.


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## 2xTrinity (Jul 10, 2008)

Right now I am actually using one of these Q2 5A Neutral White drop-ins in my N30. They are definitely the best color rendition for any LEDs I've been able to get my hands on, for one thing my wood actually appears to be the correct color, unlike my other LEDs which bleach the color out, or incans which exaggerate the red. 

It claims to be 12V max, but the board is using the same driver as the Kennan at Kaidomain, which is 18V. I've actually driven the board at 16V on a lab power supply without noticeable problems (no excessive current draw or inefficiency). See the datasheet for the actual IC here. 

It also appears this dropin is more conservative than some of the other ones, it only draws just over 2 watts, so current to the emitter is probably only ~500mA, which is good considering the heatsinking contraints.

Another option might be to try one of these 14V Incan Dropins, which might be slightly underdriven (this would probably work better on 12-13 NiMH, vs 11) but it should still work, and there would be no heat problems to worry about, either.


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## gchand (Jul 10, 2008)

The two links that you provided point to the DealExtreme SKU 771 14V Incandescent 
lamp assembly module which DX users report drawing 1.5A or so, for a power 
dissapation of 15+ Watts - did you err on your links?

George


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## 2xTrinity (Jul 11, 2008)

I corrected the link, I intended to link to a Q25a dropin. In retrospect, that's a good point about the incan assembly -- drawing half the power of the main HID lamp (at considerably lower efficiency) sort of defeats the purpose of a low-energy "Backup" light.


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## gchand (Jul 11, 2008)

Yes, that Q25a dropin seems to be a much better choice as opposed to the 14V incandescent lamp assembly. If it only draws 2 watts, you should be good for at least several minute run times. My DX 11075 LED module also dissipates about 2 watts in medium mode, and it is also good for several minutes run time, and possibly indefinitely (although I haven't tried the latter). The better color rendition is also a plus, although that is not a factor for me as I am partially color blind!

The 14V incandescent lamp assembly as you point out is a rather inefficient choice given the availability of the HID, but beyond that, with 15+ watts power dissipation it is likely to melt the N30 plastic handle if run for more than a few seconds at a time!

(edit) 
The incandescent is still a bad choice, but on second thought, a good bit of the heat dissipated is radiated out the front, so it is probably not a risk to quickly melt the N30 handle. After all, Surefire makes their Nitrolon (sp?) lights that take the same type of incandescent lamp assemblies.


George




2xTrinity said:


> I corrected the link, I intended to link to a Q25a dropin. In retrospect, that's a good point about the incan assembly -- drawing half the power of the main HID lamp (at considerably lower efficiency) sort of defeats the purpose of a low-energy "Backup" light.


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## bfg9000 (Jul 13, 2008)

The original R2 dropin also uses the Micro-Bridge PT4105 just like the Kennan. Also just like the later Kennans, the problem is they selected a 0.20 ohm current sense resistor to produce an output of 1000mA (perhaps to reduce complaints from customers about their new R2s not being as bright as their older Q5s:duh2. This is *way* too high for any plastic light, and will overheat in minutes. If you already have an R2 dropin like this: 





The solution is to replace the sense resistor (seen below at the very top of the board with R20 printed on it) with a 0.5 to 0.7 ohm one. 




Given current is 200/R2 in ohms, 0.5ohms would provide 400mA and 0.7 ohms 286mA to put things into the ~1w range, which should be safe enough for *days* of continuous operation.

Now I don't want to hear any more talk about using resistors _before_ a regulator and wasting more power than the dropin itself uses...


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## gchand (Jul 15, 2008)

FWIW my two new Deal Extreme SKU 11075 modules arrived today - they are the same as the 5-mode Lo/Med/Hi/Strobe/SOS units that I received before. Deal Extreme still has not updated their web page with the new tech specs.


George


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## mtbkndad (Mar 20, 2009)

Northern Lights,

I just found this thread and must say you did a great job.

Thanks for the great read and continued information regarding you use of the light.

Take Care,
mtbkndad :wave:


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