+Walter Boxhead yes, its absolutely fantastic +SpaceMountainLarry if you havnt go watch it, but some advice, put down any drinks before starting might ruin your keyboard spitting beverage all over it
8.4v at 800mA is 6.7 watts total, of which 1.5 watts is lost by that 2.4 Ohm resistor. So the actual LED is only running at 5.2 watts with a full battery, i.e. another eBay light with a rather exaggerated light wattage. On the other hand, replacing that LED with two 3W LED modules would mean the existing resistor can be used as the LEDs will be running at just 2.6 watts each.
I was at a Big Lots today, typically they have a few junky flashlights with your common LEDs inside, maybe in a 9 x array, but this time I was surprised, they seem to be getting in quite a few lights with SMD style LEDs. Interesting, I really don't see many SMD styled LEDs anywhere in retail stores. I should point out Big Lots is... well slightly more classy than "Poundland", but only by a hair. No set prices for the store, things vary, but it's a store that seems to sell discontinued products for the most part, although they do carry things that aren't as well. Food, discontinued sodas, house goods, bedding, clothes, hell even furniture. Kind of a catch all of random fairly low priced items, although often you can find some decent items there. Their furniture, while cheap, is actually quite good, and very reasonable. They had a couch I liked, only about 200 pounds.
The LED is the latest COB (chip on board) type that has electronics and chip integrated into one unit for highest performance, This is the next generation after surface mount LEDs (the tiny little rectangles) which in turn replaces the little plastic individual ones. These new ones are far brighter and have a wide enough pattern to benefit from the reflector. Putting a bigger battery in there will also increase the charge time unless you go to a bigger charger . How about 2 separate batteries and switch over; run on one and charge the other or cut up the case so it takes plug in batteries like a portable drill. There is one like that with the battery mounted outboard. I saw it on Amazon
"The LED is the latest COB (chip on board) type that has electronics and chip integrated into one unit for highest performance," You, sir... are absolutely full of shit.
You know, I used to think these products were all made in the same factory, but I've heard the Chinese really don't believe in "copyrights" or "intellectual property", so it may just be that these blueprints are kind of like open source schematics for making these. The reason I think that is that is that I often get a free 27 LED flashlight from a store in the United States called Harbor Freight with a coupon you can print online, every time I stop buy I pick up one of the free flashlights. They sell them for $2.99 without the coupon, and the back is pretty much sealed. You can unscrew them and replace the 3 x AAA batteries in the back, though. That being said I've recently come across virtually identical lights in other stores, but for say $6. I thought wow, why the hell are they so much more? So I bothered to pick one up and inspect it. The $6 had inside alkaline instead of "heavy duty" batteries, and also an actual door on the back for easy access to said batteries. I suppose they could all be from the same factory, but now I have a sneaking suspicion that hundreds of suppliers got the basic design for these and have all tweaked it just a hair and sell to different businesses.
I noticed that the LED was illuminating the side walls of the case, quite brightly, with the reflector removed so the reflector is going to do something beyond catching reflections off the glass
What I think would be an interesting hack for these would be to rip out the two 18650s in the back and fit a 4-cell lipo pack from an RC quadcopter or plane. That way you're always running above the LEDs nominal voltage. Then you could fit a 10W LED driver in the front and it would be full power all the way until the battery is exhausted. Only problem is you would lose the battery protection, but something could probably be found, or worst case constructed, to replace it.
Hi Clive, thanks for this great little bit of info, inspired by this I went and bought one for the pricely sum of £20 off ebay and very happy I am with the purchase too! (Pity there isn't a referral scheme with ebay, you'd make a fortune!) Keep up the good work.
I've got one of those lamps as well - I just went for the cheapest offer on ebay (12€), it's got a quite good cold-white LED, but it is only one stripe of 8 LED chips. Plus, there seems to be also just a resistor inside, but it sits in the rear part where the switch/power input are (I didn't think of measuring it when I had it open, but maybe I'll take another crack into it and have a closer look).
They must have a stock of them LED assemblies somewhere to buy as spares/play items, given the amount of these lights out and about in the world, there's got to be millions of them available... :P
hi clive, you should try and get your hands on one of the cree 2400lm ones, they work as battery bank etc. well up your street id say. plus i want to see inside one of them. hehe
Much prefer this desk colour. Just given via Patreon. Not much, but still. Since I've now watched all of your videos I think it's due! P.S. Was that your stomach making a noise at 8:04?
+PIXscotland I think it was my stomach demanding food. Thanks for the donation. I'm going to be ordering som bigger Chinese things shortly with the extra sponsorship from you and the others.
I could see replacing the original LED with either 2x 10watt LEDs and the driver boards and double the pack capacity so that you could presumably have a light with high and low switch with either twice the run time or twice the light output and it probably wouldn't cost much. Now I kinda want to buy a few.
bigclivedotcom That is true the KISS method has it's advantages but at the same time due to the modular construction even servicing the unit would be fairly easy even if it was made slightly more complex. The benefit of a driver module would be near constant output through the entire charge curve. Either way its a very hack-able looking design.
was just looking for a rechargeable work light - with aa batteries since than i could just change instead of recharge and wait. thanks this is getting close ! (couldn't find anything good in the local stores here)
Excuse me Sir, But Nothing goes in My back side! It is an exit as designed.....just sayin' for future reference.. Lol! Love your videos, please keep making them and we'll keep watching!
have you opened the car charger? i bought one some time ago off of ebay ( for just a normal single 18650 torch) and it had no protection circuitry in at all (i think it was relying on their being some protection on the actual battery) iirc the plug only had 2 resistors and an led, 1 shorted out making a fair bit of smoke as it melted the plastic plug, the usual cheap chinese type if i remember right it gave out about 8.4 volts at 160ma something to light the car up (in smoke)
Hey clive, do you have the seller of the yellow unit, as I'd like to shove a bigger battery pack in it, and dont want to get shafted by a unit like the green one that has the potted bits in the back.
Hello i was looking to light my garage with led, what would be best bang for my buck the ebay floodlights or a bunch of custom built led bars using individual leds and drivers?
+Jason Mccarthy I think it's actually a mix. Some striops, globes or panels for linear ambient illumination and the floodlights for bench work. For the fine details I'd also suggest some rechargeable work lights and even a decent head-torch for those places you just can't get decent light. (Ideal for working on fiddly things.) Then finally add a layer of strictly decorative LED lighting for effect. Yeah, even in a garage.
+bigclivedotcom - Question; If you were going to double the battery capacity in this unit, could you just parallel them in pairs and use the existing protection board for both sets of batteries; Or is that a bad idea? (Learning more on Li-Ion batteries still) - Also, I'd think if you were just to solder a charged cell in parallel with a discharged cell that would result in some serious heating from excessive current, what is "the" best route to equalize charge in these, strap them together with a 10 ohm or something power resistor, let it equalize over night, then connect them directly?
You should be able to parallel the batteries no problem, even if each has its own protection. I suggest getting the voltages close before joining them so that they can equalise without too high a current.
+bigclivedotcom Thank you, I could charge them with a pair of Schottky diodes (one per battery) I guess instead, but, resistors are pretty easy to arrange :) Thanks for the humor and good info!
Haha multiplying Chinese lamps ;) Got a quick question for you, i took apart a solar rechargeable led garden spot lamp with a 6v battery (ni-mh). I'm wanting to use the led in my van at 12v, the lamp lights at 6v and at 12 is it ok to wire straight into12v ?? Cheers from a new subscriber
+William street 12V may damage the LEDs by pushing too much current through them. It might be worth trying to run the light from a lighter socket 5V USB power supply for maximum efficiency.
+WM2869 They suggest it isn't used while on charge, but I don't see why not. The power supply is presumably current limited, so all that would happen is that there would be an equilibrium voltage at which the power supply output would be mainly driving the LED and the lithium cells would not rise above that voltage until the LED was turned off. Whether the power supply is rated for continuous all-night operation is an unknown variable.
I suppose the reason for the reflector is to make it look the way work lamps have always looked. The old halogen models need a reflector, so novice people might expect it to be there on a LED model, too, even if it's superfluous.
+thany3 It also hides the wiring and finish inside. I actually like these cases a lot. They have lots of potential for hacking into customised lights, or even waterproof camera housings.
Best bang-for-buck hack on this would be a cheap eBay buck-boost board to replace that resistor. It's burning away 1.5W continuously, vs a fraction of a watt for a switcher. Wouldn't have to touch the batteries or their protection, run time would go up substantially, and it would cost bugger all. Currently cheapest: www.ebay.co.uk/itm/291394039726
Cheap quick and nasty no electronics indeed. I've never opened mine up, maybe I'll have a look. Just took a pic, it's the same light, I used mine to light up the garden when watering (it's cooler), been 42C every day. I'd swear mine is 20 times brighter. Extremely sharpe shadows too. s15.postimg.org/s1rrdohiz/111.jpg
took me 5 minutes into the video to stop facepalming from the mating thing.
+Walter Boxhead
yes, its absolutely fantastic +SpaceMountainLarry if you havnt go watch it, but some advice, put down any drinks before starting might ruin your keyboard spitting beverage all over it
8.4v at 800mA is 6.7 watts total, of which 1.5 watts is lost by that 2.4 Ohm resistor. So the actual LED is only running at 5.2 watts with a full battery, i.e. another eBay light with a rather exaggerated light wattage. On the other hand, replacing that LED with two 3W LED modules would mean the existing resistor can be used as the LEDs will be running at just 2.6 watts each.
Thumbs up for the bench flip. Much easier on the eyes. :) Nice review.
I was at a Big Lots today, typically they have a few junky flashlights with your common LEDs inside, maybe in a 9 x array, but this time I was surprised, they seem to be getting in quite a few lights with SMD style LEDs. Interesting, I really don't see many SMD styled LEDs anywhere in retail stores.
I should point out Big Lots is... well slightly more classy than "Poundland", but only by a hair. No set prices for the store, things vary, but it's a store that seems to sell discontinued products for the most part, although they do carry things that aren't as well. Food, discontinued sodas, house goods, bedding, clothes, hell even furniture. Kind of a catch all of random fairly low priced items, although often you can find some decent items there. Their furniture, while cheap, is actually quite good, and very reasonable. They had a couch I liked, only about 200 pounds.
The LED is the latest COB (chip on board) type that has electronics and chip integrated into one unit for highest performance, This is the next generation after surface mount LEDs (the tiny little rectangles) which in turn replaces the little plastic individual ones. These new ones are far brighter and have a wide enough pattern to benefit from the reflector. Putting a bigger battery in there will also increase the charge time unless you go to a bigger charger . How about 2 separate batteries and switch over; run on one and charge the other or cut up the case so it takes plug in batteries like a portable drill. There is one like that with the battery mounted outboard. I saw it on Amazon
"The LED is the latest COB (chip on board) type that has electronics and chip integrated into one unit for highest performance," You, sir... are absolutely full of shit.
I prefer the brown worktop - keep it. Thanks for the videos.
I want to see Clive's workbench in full.
You know, I used to think these products were all made in the same factory, but I've heard the Chinese really don't believe in "copyrights" or "intellectual property", so it may just be that these blueprints are kind of like open source schematics for making these. The reason I think that is that is that I often get a free 27 LED flashlight from a store in the United States called Harbor Freight with a coupon you can print online, every time I stop buy I pick up one of the free flashlights. They sell them for $2.99 without the coupon, and the back is pretty much sealed. You can unscrew them and replace the 3 x AAA batteries in the back, though. That being said I've recently come across virtually identical lights in other stores, but for say $6. I thought wow, why the hell are they so much more? So I bothered to pick one up and inspect it. The $6 had inside alkaline instead of "heavy duty" batteries, and also an actual door on the back for easy access to said batteries. I suppose they could all be from the same factory, but now I have a sneaking suspicion that hundreds of suppliers got the basic design for these and have all tweaked it just a hair and sell to different businesses.
You know it's a good light when you get all 4 screws!
Hmm two of those leds with two battery packs, more power :)
No cake has been harmed in making of this episode of "led fondler" :-)
0:09 woke the whole house up laughing
Ha ha,lol, wow that part was porn hub worthy... LOL
I noticed that the LED was illuminating the side walls of the case, quite brightly, with the reflector removed so the reflector is going to do something beyond catching reflections off the glass
What I think would be an interesting hack for these would be to rip out the two 18650s in the back and fit a 4-cell lipo pack from an RC quadcopter or plane. That way you're always running above the LEDs nominal voltage. Then you could fit a 10W LED driver in the front and it would be full power all the way until the battery is exhausted. Only problem is you would lose the battery protection, but something could probably be found, or worst case constructed, to replace it.
Hi Clive, thanks for this great little bit of info, inspired by this I went and bought one for the pricely sum of £20 off ebay and very happy I am with the purchase too! (Pity there isn't a referral scheme with ebay, you'd make a fortune!)
Keep up the good work.
I've got one of those lamps as well - I just went for the cheapest offer on ebay (12€), it's got a quite good cold-white LED, but it is only one stripe of 8 LED chips. Plus, there seems to be also just a resistor inside, but it sits in the rear part where the switch/power input are (I didn't think of measuring it when I had it open, but maybe I'll take another crack into it and have a closer look).
What the hell lol, a few seconds into the video and it already is insane. Love this stuff.
They must have a stock of them LED assemblies somewhere to buy as spares/play items, given the amount of these lights out and about in the world, there's got to be millions of them available... :P
hi clive, you should try and get your hands on one of the cree 2400lm ones, they work as battery bank etc. well up your street id say.
plus i want to see inside one of them. hehe
I'd totally replace the led with 3xcree xhp50 or two xhp70. Hands down THE brightest leds money can buy
Your "Bigclive.com" work-bench banner is missing. I think you may be an imposter.
Much prefer this desk colour.
Just given via Patreon. Not much, but still. Since I've now watched all of your videos I think it's due!
P.S. Was that your stomach making a noise at 8:04?
+PIXscotland I think it was my stomach demanding food. Thanks for the donation. I'm going to be ordering som bigger Chinese things shortly with the extra sponsorship from you and the others.
" I think it was my stomach demanding food. I'm going to be ordering some bigger Chinese things shortly" - Sweet and sour chicken balls?
I could see replacing the original LED with either 2x 10watt LEDs and the driver boards and double the pack capacity so that you could presumably have a light with high and low switch with either twice the run time or twice the light output and it probably wouldn't cost much. Now I kinda want to buy a few.
+kuhrd There is apparently a dimmable version. But I like the simplicity of these ones. Less to go wrong, and lots of scope for customisation.
bigclivedotcom That is true the KISS method has it's advantages but at the same time due to the modular construction even servicing the unit would be fairly easy even if it was made slightly more complex. The benefit of a driver module would be near constant output through the entire charge curve. Either way its a very hack-able looking design.
was just looking for a rechargeable work light - with aa batteries since than i could just change instead of recharge and wait. thanks this is getting close ! (couldn't find anything good in the local stores here)
+youtxbebroadcast11ur You're probably not going to find anything really high power that runs on AA's. It may have to be something you build yourself.
Excuse me Sir, But Nothing goes in My back side! It is an exit as designed.....just sayin' for future reference.. Lol! Love your videos, please keep making them and we'll keep watching!
The start of this video made me giggle.
have you opened the car charger?
i bought one some time ago off of ebay ( for just a normal single 18650 torch) and it had no protection circuitry in at all
(i think it was relying on their being some protection on the actual battery)
iirc the plug only had 2 resistors and an led, 1 shorted out making a fair bit of smoke as it melted the plastic plug, the usual cheap chinese type
if i remember right it gave out about 8.4 volts at 160ma
something to light the car up (in smoke)
Please can you do a tour of your workspace? :)
Hey clive, do you have the seller of the yellow unit, as I'd like to shove a bigger battery pack in it, and dont want to get shafted by a unit like the green one that has the potted bits in the back.
Hello i was looking to light my garage with led, what would be best bang for my buck the ebay floodlights or a bunch of custom built led bars using individual leds and drivers?
+Jason Mccarthy I think it's actually a mix. Some striops, globes or panels for linear ambient illumination and the floodlights for bench work. For the fine details I'd also suggest some rechargeable work lights and even a decent head-torch for those places you just can't get decent light. (Ideal for working on fiddly things.) Then finally add a layer of strictly decorative LED lighting for effect. Yeah, even in a garage.
aldi sells something like this from time to time
Will you post the ebay link you bought these from.
Would it be possible to replace this LED with a Cree full spectrum COB for usage in the greenhouse?
If it's the same type and wattage of LED then it should work.
+bigclivedotcom - Question; If you were going to double the battery capacity in this unit, could you just parallel them in pairs and use the existing protection board for both sets of batteries; Or is that a bad idea? (Learning more on Li-Ion batteries still) - Also, I'd think if you were just to solder a charged cell in parallel with a discharged cell that would result in some serious heating from excessive current, what is "the" best route to equalize charge in these, strap them together with a 10 ohm or something power resistor, let it equalize over night, then connect them directly?
You should be able to parallel the batteries no problem, even if each has its own protection. I suggest getting the voltages close before joining them so that they can equalise without too high a current.
+bigclivedotcom Thank you, I could charge them with a pair of Schottky diodes (one per battery) I guess instead, but, resistors are pretty easy to arrange :) Thanks for the humor and good info!
Haha multiplying Chinese lamps ;)
Got a quick question for you, i took apart a solar rechargeable led garden spot lamp with a 6v battery (ni-mh). I'm wanting to use the led in my van at 12v, the lamp lights at 6v and at 12 is it ok to wire straight into12v ?? Cheers from a new subscriber
+William street 12V may damage the LEDs by pushing too much current through them. It might be worth trying to run the light from a lighter socket 5V USB power supply for maximum efficiency.
Does the light still work while on charge, and if it does is it as bright as it is on full charge.
+WM2869 They suggest it isn't used while on charge, but I don't see why not. The power supply is presumably current limited, so all that would happen is that there would be an equilibrium voltage at which the power supply output would be mainly driving the LED and the lithium cells would not rise above that voltage until the LED was turned off. Whether the power supply is rated for continuous all-night operation is an unknown variable.
Just thought I'd ask as I know some products you could still use when plugged in if need be.
What is the best lumen light
The cob chip or three watt chips?
I have one of these, a better built one, works real well
Can u put the $500.00 LED in it? The LED that emulates the sun? If anyone need one, you do Clive!
What is that ungodly thing with the red handle that you are using?
Apparently it screws things!
***** I'm not so anal about my screwdrivers!
as i said earlier i hade one of those from jaycar each cell was rated at 1500 mah each with 4 cells
i had one of those from jaycar with 4 18650 cells
i tired breading them and a Nitecore came out
please, next time you breed led lights, mark the video as NSFW :))
@ 0:08 this content is porn hub worthy
I suppose the reason for the reflector is to make it look the way work lamps have always looked. The old halogen models need a reflector, so novice people might expect it to be there on a LED model, too, even if it's superfluous.
+thany3 It also hides the wiring and finish inside. I actually like these cases a lot. They have lots of potential for hacking into customised lights, or even waterproof camera housings.
Best bang-for-buck hack on this would be a cheap eBay buck-boost board to replace that resistor. It's burning away 1.5W continuously, vs a fraction of a watt for a switcher. Wouldn't have to touch the batteries or their protection, run time would go up substantially, and it would cost bugger all. Currently cheapest: www.ebay.co.uk/itm/291394039726
+FlyingShotsman Never voltage drive LEDs. Only current drive, else you get thermal runaway.
That was wierd :D
It is too yellow
Cheap quick and nasty no electronics indeed.
I've never opened mine up, maybe I'll have a look.
Just took a pic, it's the same light, I used mine to light up the garden when watering (it's cooler), been 42C every day.
I'd swear mine is 20 times brighter. Extremely sharpe shadows too.
s15.postimg.org/s1rrdohiz/111.jpg
Hue hue hue he he.
A pot resistor:)