3x Triple Output Harbor Freight Free Flash Light Upgrade Project
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- Опубликовано: 11 июл 2019
- This is a modification video showing how the new generation of Harbor Freight work lights with their LEDs on a strip of metal you can easily upgrade them to higher output Levels by combining several lights in the one. . .
You have small screws all over your bench, where is your free 4" magnetic parts bowl?
Next @Catus Maximus project... Truck LED light bar from free harbor freight flashlights 😂
Fun project, nice job! 👍🏻
These are really good flashlights from HF.Thier good for camping, or emergency, easy to carry on one self , best of all u can get them FREE,!!!!!
Thanks for jumping right in there. A small suggestion for the next one, daisy-chain the wires , to save some space.
I was going to link all the positive terminals together by wanted to try to avoid soldering on the LED element itself because the contact pads are really delicate . with light-emitting diodes they have what is known as a voltage drop these are designed to run at 4.5 volts and so all have to be wired in parallel directly to the batteries if you wired them in series than the LEDs would drop the voltage and it would not work at all.
Nice. Next maybe mod the battery compartment to take a 18650 rechargeable flashlight battery. That’ll take that thing to the next level
Just for fun I modified some of the older ones to use 3 - AA batteries to increase run time. Got some battery cases that take 3 AA batteries and used foam tape to attach the battery holder. Lost use of the magnet but still able to use the hook.
Definitely a cool video! Keep on making great content bud!
Nice job. Maybe stick all the magnets together too. Anytime I stick mine to a vertical surface it just slides down to the floor, for some reason mine is exceptionally weak.
The magnets slide down for me as well when the surface is smooth, like on a refrigerator. They don't hold well.
There seems to be a Rev 1 with the super bright LEDs, the Rev 2 with the weak magnet + the yellow HX-365A1 strip, and the Rev 3 with the stronger magnet that's flush. I kinda want to rebuild this thing using a 3d printer, or re-purposing the insides... !
Thanks for the idea I just made one for myself
I do enjoy watching your review videos but I like these project videos at least as much if not more I would like to see quite a bit more of them. Keep up the good work @Catus Maximus
You need more HF Tool's
Really enjoyed the video keep making things
Ideas oh the ideas hehehe Great Job! Subscribed!
Nice Job Catus . You'll get better , Just do more project Video's Too .
I have so many of these, but what I HATE about them is having to push the on button TWICE to bypass the small leds, which are useless.
So I modify them so the switch only turns on the main light and I remove the other three.
You could also change it to use 18650 lithium cells, and glue the second light to the back as just the battery holder.
It is kinda cool to do this stuff, but you can buy powerful led lights pretty cheap these days.
btw, I actually used the old ones for a car racing wireless warning system, and replaced some of the leds with red and blue ones,
so I was upset when they changed them to the single strip led, but as a light the are much better.
nice trick! now you should convert the triple batteries to a rechargeable 18560 with a charger plug.
Good idea!
1 screw probably saves them 1-2 seconds per piece probably amounts to quite a large savings on a full run for items they give away
I have one of those black Quantum flashlights too but mine shuts off when I bump it or even move it too fast. Do you experience that problem with yours?
So, any difference in battery life between the 1x and 3x?
awesome. 5 strip version next please
Hey i know they are freein the stores but on Ebay Harbor Freight Tools there are almost always guys selling them for $2.00 each i posted that in case others wanted to gang a bunch of them for other similiar projects maybe hooking them up to a DC plug in power supply or something similiar i personally have been keeping one of those Honda suitcase generators /Inverteors around for miscellaneous projects and Power outages so one of the things i like to do is collect 12 volt items so i can have emporary lighting ,radio, and other luxury items some of which i might use on my boat or for camping trips doing a Boondocking weekend with my travel trailer fYI i enjoy tinkering and making multiple port stations using free or cheap things i pick up for free or very cheap many things like 12 volt lights i find and repair Dumpster Diving at my Marina and i have a Freind that Actually doesBoat removal and disposal as a side business so he will let me pull off whatever i want before the boats are smashed and placed inDumpsters its basically a hobby of mine that entertains me and doesn’t cost much to do a few years ago at my home we had a Ice Storm that took out power for a week and with that little Honda i was able to keep my place warm enough to be comfortable plus we had local radio station for the News and i kept Fresh Coffee for myself and the neighbors sort of becoming the local hero because i knew how to do things like make Coffee on a Camp Stove ? it’s amazing how many people do not these days ?
To anyone new watching this, instead of drilling the perfect sized holes in the sides, I used wire clippers to just cut out the spaces needed, and then used some of the extra screws in the holes on the ends of the LED strips to keep them in place.
This saves a ton of time and frustration.
Either way though, you have to be careful; the plastic is brittle and easily damaged
I enjoyed this video. You said the modified light has 440 Lumens, how did you arrive at that figure? It would be nice to see a side by side comparison I would also like to see how the new model compares to the old one.
HF states that the light has 144 lumens, so he's probably assuming that it will have 3 times the lumens of a single light (which works out to be 432 lumens). Whether that is actually the case is going to be dependent upon the circuitry they are using to limit the current in LED strip... HF states that the light will run for 48 hours on 3 batteries... Assuming around 1000-1500 mAh capacity for the battery, that means that it would be drawing around 20.8 to 31.3 mA... The question though is where is the current limiting resistor in the circuitry? If it is external to the LED strip then by wiring it this way, you still only have 20.8-31.3 mA available, but it must be split between 3 LED strips... If it is integral to each LED strip, that would be better since each strip could still get the 20.8-31.3 mA that they were getting when they were in a light with a single strip...
A quick look at the circuit board seems to indicate that there is a current limiting resistor, but it is only used for the mode when the 3 discrete LEDs on the end are being lit, not the LED strip... The color codes on the resistor appears to be black-red-red, but even with a magnifying glass, it's difficult for my old eyes to read... If this is right, then it means that it is a 200 ohm resistor... On the other hand, if it is red-red-black, then that would be 60 ohms... Probably the latter since with a 4.5V supply voltage and a 3.3V Vf, you would need a 60 ohm resistor if you wanted to limit the current to 20 mA...
Nice job. I have several larger led strips and panels that would be nice in lighting projects around the house. They were driven by 120v. I would like to drive them with cordless batteries. How can I determine their overall dc fwd voltage? Can you help?
malti meter ima gees bro
Just dissected my own and they have fully ditched the screws holding the switch board and went with melted over pegs.
That’s a hell of a lot of work for the end result.
Nice idea but it’s like a 2-3 hour commitment
Maybe
zink carbon batterys can be recharged a little bit with less run time 2 them
Anyone know the max current for these COB LEDs? I have been trying to figure this out. I use a coupon every time I go to HF, so I have close to 30 of these things. I'm trying to hook them up to Arduino, but without knowing the max current, I'm afraid to experiment too much and blow my board.
gunna need to do an 18650 swap like that other guy
The best crappy batteries that come with the free lights are malt max, although flavoring a milkshake with them is not recommended. The names of most of them is pretty funny.
You need legions of those batteries. 😁
Wait you got three that actually worked? Lol you have better luck than me.
I haven't seen the coupons for the free flashlights for a while now (3/21).
For the most part they have stopped the free flashlight promotion as of the end of 2020. Occasionally a coupon for it will pop up, but I've only seen that once since the beginning of 2021.
Wouldn't the LEDs die an early death since you are still going through the same size resister?
No these are ridiculously simple the LED strips just take the 4.5 volts so all that's happening is I'm draining the battery three times faster
You need to upgrade the battery to 18650s
the batterys can git stuck in the qwantoms man happed 2 me
👍😎☕🔧🔨
Next test and upgrade....See how long the AAA batteries last and switch them out to AA batteries and do the same test,
mod or hack(whatever you want to call it) using 2 of those quantum worklights 1 pvc cross(1") 1/4-20 female and a 1" disc magnet. top&bottom of cross 1/4-20&magnet. left&right of cross put lights in horizontal(magnet base will hold lights) lights can be twisted to change beam direction. magnet on cross to attach to steel. 1/4-20 to attach to tripod or photography lightstand.
great light for camping 🤠
Should have deleted the 3 diode flashlight, and soldered the center COB diode strip (not element) to the flash light circuit. That way when you cycle through, you have the low power usage from one light in the middle. Then medium power from the other two on the other circuit, then the last click will do all 3 for max power. That way your not cycling past a useless flashlight with 3 diodes. I'm making a channel similar to yours this week. I do "Hack N Decker" Mods to tools. Other than that great little hack.
Why not add lithium batteries??? Use a small cut off disk... would be easier...too bad you couldn't use one of the other switches that way you have the original switch w/the LED and two LEDs on the second switch...
My harbor freight never has these anymore
I have to ask at mine. They always seem to have some squirreled away somewhere.
Your experiment only shows how to kill the life of the batteries by adding more mAh consumption
No, those stick lights are most definitely NOT worth 8 bucks. They suck, batteries die absurdly fast. The biggest problem is that the magnet also sucks, which leads to the light falling off whatever it's stuck to, which leads to the light hitting the ground, which leads to it not wanting to stay powered on unless you constantly whack it against your palm. 8 dollars for a pain in the ass? That's a big throbbing rock-hard nope.
You convinced me to just buy the $8 flashlight instead. Don't have the time for this, Not worth my time.