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Author Topic: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?  (Read 3263 times)

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Offline erlomd

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How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« on: March 28, 2016, 06:50:44 PM »
Looking at my Tri-Cree xpe2 (BBW) light up for the first time got me thinking...does it get brighter?

don't get me wrong, its very bright connected to the battery (when I was testing to see if I wired the LED's correctly) ... but it still left me questioning if it does get brighter?

As of now, Im running both "blue" LED's on individual (1ohm 2w resistors) connected to a 3.7v 18650 Li battery...eventually it will be hooked up to the NBv3 which I know has a built in driver that you can adjust using the SD card.

will it get brighter once installed and dialed in on the NBv3?

Ive seen people running up to 1100mA (1.1A) on it...and some say that after 990mA you can't even tell the difference...

another topic here says that overdriving them at 1500mA (1.5A) seems to be the limit as to how much power is given to them without burning the bulb out.
heres a quote from that thread:

"What is the maximum safe operating current?


Sustained operation tests were performed on heat sink mounted XP-E2 green and royal blue LED stars at 1.5 amps and 2.0 amps with the collimator lenses attached and all LEDs operating simultaneously.

At 1.5 amps, the LEDs operated continuously for over an hour with no problems.

At 2.0 amps, the LEDs in the LED stars started to fail and go dead in less than 5 minutes.

The operating current for the new test sabers was selected to be 1.5 amps per LED.

The small incremental increase in brightness going from 1.5 amps to 2.0 amps makes it not worth the effort and cost in LEDs to try to find a possible safe drive level between 1.5 amps and 2.0 amps to drive the LEDs."


Located Here: Overdriven CREE XP-E2 LED Sabers & Fluorescence Enhanced Saber Blades

Offline erlomd

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Re: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« Reply #1 on: March 28, 2016, 08:08:11 PM »
well...never mind...I was told on TCSS (wealth of knowledge there too...) that the NBv3 has a 2A Limit...so at 1000mA for each blue LED, thats as much as I can drive it...with the 1ohm 2w resistors...however, maybe this will be an interesting topic of discussion for those who are not limited in their sound card!

Offline erv

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Re: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« Reply #2 on: March 28, 2016, 09:39:49 PM »
that limit is based on common sense, the driver part used has 6.5A max ratings.
The driven power can be easily doubled on the NB using an external PEx, or by adding a piggy-back transistor on top of the one on the board. The limit is really your battery.

Offline erlomd

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Re: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« Reply #3 on: March 28, 2016, 09:46:43 PM »
that limit is based on common sense, the driver part used has 6.5A max ratings.
The driven power can be easily doubled on the NB using an external PEx, or by adding a piggy-back transistor on top of the one on the board. The limit is really your battery.

makes sense! thank you sir! your a gentleman and a scholar!  :grin:

Offline Rysandro

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Re: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« Reply #4 on: March 29, 2016, 12:24:20 AM »
Another option:

All the New NEC boards (Spark 2 $79.99) have 4A mofsets

Offline erlomd

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Re: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« Reply #5 on: March 29, 2016, 06:35:45 AM »
So let me get this straight...

ohms means resistance...so, the lower the ohms the less resistance there is and more power is unleashed...the wattage is the amount of power you will be unleashing...so in essence, the less ohms and the more watts the brighter and more dangerous it is right?

Offline ABQThor

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Re: How do you Brighten your Tri-Cree XPE-2 To Full Potential?
« Reply #6 on: July 23, 2018, 08:22:37 AM »
I personally knew the Photonic Bladesmith, he's since passed away. The limit is around 2 amps however if you refer to his charts anything beyond 1.5amps heatsinked the gains of a higher voltage and amps exponentially drops. Typically what I have experienced has been having a life of a couple months at 2 amps because I wasn't willing to listen to have at first, about two months in I suffered LED degradation and was left with an LED that over driven was no brighter than stock.

 

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