[Closed] P7 Torch Adaptor / 18650 Holder

Registered interest before on here.

If that's been lost, still count me in for full kit.

Same name - CustardCream.

Thanks.

I think I registered some interest previously too - maybe with a "yorkshire" in my name then...

Oh, and red anodised for me! 😀

Looks great Rich, I'm still interested. Well done.

could you not just drill a hole in the adapter to bolt it to an existing QR Handle bar mount like this?:

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?ModelID=6091

Looking good.

I should have mentioned that I have a note of everyone who registered interest before on my ever increasing spreadsheet, the only issue will be that I didn't note down everybody's email addresses, so if they haven't re-registered, or don't have an email address in their profile now, I'll struggle to contact them.

I haven't really addressed the issue of mounts, as everyone seems to have their own preferences - I like the lock-blocks as they are cheap and versatile. I also want to buy as few parts as possible to minimise the amount of stock I have to buy in advance and financial outlay.

Cheers, Rich

Still interested

I'd be interested in one for sure.

Sorry, I'll re-word that ;o)

would it be possible for us to drill a hole in the adapter to mount a suitable QR handlebar mount?

Hi,

I'm still interested.

petebeale@gmail.com.

count me in

simonatwork@hotmail.com

im interested too. Can you repeat the pricing? Cheers!

yep still keen

which p7 torch do you recommend

interested too - thanks. WHat sort of price would these be at?

Count me in too!!

craikhome@googlemail.com

Yep interested

Markcook.220bpm at virgin.net

Still interested chris dot salt at derbyshire dot gov dot uk

looking good ferret halljoinery@hotmail.com

Put me down for 2 pls
crow123@tiscali.co.uk

tell me when!

I have a few friends who would be interested in these, could you post some info about price etc.
my mail is in my profile..thanks

Right, apologies for delayed response, been busy removing a gearbox from my motorbike 😥 and also working on these holders over the weekend.

Repeating the pricing (slightly revised due to cable costs being higher than I'd anticipated)

Battery pack without cable ~ £12
Battery pack with cable ~ £17 (with 2.5mm male plug) - increased from 2.1mm
Battery pouch ~ £7
P7 tail cap (to replace the battery tube) ~ £20

Complete package ~ £37

All would have about £1 postage on top to the UK, a bit more to the rest of the world

The internals of the adaptor are potted - this eliminates the need for lots of screw in bits and pieces as the P7 has, must suitable to short runs when trying to keep costs down, and assuming every-thing's OK to begin with, should ensure it remains so!

The cables I'll be using are [url= http://www.batteryspace.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=4143 ]these[/url], up from 2.1mm as I was struggling to find ready made cables at sensible prices in that size.

I am undecided on the idea of putting a threaded hole in the side for a mount. The wall thickness of the adaptor is only 1.5mm, so there wouldn't be a huge number of threads gripping on, so a fair chance of potential stripping. Of greater concern, would be the potential for internal shorts. The body is the negative, and the internal contacts are positive, if the attachment screw was a bit long, then it could short out the battery pack. With 4 cells, this could be some considerable current before the protection circuitry kicked in, which could fuse everything together in a bit of a mess 😯

I'd be much more comfortable avoiding this issue entirely 😀

Right, the prototype is up and running with the internals all potted, and works nicely - a fair bit brighter than my 5-mode P7 on full power. It does generate a good deal of heat, hopefully this'll stabilise to something sensible when on the move.

I also have another mould in process, using my new vacuum degassing chamber, hopefully bubbles will be an issue of the past!

[img] [/img]

He'll be cured by this evening, I might even manage to cast the first one tonight.

Cheers, Rich

is the jack plug/socket at the back waterproof?

Guys,

It is with great regret that I will not be continuing to pursue the P7 adaptor concept 🙁

There has been overwhelming enthusiasm from MTBíers all over the world, much more than I had envisaged when I started messing around with battery holders. I am very sorry to disappoint a lot of keen prospective buyers.

Let me explain - I had rather naively assumed that one P7 was the same as another, and I could produce a universal fitting to replace the battery tube. However, while they look the same from the outside, the internals seem to change quite frequently, which would at worst render the adaptor useless, or at best mean it would only fit a few torches. Trying to keep track of design changes and produce a guide of what torch a potential buyer has, and thus which adaptor is required, is beyond what I am willing to do. Given the potential for large numbers of returns on adaptors which won't fit, and the very small profit margin on each one, the chances of making a considerable loss are pretty high. I would also have to keep a fairly high inventory level of parts, and commit to fair sized production runs, so despite the provisional orders, the risk is high.

I will still be making 4 x 18650 battery holders, and pouches, suitable for DIYíers or people wanting an external pack for existing lights, but not a complete system. I cast my first finished holder using my rapid prototyped mould, and it's excellent, fantastic surface finish and geometrically perfect.

[img] [/img]

If people want one of these, I'll be making quite a few, £12 + postage to anywhere in the world, let me know, will have them available very shortly in 4S1P, 2S2P or 1S4P.

Thank you to everyone for their constructive comments and useful input over the past month or so, it has been great to tap into a wealth of knowledge, ideas and experience. It has been great fun, and kept me amused for a good few weekends and evenings, but a number of variables seem to be conspiring against me. Sorry for letting you down.

Cheers, Rich

ah i'll bet your gutted after all the hard work research etc.. it was looking good too.. 😥

That's a shame Rich, but good on ya for having a bloody good go. Put me down for 2 of the holders with pouches, I'll just have to bodge my own.

Why don't you get in touch with Deal-Extreme and sell them your concept at a small fee 💡

Turboferret - how gutting for you and for us hopeful customers.

Has anyone got any good ideas as to how to connect the battery holder to a P7 torch without one of turboferret's screw-in adapters?

Gutted Rich as I'm sure you are. I was looking forward to building a double light syste. I'll need to have a bit of a rethink about how to take out the middle section of the battery.

Good effort all the same.

It is a shame, I'm a bit disappointed, but there seemed to be too many variables to contend with.

I have spent a lot more time and money on the battery holder itself than the torch adaptor, so not a huge amount wasted really, it's been an interesting little project.

A few ideas for rigging up external power to a P7, first decision is whether you make a dummy 18650 cell, or connect direct to the battery terminals.

A dummy cell could be a simple as a bit of dowel with a drawing pin in each end, a slot sawed half way through lengthwise, and wires soldered to the ends of the pins (might have to be brass pins and not plated ones).

Another idea would be to solder directly onto the spring terminal and brass terminal inside the battery. For the tail-cap end you'd have to make sure you had a reasonable length of cable as it'll get coiled as you screw in the end.

Another idea from MTBR was little crocodile clips on the terminals!

To get the cable out of the torch, what I'd do would be to dremmel a slot down through the tail-cap threads into the meat of the battery tube. That way the cable can be easily removed, and plugs and the like don't get in the way.

I would steer clear of any cheap cables and sockets, the more expensive ones from BatterySpace and the like are justifiably so, the last thing you want is a dodgy power connection.

Cheers, Rich

Rich - may be you could sell a bundle of battery holder, pouch, cables and crocodile clips? Just a thought?

I'm interested:
ted'at'targetmedia'dot'net

I'm not so convinced on the crocodile clips concept myself 😆 but will certainly be offering holders and pouches.

I must admit I've gone off the idea of buying in things like cables, and selling them on, I'll quite possibly be stuck with a load of them unsold, which I want to avoid.

So, I won't be selling any kits ready to plug and play with torches, just some components for the DIYer.

Cheers, Rich

Rich, 11 outof 10 for effort my son!
I'm still up for a pair of holders and pouches, ( the 4 cells in parallel variety). I think the selling the idea on to Dealextreme is a good one, especially if you have a working prototype to send them. Their contacts in asia could probably reverse engineer it and knock up a thousand units in about 48 hours for peanuts!

Drillski
peternadin at btinternet dot com

Just a thought about bodging now guys.

If i remove the batery tube completely, and i remove therefore also teh clicky switch from the end, do i have to replace this with anything fancy, i.e. does it have any important circuitry in it, or is it just a locking and non locking switch, or does it contain the multi mode jazzy bits? If it is justa simple switch,could i replace it in the circuit with a another similar affair elsewhere in the circuit?

Drillski

Drillski, the switch is a simple basic latching on/off, although the 2 mode has 3 positions, direct, through a resistor, and open. The driver for the 5 mode torch is in the emitter pill.

You say remove the battery tube, but do you realise that the pill screws into one end of the tube, and the whole thing screws into the head of the torch?

This is why people favour cutting the tube down, as otherwise you have to cut some threads.

Some great info about modding and lots of photos of the internals [url= http://www.el34world.com/Misc/bike/BikesLights1.htm ]here[/url]

Cheers, Rich

Soooooooooooo, i could cut the battery tube off behind the emitter, put in a blanking plug, run in a lead from the battery through said plug that made contact with the positive contact on the emmiter and the shortened battery tube, with an inline switch built into the batery lead, like this one..

http://www.batteryspace.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=4415

all it would mean would be that i would have to fully turn it on and off to cycle through the modes. Am i right?

That solution sounds as though it'd work, although it's a momentary off that you need to cycle through the different modes. Most switches do have a state where they are off but not fully latched, so should be OK.

Keep us posted how you get on, good to see ingenuity at work 🙂

Cheers, Rich

i'll have a battery pack, cable and pouch (maybe 2)

garycartwright@hotmail.com

cheers

Right, subsequent to the demise of the replacement battery tube I've decided to make an alternative.

There was quite a bit of interest in the idea of a nice simple 'dummy cell' concept for those wanting an external battery pack for the P7, and were happy to drill a hole in the side of their torch.

This will be a bit of a DIY solution, as you'll have to source your own cable, and either crimp or solder the ends, and of course drill your torch, but it should be a fairly simple solution which should be reliable and versatile.

[img] [/img]

That's the holder, and this is roughly how it'll go in a P7 (only with the wires meeting up of course!

[img] [/img]

Price will probably be under a tenner, but not really decided yet.

I've updated my [url= http://www.turboferret.co.uk/Bikelights/bikelights.php ]website[/url] and the ordering page will be up and running as soon as I've made a few pouches and cast a few holders - I'd rather people had to wait a bit to order, than wait to receive after paying!

My friendly rapid-prototyper is again providing amazing help, and I'd expect that I'd have the first dummy cells within a fortnight.

Cheers, Rich

Rich - so the advantage of the dummy cell over simply soldering the cables to the terminals in the torch is that you can remove it and use a single normal cell instead if you want to? Are there other advantages?

I would be the first to admit that it doesn't offer a huge number of advantages over soldering direct to the terminals.

However, I have found that unscrewing the emitter on some of the new P7's to be virtually impossible, so you may find that trying to solder to the positive terminal inside the battery tube is rather tricky.

Also, the tail cap will obviously rotate and coil up a wire soldered to it, but with some slack that shouldn't be too much of an issue.

Depending on whether you drilled a hole in the side of the torch, or cut a slot down through the tail cap threads, you would most likely have to un-solder the connections from the dummy cell to remove it fully from the torch anyway, assuming you couldn't thread the other end of your power cable through your torch hole.

Clearly there are loads of solutions, it's just several people had expressed an interest in this idea, so I thought I'd give it a go.

It's not a commercial 'plug and play' option, but might be of interest to some folk.

Cheers, Rich

Thanks. I didn't mean to poo-poo the idea, but I did want make sure I wasn't missing a big problem with the "just solder it" route.

No worries jfeb 🙂

You did make a very valid point though, since soldering will still be a requirement with my solution.

I think the disassembly problem with the new P7's is a genuine issue though, getting the emitter module out, they can be a bit of a b@stard 😯

Cheers, Rich