It (he) was a troll

I just paid £550 for mine w/o a Ti spring, which would be £150 extra

The issue may not be the shock fouling the frame it's more likely to be the -ve effect on geometry.

Lengthening the shock will increase the seat and head angle, lift the BB as well as shortening the wheelbase, all not good ideas from a handling point of view.

You can of course increase the sag to combat this when the bike is static but it will still extend to these dimensions when you're out riding.

I personally would'nt recommend it, however if you do go ahead I may have a 2010 RP23 Boost Valve shock for sale which is 190×50. ;o)

I had a Romic coil on my Turner with air Pikes up front.

I used it mainly for uplift days, the Alps and Scottish trail centres and always felt that the front was mismatched to the rear.

I personally much prefer coil to air and my new ride (an 2010 Orange 5) has Fox 32 Vanilla (with QR15) up front and a CCDB at the back. I accept you do pay a hefty weight penalty but I don't mind it so much as coil gives you that bomb proof feeling on the decents (btw the Orange is 31lb and the Turner was 36lb)

Is your Boss one of those who's gone early? Rank has its privilidges after all.

I'd record all the additional hours you have put in whilst your colleagues have left early and ask for them off at some other time to ride your bike. That's only fair. It depends on how much of a tool your Boss is.

Gray

I'd considered a quad conversion too, however I couldn't get the right battery/driver combination.

x4 XPGs at 1000mA should give a total Vfd of about 13.2V, if you're using a 14.4V battery you'd need a buck converter like a bFlex or one of BlackCat's drivers where the input voltage must be greater than the output voltage.

However, the bFlex margin is recommended at +1.1V over Vfd and BlackCat's is +10% over Vfd. This means the lowest recommended battery voltage is 14.3V for a bFlex and 14.6V for a BlackCat. It won't take long for even a freshly charged battery to drop below these figures and therefore send the board out of regulation. This would mean losing dimming capability on the bFlex, not sure of the implications with a BlackCat though.

I'd also considered a x5 XPG which is even worse! However it can be overcome using 2 drivers. I had planned on using a Hope HID housing to fit it all in, this may be a bit of a squeeze in a Lumi halogen can though.

I've managed to upload the pictures for this now.

First one is a standard snap using auto settings:

This second one is using Trout's settings (6sec, f4 etc)

Obviously these were taken on different days, the 2400 lumens haven't melted the snow :wink:

Trout

I haven't talked to Cutter about it, I just ordered another board. I haven't measured the voltages on the new one because it's giving me 5 distinct brightness levels at 1000mA (and 1200mA) which it wasn't doing before. Plus of course it is noticably brighter at full tilt so I'm assuming it's working correctly. It may be worth dropping them an email just to give them some feedback though.

With the camera, I'm just using a compact digital, haven't a clue what settings it's on but that explains the difference in the images. It's reaching the end of my garden quite easily which is 150 feet away, although I haven't actually tried it on the bike yet.

I'm now thinking of my next project, a Hope HID can conversion with x5 XPG R5s on a custom heatsink. Have you used the Ledil Lisa2 clip on optics? Are they any good? Also, what's your view using a master/slave pair of bFlexs to drive them? (plan was to use a 14.4v Li-ion battery)

I've now managed to get this working with a new MCPCB. It must have been a cumulative effect of particularly high individual Vfs on the old board. It looks like the maxFlex is fine.

Consequently it is much brighter (I have a pic but can't upload it for some reason?) but still doesn't look as bright as Trout's above, even at 1200mA and a fully charged battery. I suspect it might be the shitty camera I'm using. I take it you've turned the flash off Trout?

My old Turner was stove enameled 'metallic burnt copper' by Bob Jacksons in Leeds. £110 IRC. Includes stripping the old colour etc and would have included over lacquering (sp?) transfers if I wanted.

DaveGr – I used something similar on my conversion, look back through the posts for pictures. It seems to work very well, although I've only been out in the freezing weather which obviously helps. They should fit exactly as a 540 motor is just the right diameter, however I've had two different designs supposedly for 540 motors but when they arrived they were different diameters.

BlackCat – you only need x1 LED in the cart to set the type required on the MCPCB, then select however many boards you want.

@ BlackCat

If you solder the driver board directly to the PCB, wouldn't that get in the way of the heatsink?

If you're that intersted there's always the internet to find out more.

http://www.dogging.co.uk actually exists!!!! 8O

I don't know about poor form, I thought that was obligatory.

We've got a 'knicker tree' on one of our routes (I find it strangely interesting :oops: )

Someone has drapped bra's, knickers, all sorts of stuff over the branches and lined a clearing with the pages from porno mags.

We also found a full length mirror and a blow up doll in a clearing once.

They're a funny lot Nottingham way.

I needed help with something specific and I knew a couple of the guys on here would maybe know the answer, so the title said 'Paging: so-and-so etc.'

Can't do that it seems, I should have either emailed them direct or just put a generic title.

Not really fussed 'cos they found it anyway, it's just that I got a formal warning email telling me not to do it. :oops:

LOL at DezB, is that a typo or a deliberate gag – 'prison'spider

'kin funny anyway.

I'm not saying any more as I'm just digging a bigger hole for myself.

This happens almost every week on our Thursday night ride. You wouldn't believe what we've seen!

Proper full on man-on-man action, with an audience! (not us)

You need to know the code too.
Interior light on but windows up – watching only!
Interior light on windows down – come and join in!

We've had blokes pretending they've lost there dog when we've come across (no pun intended) them in the woods. Blokes getting out of steamed up cars in the middle of nowhere saying their missus needed a pee (which obviously necessitated her taking all her clothes off and hanging her ankles out the windows!

It's a constant source of amusement.

Oops, there is one about trying to avoid the swear filter though!

Darn and blast it! Soz Mod.

Sh*t there isn't is there?

The battery pack is fine, it's a 4.4Ah Lumi bottle and having monitored the discharge circuit and it puts out the 14.4V for most of it.

Trout
How much for a kit? I might be interested. (especially seeing as I now need new internals for my kit). Email in profile. Thanks.

Trout

I've bi-passed one of the LEDs (one I've now bust as the little dome has come off) and I'm getting a full 5 levels of brightness in the 1200mA setting, which suggests I'm not hitting the Total Vf limit. It is brighter but still nothing like your image above. This would suggest to me that the maxFlex is ok and that it is the LED board??

I think I'll change them both and start again afresh, so if you've got a spare x7 XPG R5 MCPCB I'd be interested.

Stuart

I've just measured each of the individual Vfs at 700mA:

3.44V, 3.29V, 3.18V, 3.34V, 3.42V, 3.34V, 3.36V, Total Vf = 23.37V

Total Vf measured 23.0V

In theory these should all be around 3.2V

I'll check the solder joints and try again.

Hi Trout

It's the same battery as you are using, a 14.4V Li-ion. The maxFlex is bonded (with Artic epoxy heat transfer paste) to a 8mm think Ali plate inside the housing which is an interferrence fit in the can.

It seems to working in all other respects ie menu selection flashes etc.

George reckons I've just got a MCPCB with particularly high value Vf LEDs on it.

Don't suppose you've got a spare maxFlex and MCPCB I could buy??

trout – I've tried all the settings from 350mA upto 1200mA and the max output seems to be pretty much the same. I'm not getting anything like the pictures you posted.

The LEDs are on a MCPCB so taking one out might be difficult.
I've metered the total Vf in various settings and I have to run it in 700mA to keep the Level 5 multimode value below the 23.5V limit. This means max theoretical output is only 1700 lumens, which is bit poor.

Chucky – that's exactly the setup I used last night (see pics in earlier post). I'm using the 2.2Ahr Li-ion battery from my original Hope HID fastened to the shoulder strap of my camelbac. Very neat and much lighter than the Hope head unit.
I haven't run the battery flat yet but sensible use of the lower power levels should eek it out over 3 hrs.

The maiden voyage with mine went swimmingly last night. Very pleased with the amount of light and the beam pattern from the Cutter Cute 3 optic.

Had it running at full tilt (1000mA) for most of the ride and it hardly got warm at all (it was -2deg though).

I'm considering converting my other Lumi can in the same way but with the quad board instead.

Should also be picking up the CNCd housing for a x7 XPG bar light today.

I'm getting rather carried away with this home building malarcky. :D

Thanks fergus

Maiden voyage with mine tomorrow night. Max setting is 1000mA but I do have an external heatsink. Plan was to run the majority of the time at less than full power and only crank it up when I really need it.

fergusd – some questions:

How did you establish you need to turn it off?
Does your driver have a thermal overload? and is it being tripped?
Have you got any external heatsinking?

I'm using the bFlex driver with 5 power levels and I was planning on dipping it to lowest level when I stop, so I don't blind people for one thing and to control the temp. Hadn't planned on having to turn it off though.

It's amazing how Wikipedia can make an expert out of anyone! :wink:

The spectral intensity of sunlight peaks at about 600nm wavelength with a smooth curve at either end(visbile light being around 400nm to 700nm ish). The ideal output for a bike light would be a similar profile giving 'daylight' feel to it. Unfortunenately I don't think that's possible with LEDs.
The XPG has a significant spike at about 450nm, the blue end of the spectrum, and relatively little at the 600nm end. This is why they have a bluey, ice white kind of colour. In my experience can this can lead to contrast issues, particularly with a helmet light on its own.
Has anyone tried a multi LED setup with differing BIN lamps to try and construct a sunlight like spectrum? Maybe that should be the next project :?

Chucky

The R4 has a nominal output of 130 lm, driven at 1000mA it's 2.5 times that, giving 325 lm.

x3 should give 975 lm. (an XPG R5 would be 1042 lm)

These are datasheet numbers so are to some degree theoretical, I'm not sure how to calculate/measure losses in the system to get the real figure though.

Externally the XPG opitics are exactly the same as the XPE.

Link to XPG Cute 3 datasheet:
http://www.ledil.com/datasheets/DataSheet_Cute-3-XP-G.pdf

Link to XPE Cute 3 datasheet:
http://www.ledil.com/datasheets/DataSheet_Cute-3-XP.pdf

I originally wanted a narrow spot but as Trout mentioned above the XPG adds 8deg to the XPE optic, which has actually worked out really well, so the XPE optic is fine.

Just completed my Lumi can conversion:

Comparison to my previous helmet light, a Hope HID (first picture)


(apologies for the shakey camera work)

I used the MR11 triple MCPCB with XPG-R4 LEDs from Cutter (I used R4s cos R5s were out of stock) and a Ledil XRE optic also from Cutter.

Note to Gray above, XPG optics are available but just not from Cutter yet. The Ledil site lists them and has links to datasheets etc. Problem is getting hold of them. I spoke to a couple of UK agents and they would have to order minimum quantities etc.

The LEDs are driven by a bFlex driver, again from Cutter, it's dearer than the ones listed on Ebay but much more versatile and programmable.

I also used the RC traction control hub as in the original post for the internal heatsink, which worked well.

I had also hit upon the RC motor heatsink idea and bought one from the States on Ebay, however BWDs suggestion was much neater so I used that instead (thanks BWD). I haven't yet had it running for more than 5-10 mins or so at full tilt (1000mA), however so far it doesn't seem to be getting red hot.

I can also recommend the heatshrink idea for sealing the driver board, much easier than insulation tape.

Other tips you might want to consider:
– to increase the amount of space inside the can I sourced an alternative toggle switch from Farnell, order code 957-5731. This is a momentary on and has a much smaller switch body. Also, I removed the plastic spacer so it sat flush with the inside of the can. You still need a spacer on the outside if you use the weather proof switch cover, I used a small length of Camelbac hose to provide a decent seal.
– This isn't necessary but I changed the power connection to a three pin Brad Harrison/Woodhead type as used on the original Hope, then made up a short adaptor lead from the Lumi connector to a three pin. This means I can use either the Lumi battery or the Hope one. This connector is also smaller than the original Lumi one helping to save space.

Thanks to all who have posted, this has been a very interesting (and so far successful) project. I'm currently waiting on a custom CNC housing to be made (should be done Monday) so I can fit all the components to make a x7 XPG R5 bar light (that's nearly 2500 lumens folks!)

Cheers

poisonspider

In that context then, a 'course' would seem to be the same as a 'track' on other Garmins (the E-Trex for example)

Strictly speaking a 'course' is the same as a 'heading', meaning the direction you are currently going in.

A 'route' is a number of waypoints linked together to create series of headings. These normally connect significant trail features such as mountain tops, river crossings or the pub at the end, although they can of course be programmed for any grid refernce. Typically more information can be assigned to waypoints, such a name etc.

There is another term, 'track', which a series of 'trackpoints'. These are purely grid reference markes which when linked together create a more detailed path or route to follow. Trackpoints tend not to have names assigned or any other attributes, hence most GPS units can store many more trackpoints than waypoints. A GPS can be set to log trackpoints at regular intervals to provide a record of where you have been. Typically these 'tracklogs' can be downloaded into mapping software for displaying on a computer.

Whinlatter was on the agenda for last year but then got pulled. Maybe the TBA in Sept will be there next year?

(When I say last year I mean this year!)

Everlong
I covered my new O5 with it earlier this year, the flat sections (like the sides of the swing arm) are fine, however the underside of the downtube is a bit of a bugger. The weld seam down the middle means you can't get it perfectly flat so you get gaps at the end which list dirt and sh*t underneath. It still stops stone chips but looks after a while it looks a bit manky.

Also, avoid putting it where you're likely to clamp it in a stand, if you have one, because it can pull the tape off if you try and rotate it with opening the clamp properly. I used proper 3M stuff on my old Turner and it's much much better (the glue is totally different and it's thinner and more flexible). With hindsight I wish I'd got the pukka stuff for the Orange.