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Attack of the blinking dimming flashlight

A project log for My project site activities/misc projects

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kc-leeK.C. Lee 12/29/2021 at 20:580 Comments

I would never have thought that the blinking dimming light movie tropes is being kept alive by poorly made flashlight clicky switches in my flashlight mod.

I managed to extract the mechanism that was pressed fitted into the end cap of the flashlight.  They use some iron strips as part of the contact.  There are 2 such contacts in series and they gets even worse as I use the switch for the boost supply with about 3X currents.

I cut2 pieces of gold plated (15um) pin from a 2mm connector.

I soldered them onto the contacts.  The contacts needed to be bent flat as the pins adds extra thickness.

There is a metal piece that looks like a top in the previous picture.  I had to bent the circular part down to make more clearance for the pins. I reassembled the switch and soldered a short piece of bare stranded wires.  This wire helps to make better contact to the side wall of the end cap.

Unfortunately the plastic they used is too soft and I do not have the right jig to press it back in place.  If there were a time I wish I had a 3D printer, this would be it.

Anyways this fix got rid of the flimsy flickers and the light a lot brighter.

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