2 AA Mini Maglite LED Upgrade Combo

[Big Frank]

I decided to start a new thread for this to make it easier to find. And I'm trying to put all the information together. I got a 2 AA Mini Maglite LED Upgrade Combo from Nite Ize yesterday. It cost $10.99, and includes a new reflector with a larger hole in the middle. A stock replacement reflector is $7.00 from Maglite. So the combo kit from Nite Ize, with a 30 lumen LED in a plastic holder, and a push-button tail cap switch, is quite a bargain. Maglite claims the incandescent bulbs put out 14 lumens, but other people say it's closer to 5 lumens, or maybe 8. Either way, the LED upgrade is more than double the output.

I put the push-button tail cap switch on my Pro Brite/Maglite Frankenlight, but it was so much trouble trying to get the LED in the right place so it would turn off and on, that I took the LED out and will recycle the aluminum parts of the flashlight. I put the push-button tail cap switch on the Minii Maglite I got from work, 20 years ago or whenever it was. It came in a case with a pair of batteries. The color is gunmetal gray and after the GM logo it says, Safety is our #1 Priority. I put the LED upgrade in it too, and put ther red filter I made for it back in. I traced circles around a penny or something, and cut 2 of them out of a red filter for a G.I. crookneck flashlight I used to have. When the switch that flashlight broke, I threw away the main body and kept all of the other parts. I keep this flashlight in my bedroom so I can use it instead of a white light at night.

I forgot to post these links until I started the second post.

https://niteize.com/led-upgrade-combo-ii-fits-aa-mini-maglite-30-lumens

https://maglite.com/products/replacement-reflector-mini-maglite-2-cell-aa

[Big Frank]

Here's the Mini Maglite with the red filter. And a picture of a 3mm LED that can replace the light bulb, the incandescent light bulb it came with, and the Nit Ize replacement LED module. The last 3 pics are for a 5mm LED that's available for 18 cents at Lighthouse LEDs. You may be able to get them cheaper elsewhere, but that's where I bought all of my 3mm LEDs. You can cut the leads to length on the 3mm LEDs and use everything else as is. But if you want to use 5mm LEDs, which I recommend, you need to enlarge the hole in the reflector. I tghink the Nite Ize kit has a 5mmLED. Whatever size it is, it wouldn't fit a stock reflector and I had to use the one in the kit. So, you can buy the Nite Ize kit for $10.99, or buy a 5mm LED for 18 cents and cut the legs down to the length of the pins on an incandescent bulb. Or just slightly longer since they don't like to go all the way in, at least the 3mm LEDs I bought don't. And anytime you use an LED in a flashlight, whether it's from a kit or just a plain LED, if it doesn't light up, unplug it, rotate 180 degrees and plug it back in too correct the polarity. Current only flows one way through a diode and that includes LEDs. LEDs can run off 3 volts without a resistor in the circuit, except the 2 red LEDs I bought that were only 1.5 volts. Oops, they each blinked once as they burned out. The original tailcap from the Mini Maglite had the drawstring from my field jacket hood on it. You can see it in the first pic. I cut the hood off my field jacket because I never use it and wanted to use the material for patches.

https://lighthouseleds.com/5mm-led-white-ultra-bright-15-000-mcd.html

[Big Frank]

In this video of the LED upgrade you can see how much bigger the hole is in the new reflector. If you want to skip the conversion kit and just use a 5mm LED, that's how big you need to drill the hole in the old reflector. 5mm is not quite .20", it's under 13/64" but over 3/16". With a plain LED you need to do the same thing as with this conversion, plug it in and if it doesn't light up turn it around the other way. Like trying to plug in a USB type A cable, you have a 50/50 chance of getting it right the first time. That's why I started using a paint pen to mark the top of those cables that don't have a name or logo on them.

Since the head has to be backed off a bit to turn on the light, and is what focuses it, after I put the push-button tailcap on I turned the light on, focused it at a random distance, and wrapped a few layers of Scotch tape around the bottom of the head to hold it in place. Now when I want to turn the light on I can just click the switch and know that the head of the light hasn't rotated to the off position.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkthoUTn_go

[Big Frank]

My friend's mom uses white out to mark her USB-A cables with a white dot so she knows which side is the top. I thought that was a good idea, but since I have a paint pen I used that, and made a big spot on my charger and cable. The other end of the cable is a USB-C to plug into my phone so I don't have to worry about it. My other charger has a USB-C plug on both ends of thee cable so I didn't need to mark it. Paint should last longer than white out, and even if it wears down, the big spots will last a long time.

Today's trivia -- Liquid Paper, the first correction fluid, was invented by The Monkees' Mike Nesmith's mom when he was a teenager.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bette_Nesmith_Graham

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_Paper

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Nesmith