Support Group/Thread For Mod Addiction or MA

[HARDTRAILZ]

Got the roof rack off today for modding soon.

 

[BlazingTrails]

Hell yeah!!

We just got through replacing the LEDs and resistors that Aaron ordered. They sent the wrong resistors they should have been 680 ohm and they sent him 330 ohm so it was burning up the LEDs smh.

 

[Blckshdw]

Look at that intense concentration!!!

 

[Capote]

[emoji3] Look at that intense concentration!!!

Yeah that's what Brandon was saying [emoji12]

 

[Darkrider_LS]

[emoji3] Look at that intense concentration!!!

He's got this.."must solder Leds and not shit myself doing it" look goin on

 

[HARDTRAILZ]

Squeeze a cheek!!!!

 

[BlazingTrails]

 

[HARDTRAILZ]

Need to mod a better way to poop in the woods. Today was rough after drinking last night

 

[dmanns67]

Need to mod a better way to poop in the woods. Today was rough after drinking last night

I have spent many weeks $hitting in the woods. Leaning against a tree is ok, but cutting a hole in the bottom of a 5 gallon bucket then using the bottom as a seat works well. I have also seen a toliet seat that attaches to a trailer hitch and you can attach a bag or a bucket to the bottom of it.

Some call it a bumper dumper

http://www.bumperdumper.com/bumper2.htm

 

[BlazingTrails]

We went from soldering to 'professional' shitting in the woods rotfl

 

[dmanns67]

Back to soldering, I received my new Cree board from Kevin. Have to take it into work on Monday to use my electricians soldering iron and solder. Hopefully I do not have any further issues with this headlight.

 

[HARDTRAILZ]

When you are in the woods squeezing a cheek...soldering is not the mod you think of

 

[BlazingTrails]

I let you know next time I'm pinching one off in the woods rotfl

Hey Dave any idea what part of those boards as failing? Do you see any burnt spots? Are the smds just dying?

 

[dmanns67]

I let you know next time I'm pinching one off in the woods rotfl

Hey Dave any idea what part of those boards as failing? Do you see any burnt spots? Are the smds just dying?

Not that I can see. There was one Cree chip on one of the boards that started to separate from the board. Other than that they appear to be ok.

Kevin thought the fan on my heat sink stopped working which would have caused extreme heat. The fan runs and I also left the dust cover off, so heat build-up should not be an issue.

I assume the Cree chips are soldered to the boards. I am going to see if I can remove and resolder them. Maybe bad solder points

 

[BlazingTrails]

Its hard to say without load testing them. They look pretty basic to be having this much trouble. Sounds like it may be a problem with heat on the solder joints. I wonder how hot the crees run? They may not have been solder soaked thoroughly.......

 

[dmanns67]

They get pretty hot after only running for a few minutes. The post they are mounted to is hot to the touch. I have a thermal gun at work, maybe i can get a reading running off a 9V battery.

 

[BlazingTrails]

There could be a major temp difference between 9 and 14 volts. Any idea what the nominal voltage is on the crees? I know there is a driver box what is the output voltage? I wonder what the current draw is.....

 

[dmanns67]

There could be a major temp difference between 9 and 14 volts. Any idea what the nominal voltage is on the crees? I know there is a driver box what is the output voltage? I wonder what the current draw is.....

Yeah I figured there would be. I do not have access to the gun outside of work.

Not sure about the nominal voltage, but according to Kevin, input is 12v and output is 24v which is why the driver is required.

 

[djthumper]

Might just need to reflow the solder on the CREEs, if all of the solder is gone then they are using the wrong stuff.

 

[dmanns67]

Its hard to say without load testing them. They look pretty basic to be having this much trouble. Sounds like it may be a problem with heat on the solder joints. I wonder how hot the crees run? They may not have been solder soaked thoroughly.......

I did a quick test at work yesterday with powering my new Cree board with a 9v battery and some wire. I used the thermal gun and the temps jumped from 70*F to around 130*F within 30 seconds. The board was so hot I could not touch it for a few second after pulling the wires off of it. These Crees definitely run hot. Not sure how the 9V temperature would differ from operating at 24v or if it would be close to the same. I will tell you that I was seeing spots from those damn Cree for 5 minutes after removing the wires

On another note, the new Cree board that Kevin sent me works. The downside is that the new Cree board that I installed a week ago has now failed with about 30 minutes of use. I did not install the new Cree board because that makes (4) Cree boards that have went bad with this one headlight.

I am thinking that might be an issue with wither the driver or the headlight itself causing the Cree boards to burn up. I have not had one issue out of my driver's side Cree headlight, so I have moved the Cree driver to the driver's side to see if that causes any issues with that headlight.

I have emailed Kevin and told him the situation. He is going to send me a new 9005 Cree headlight. If I do not see any issues with the driver's side Cree headlight using the driver from the passenger side headlight, then the issue must be with the Cree headlight itself. What that issue is, I am not completely sure.

I will tell you that I am tired of messing around with these Cree headlights, especially with the limited amount of use that they get

 

[Blckshdw]

Boo on that!! How much are these kits going for again? I looked at the VLEDs answer to these, theirs use Luxeon Rebel LEDs, but for $250, that's WAY too rich for my blood.

 

[BlazingTrails]

I did a quick test a work yesterday with powering my new Cree board with a 9v battery and some wire. I used the termal gun and the temps jumped from 70*F to around 130*F within 30 seconds. The board was so hot I could not touch it for a few second after pulling the wires off of it. These Crees definitely run hot. Not sure how the 9V temperature would differ from operating at 24v or if it would be close to the same. I will tell you that I was seeing spots from those damn Cree for 5 minutes after removing the wires

On another note, the new Cree board that Kevin sent me works. The downside is that the new Cree board that I installed a week ago has now failed with about 30 minutes of use. I did not install the new Cree board because that makes (4) Cree boards that have went bad with this one headlight.

I am thinking that might be an issue with wither the driver or the headlight itself causing the Cree boards to burn up. I have not had one issue out of my driver's side Cree headlight, so I have moved the Cree driver to the driver's side to see if that causes any issues with that headlight.

I have emailed Kevin and told him the situation. He is going to send me a new 9005 Cree headlight. If I do not see any issues with the driver's side Cree headlight using the driver from the passenger side headlight, then the issue must be with the Cree headlight itself. What that issue is, I am not completely sure.

I will tell you that I am tired of messing around with these Cree headlights, especially with the limited amount of use that they get

I would not swap the driver over to the drivers side. If it has only been happening on the passenger side then that would lead me to believe the driver is indeed bad. can you test it with a volt meter? there would be an insane difference in temps from 9v to 24 volts like probably 100 degrees or more. if those are 24 volt crees then the driver should only be putting out 18-20 volts. if you have a full 24 volts and no voltage regs on the cree chips that will burn them out as well. I wish I could test them lol

 

[dmanns67]

Boo on that!! How much are these kits going for again? I looked at the VLEDs answer to these, theirs use Luxeon Rebel LEDs, but for $250, that's WAY too rich for my blood.

Kevin's kits are going for $80 plus they claim to be 3600 lumen which is why I went with his kit instead of kits on vleds.com. $250 for hi beams is way too much for me to spend, plus their kits were only like 2400 lumen.

I would not swap the driver over to the drivers side. If it has only been happening on the passenger side then that would lead me to believe the driver is indeed bad. can you test it with a volt meter? there would be an insane difference in temps from 9v to 24 volts like probably 100 degrees or more. if those are 24 volt crees then the driver should only be putting out 18-20 volts. if you have a full 24 volts and no voltage regs on the cree chips that will burn them out as well. I wish I could test them lol

I have swapped the drivers each time to verify the dirver was still working and the passenger side driver still powers the Crees. This time I just left the driver on the driver's side to see if it affect the Crees. Kevin did not want to send me a new driver, until it makes the Crees fail on the driver's side. Then he will be sending me (2) new cree boards and a new driver. I would hate to have him send me a new Cree headlight and then the driver burns up the Crees again on the new headlight. At least with swapping the driver to the driver's side, I will know if the driver was the issue or the headlight.

I do have a multimeter. I can test the wires soldered to the Cree boards and see what the voltage is with the current driver and then swap in the other driver and see what that voltage is to compare the difference. Maybe the driver is above 20v

 

[Darkrider_LS]

I just sent Kevin another pm to see if he ever received the defective driver I sent back to him in September. Hopefully I get a response soon, I liked the performance I got out of them for the short time I had the Leds in the tb.

 

[dmanns67]

I just sent Kevin another pm to see if he ever received the defective driver I sent back to him in September. Hopefully I get a response soon, I liked the performance I got out of them for the short time I had the Leds in the tb.

When I spoke with Kevin, he said that he does NOT need bad drivers back. He only needs the headlight shipped back to him.

 

[Darkrider_LS]

When I spoke with Kevin, he said that he does NOT need bad drivers back. He only needs the headlight shipped back to him.

Back when mine failed he asked me to send mine back for exchange. Hmmm

 

[dmanns67]

Back when mine failed he asked me to send mine back for exchange. Hmmm

Strange. Maybe he changed the policy. He just emailed me yesterday stating that.

 

[Darkrider_LS]

Strange. Maybe he changed the policy. He just emailed me yesterday stating that.

That's what I'm thinking happened

 

[BlazingTrails]

Seems to me the driver is the expensive part and he would want it back to try and repair it and re-sell it? I wish I could get involved with these because I ma pretty sure I could eliminate the issues they are having....

 

[Blckshdw]

Seems to me the driver is the expensive part and he would want it back to try and repair it and re-sell it? I wish I could get involved with these because I ma pretty sure I could eliminate the issues they are having....

Unfortunately, the extent of the hardware support is getting replacements from his vendor, and sending the stuff back to them for diagnosis and hopefully resolving the issues on future products.

 

[dmanns67]

Unfortunately, the extent of the hardware support is getting replacements from his vendor, and sending the stuff back to them for diagnosis and hopefully resolving the issues on future products.

The bad part about his vendor is that they are in Hong Kong, so his shipments take forever.

 

[djthumper]

I have been working with Kev on some of the failures. I still need to do further testing with my failed light. I just need to find some time soon.

 

[BlazingTrails]

well once it is all worked out I will probably get some. but NOT until then

 

[HARDTRAILZ]

Agreed

 

[dmanns67]

well once it is all worked out I will probably get some. but NOT until then

Kevin said that he has been on the fence about finding a new supplier for the Crees. After all of my issues and burning through (4) Cree boards, he is going to look into a new supplier. Hopefully a US supplier if possible. I believe he gets his 2400 lumen Crees from a different supplier, but I am not sure if they are in the US.

I shipped the headlight and Cree boards back to him this morning. Hopefully I will have my new headlight by Saturday. So far the driver's side Crees are holding up to the driver. I will try to get some voltage readings tonight when I get home for a comparison.

BT, I was talking to one of my electricians at work and he thinks that I might see upwards of 30v. Does that make sense to you? If I am seeing that voltage, maybe that is why the Cree boards are burning up.

 

[BlazingTrails]

It sounds like we are on the same page.

 

[Capote]

Idk if this counts as a mod, but having to dremel this bushing from the dorman bushings pack I got at AutoZone to make it fit..

 

[Mounce]

Did she fit?

Currently planning radio upgrade for the stang. I've got every light possible swapped out, only possible and relatively cheap mod left is radio and speaker upgrades..not sure if I'll be able to do radio + speakers at the same time due to budget..what would y'all recommend first, radio or speakers?

 

[BlazingTrails]

Are your speakers blown? I would start there...what good does a new radio do with no speakers?

 

[Capote]

Did she fit?

Currently planning radio upgrade for the stang. I've got every light possible swapped out, only possible and relatively cheap mod left is radio and speaker upgrades..not sure if I'll be able to do radio + speakers at the same time due to budget..what would y'all recommend first, radio or speakers?

Yup, but made the middle hole a c*nt hair too wide so there's a little play on the pin it grasps. But I went through the gears fine, she'll be fine until Friday when the actual oem bushing comes.