DIY RGBW flashlight

Convoy distributes complete flashlights as well as empty housings. These are the perfect base to build flashlights according to your own needs. There are many different LED’s and drivers that fits in these hosts.
This article is about a 4 colour LED with some nice effects as bonus, I like the police beacon.
The small version for 18350 battery (900mAh) runs about 45 minutes, the larger version for 18650 battery runs longer accordingly, depending on the type of battery you use.
The main reason for me to build this flashlight is constant brightness of all 4 colours. Use of color gels reduces the brightness more or less, depending on the color.

It is a pity that I could not find a driver with the possibility to mix the colours and with modes like colour fading so far. That would be nice.

The flashlight is lightweight and very small. It is the perfect daily companion.

What you need:

Convoy S2 host 18650 Version
or
Convoy S2 host 18350 Version
Cree XM-L RGBW Led and driver
soldering iron
something to screw the pill, I use a circle with two metal spikes
tweezers or small pliers to thread the wires
a glass of finest scotch whisky (Lagavulin will be best) for the steady hand 😉

How to:

First, disassemble the host. Then put the wires through the 2 holes in the brass pill, 3 black through one and the red and fourth black through the other. Solder the wires to the connectors on the LED circuit board.
The wires at the driver are: positive (red wire), white, red, green, blue (clockwise)
The connectors at the LED circuit board: + (positive), white, blue, green, red (clockwise)

Move the wires back in the brass pill as much as possible. Make sure none of the wires goes over the LED or outside the pill.
Mount the small brass ring to fix the driver. Solder the brass spring at the middle connector of the driver. Put the glass and reflector in the head of the flashlight and screw the brass part in the head. Make sure the reflector is fix. Assemble the other parts, put a battery in and light on.

Characteristics & modes:

The driver powers each of the 4 LED’s with 1 Ampere so it is about 300 lumens. But i can’t meassure it by myself exactly.
The modes are: white, red, green, blue, strobe (all 4 LED’s), red/blue strobe (police), red blinking

All the best!
Sven