Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

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gcbryan
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Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by gcbryan »

This is a $95 670 lumen (potentially) led dive light available from DealExtreme in Hong Kong. It comes with lithium-ion rechargeable batteries and charger. It is more or less comparable to a Light Cannon at 1/4 the cost and size.

Well, I have mixed results for the actual dive test tonight. It didn't leak and when it was working I liked it better than my Light Cannon. I don't know that it is brighter or throws further it's just bright and different.

I like the fact that the light distribution is more even (no hotspot) is a little wider than the 6 deg spot of the LC and the light color is more natural looking. The end result is that at least closer up it seems a lot brighter than the LC and a lot more natural looking.

I used it with the soft sock mount from Oxycheq so I could use it hands free. The handle is a little long when you are using dryglove rings but it still was no problem.

I really liked the light output and light color. However, I had similar problems to those described by Ron Frank on Scubaboard.

I'm not sure if it is a pressure issue or a temperature issue. Since I'm diving in 50 degree water you wouldn't think it would be temperature unless the heat sink just isn't effective in disbursing the heat to the light body.

This was a rather shallow dive so no deeper than 60fsw. It worked on all settings until it just went down to an output less than the 20% setting. I turned it off and used the Light Cannon for a while. Later I turned the Cree back on and it worked on all settings...for awhile. I went back and forth like this for the entire dive.

So, it seems to be a time related thing which seems more like temperature. Maybe it's not time or temperature but just a bad switch.

I'll have to do some more dives with it but if anyone else has figured this out please post or send me a PM. By the way, it doesn't seem to have this problem out of the water although I probably haven't kept it on that long out of the water either.
Last edited by gcbryan on Sun Nov 08, 2009 9:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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H20doctor
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by H20doctor »

Sounds like its a good fit for you... Ive noticed on mine that youve got to charge up the 18650 Batteries .. I run the 3000 Ma in mine , and dont have any issues with dimming , Skydiver has one and maybe he can chime in here as well
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gcbryan
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by gcbryan »

I'm using Trustfire 2500 ma. I'm running mine now as a burn test to make sure it doesn't do this after a while out of the water. I believe this is only an in water problem however. I've heard of a few others having a similar problem. I'll file the RA request in case I need to send it back but I'd really like to figure it out and keep it if that's an option.

I'm posting the review on several forums in case someone else with that problem figured it out.

It's a great light otherwise. It even made the Junkyard seem like an interesting dive!
Last edited by gcbryan on Sun Nov 08, 2009 9:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Nwbrewer
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by Nwbrewer »

If it doesn't do it out of the water, it's not a temperature thing, but it sure sounds like it is. I've seen some people on CPF with DX lights where no thermal grease was used between the emitter and the body, or between the driver and the body leading to a poor thermal path. This (to me) sounds like your driver is getting hot or running out of juice. Airsix had the same issue in his custom MC-E divelight (too hot). I sinked all the ships on my board, and did not experience the same issue.


I did have something weird happen with the levels when I tried to do a second hour long dive on my battery pack (it sucks I need a new one) where it was skipping around. Are you sure you had the batteries all charged up? You're just using the little black tray charger with Trustfires right? Either one could be suspect. Try meeting up with Doc and swapping batteries for a dive.

Good luck, let us know what you find.
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gcbryan
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by gcbryan »

Nwbrewer wrote:If it doesn't do it out of the water, it's not a temperature thing, but it sure sounds like it is. I've seen some people on CPF with DX lights where no thermal grease was used between the emitter and the body, or between the driver and the body leading to a poor thermal path. This (to me) sounds like your driver is getting hot or running out of juice. Airsix had the same issue in his custom MC-E divelight (too hot). I sinked all the ships on my board, and did not experience the same issue.


I did have something weird happen with the levels when I tried to do a second hour long dive on my battery pack (it sucks I need a new one) where it was skipping around. Are you sure you had the batteries all charged up? You're just using the little black tray charger with Trustfires right? Either one could be suspect. Try meeting up with Doc and swapping batteries for a dive.

Good luck, let us know what you find.
When I ordered the light I did order a second set of 18650 Trustfires so I can try using those for my next dive. I hope it's something like that because I really don't want to send this light back. I really loved the light and would like to do an entire dive where I could enjoy the output and not have to switch lights back and forth. I'll post again after I get it in the water again.

I did let it run a bit longer out of the water last night than I have before so I guess it can't be a temperature thing. I don't see how it can be a battery thing either though if it doesn't do it out of the water.
Last edited by gcbryan on Sun Nov 08, 2009 9:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Burntchef
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by Burntchef »

just got the new sartek ebl2200 ,runs on 3 aa, put out a crazy bright focused beam. will do a review once it hits the water, jake you free thur?
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by Nwbrewer »

Burntchef wrote:just got the new sartek ebl2200 ,runs on 3 aa, put out a crazy bright focused beam. will do a review once it hits the water, jake you free thur?

I can be after 3:00. Muk?
"Screw "annual" service,... I get them serviced when they break." - CaptnJack (paraphrased)


"you do realize you're supposed to mix the :koolaid: with water and drink it, not snort the powder directly from the packet, right? :smt064 " - Spatman
gcbryan
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Re: Dive Light Review:Cree MC-E Dive Light

Post by gcbryan »

This is a follow-up review just in case anyone comes across this review in future searches.

The change of batteries solved the dimming problem. I did several dives with other batteries and no problems. Just for fun I did a dive with the original batteries and at 20 fsw it dimmed again. This time I just left it alone and continued to use it. Within a minute or so it went back to full power and stayed that way for the rest of the dive. Weird but no problem.

I just don't use those batteries any longer.

I did have a flood a few dives later but the light continued to work as well as the batteries. I cleaned everything up and dried it all out. I had to clean up the driver a bit as well.

The problem seems to be that the spring was too long to allow the glass lens to fully compress the o-ring. This allowed the bezel to come loose under pressure. I cut one of the coils off of the spring and this seems to have fixed the problem.

At this point I would say I have a robust led dive light with at least 500 lumens and at least a 2 hour runtime that can be used hands free all for $95 including batteries and charger. Batteries used are rechargeable li-ion and are more or less the size of a AA battery. It uses two.
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