After seeing the thread in the reviews section about a possible 8x sled from Kendall at hightechdealz.com, and seeing the results that Dave (daguin) got, I ordered in two of these sleds. The seller was great to deal with, I will have no hesitation in going back to him in the future. However, I feel that Kendall's supplier may have let him down ...
I carefully removed the diode from sled #1. This sled had some small impact damage near the bluray diode. Unfortunately, in my excitement, I did not photograph this damage. Why would I? Sleds are known to be rejects with small flaws that prevent their incorporation into a finished product, but usually contain a good diode. Well, this diode failed at 180 mA in my test setup. It was well heatsinked and was run off the same bench current regulator that I use to test any diode that draws less than 3A. Max current was set at 300mA so I could not overcurrent my diodes. Well, despite precautions, #1 LEDed at 180mA, never producing more than 130mW on my Coherent 210 thermal LPM. I shook my head, and was glad that I bought two sleds ...
So, I unpack #2 from its' package. I see a problem immediately! There is some kind of serious chemical corrosion all over the sled, most severe in the area of the bluray diode! I extract the diode anyway and set it up for test. It fails at 140mA !!! LEDed at 140mA! A couple of photos attached of the corrosion on number two.
Photo #1 - corrosion near red/ir diodes.
Photo #2 - corrosion near and inside bluray diode pocket.
I hope others do a little better in the 8x sled lottery than I did. In conclusion, I don't feel that this is Kendall's fault, I feel that his supplier sent him a variety of good and bad sleds. I randomly got two bad sleds. In the same test run, I tested 2 diodes GGW 6x from Glenn, both were perfect and powerful, so I don't feel that it is my test process at fault.
Hope this helps ...
Bill.