Did i ruin my driver?

[cbrian4]

I was trying to check the current on my dorcy junior flashlight, and i had heard that it needed to be under load so i took off the head piece of the flashlight and held the led assembly down in order for it to make contact see pic . I turned it on and set my multimeter to 10 amps max and put the positive lead on the spring, which makes contact with the positive terminal inside the flashlight. I then touched the negative lead to the outer ring of the flashlight. I started to get a reading when all of the sudden i smelled smoke. I looked down to see that plastic was melting. I immediately stopped and took out the head of the flashlight and the spring was red hot. I plan on using this flashlight for a diy laser but not if the driver is destroyed, could i have ruined the driver inside the flashlight? The flashlight itself still works as normal. I basically short circuited it.

 

[rkcstr]

Doh! Yes you did short it. Common mistake for testing current; leads have to be in series with the circuit, not parallel. Case is usually negative while the spring connecting the board to the battery is positive. Since you essentially shorted the batteries (from what you told me, I think that's all you shorted), the driver is probably fine, all the current was just going through the multimeter.

 

[cbrian4]

Yeah and i tested the voltage and it is still boosting the 3volt battery to 5.1 volts so thats a good sign.

 

[rkcstr]

If it's working, then you're probably fine. I don't have one of those flashlights, so I have no idea what's in it, but if it's doing it's job, doesn't sound like anything's fried.