This light is actually really neat. The LED strip gives very even all round illumination with scope for customisation.
The circuitry is also unexpectedly simple, but with one of those specialist ICs that are hard to identify and find. That's a shame, since it's a very handy one-chip solution for lithium based solar lights.

The integrated circuit relies on the solar panel as a current limited source of charging current that is just switched off if the cell reaches about 4.18V. It also switches the output to the load with dusk sensing based on the output of the solar panel, and turns off if the cell voltage drops too low.

This unit had a weird and deceptive fault, resulting in a series of perplexing tests that didn't show the correct results. Just placing the test probe on the PCB effectively bypassed the fault and showed continuity where there actually wasn't any.

The lithium cell actually matched its description for a change, with over 500mAh capacity.

Here's an AliExpress link to the product (not a sponsor):-
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005007336076758.html


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