… and FWIW my UT01 also has the problem… but I did not contribute to the poll since mine was part of the first batch / group buy back in dec 2016.
So just add a +1 to the defective batch.
I received my UT01 this week, but it’s DOA sadly…. Tried several AA and 14500 but no go…. I got a refund from GB, but utorch should take note of the failures lately.
Second UT01 arrived today. Had to trim the 5 pins sticking out of the driver by the battery + contact to get flat tops to work, not a problem to me, easy fix. Other wise it seems perfectly fine.
Also got my Second Lumintop Warranty card in the box.
Anyone contact Lumintop to tell them that your UT01 is malfunctioning?
Awaiting #3 to arrive. will vote once it arrives.
How did you go about doing it?
Since my order (several items) that contains the UT01 is not yet complete (it was split into 2 orders: the 1st batch with the UT01 arrived; and the missing items — which Gearbest had not informed was out-of-stock, until I opened a ticket about the ‘missing items’] apparently is to be shipped on a later date, since they’re still not on stock, about 1-2 weeks later — it’s not yet on stock as of today). I think it’s not possible to make a ‘review’ in Gearbest if not indicate ‘confirm item arrive’.
Also, my UT01 is actually DoA, it didn’t work on AA and 14500 when it arrived; had I not spent MANY HOURS trying to troubleshoot it and make it “sort of” work (with my very in-elegant workarounds that are not 100% foolproof). Would like to return it and get a refund if that’s possible.
I opened a support ticket with them and they needed a video to demonstrate it’s not working so they gave me 3 options; 1 - refund with GB, 2 - refund money, 3 - replace with another one. I chose refund money as there’s too many cases of bad units.
Okay I received all of my ut01 now 2 NW and 2 CW. 3 of those i bought as gifts for the coming holidays. The one 1 kept for myself (NW) and have been using a few weeks had the issue. After testing the other 3 one of them started to have the same issue (also NW).
The problem occured when i had an NiMh in it and was switching between low medium high and turbo. I noticed there was no difference between High and Turbo. Which is odd because the NiMh was fully charged the night before. And i did the setup putting the Turbo on highest and the High on medium (the ramping setup in hidden mode) So i put an 14500 battery in it to test it the Turbo was back. And that’s when it happened, after turning off the flashlight I couldn’t turn it on again. Needed to loosen up tailcap and re-tighten it. Put back the AA NiMh same issue. Won’t turn on after turning off. I guess switching from roughly 1.4 to 4.1 volts fried something up the driver.
The other 2 CW are still working fine but i dare not to put a 14500 in it just NiMh’s from now on. One of those did had a little issue once. When turned on it wouldn’t switch off with a button press. I needed to loosen up the tailcap to power off after that it behaved normaly again. I hope by using NiMh and AA won’t cause the malfunction. So now 2 out of 4 of the flashlights are malfunctioning.
I submitted a ticket with gearbest for the initial faulty ut01 they offered me a resend or full refund which is pretty cool. I chose the latter. But i don’t know if they will be as generous if I submitted a second ticket.
I’ve noticed another anomaly in the past couple of days that may contribute to solving some of these problems. I’ve been using my ‘misbehaving’ light a lot, in an effort to figure it out.
I’ve noticed that the last two (very fresh Imedion LSD) NimH cells it shut down on both tested 1.16 v. upon removal. I would expect that they should have been drained further, perhaps to 0.9 v. (?)
In both cases the light shut off abruptly, with no ‘tapering off’ of output. With the second cell, I had cycled the modes through a couple of times from moonlight right through ‘turbo’, and all were obviously fine. Output was solid on all modes. A very few minutes later, the light simply shut off. Putting in a fresh cell revived it at once, without having it misbehave on startup.
Do you suppose there’s a LVP issue here?
Alkys work erratically, if at all….Energizer Ultimates (lithium primary) work the best, and drain completely; (a vampire 1xAA only ran about 15 minutes on low after removal from the UT01)……NimH work pretty well, but run times seem short with the shutoff happening at 1.16 v.
I think we might have multiple problems here; driver issues, switch issues, tail cap issues. It’s a good thing they were cheap, and I’m grateful that I have a couple that (so far) seem to work as advertised.
Yea, i am pretty sure our issue has something to do with the Low Voltage Protection kicking in when it’s not supposed to. I noticed the same issues with AA Alkaline and NiMh it wouldn’t go to turbo just shuts off or it would jump to strobe by itself just acting all sorts of crazy. With AA it happens around 1.4 volts with NiMh around 1.15 volts.
We could do a groupbuy of replacement switches
I would say 2$ with shipping possible, I repaired 2 that work now perfect and got one switch in my part box just in case
Just got my second. Didn’t work at all when first put in NiMH. Reinserted and works fine. Much different tint though both nw.
yeah new ones are reported 4000K tint not 5000K 3D
Seems right very warm. Brighter too. Nice. Will try the programming on old one.
My new one showed problem after changing battery again. Took tailcap off one that never had problem and switched and the problem switched from new light to old one. So tailcap has to be culprit.
you have to be sure the tail cap makes contact, some batteries are too long
a fix is remove the tail board and sand it down glue in again
Used same batteries just switched tailcaps and problem moved from one light to other.
Put wire at bottom of tailcap as in other thread and fixed. Also got it to programming mode with help of video on blf.
44% failure rate (for those who take the time to surf here). Thats ugly… the failure rate is, not those who surf BLF.
But what if I have 3 that work and I can only vote once? And this is my situation.
Also if someone buys 2, one works one don’t and they voted yes?
Hardly a way to track the percentages.
I’m quite certain the failure rate is actually less than 44%, as most people who have good ones probably ignore the poll. Personally I have four, of which one is less than perfect, but still in daily service as I try to figure out its occasional quirks. I’ve thoroughly run the other three through their paces, and they work as advertised. These were acquired in three separate orders across a month or so, so I doubt there was a ‘good batch / bad batch’ effect.
All the same, the failure rate is obviously very high and undoubtedly why the price is $9 instead of $23. I think they’ve chosen to unload them at fire sale prices rather than scrap them - and that is probably the wrong choice for the sake of the brand. The name “UTORCH” will at least be suspect from here on in and it wouldn’t surprise me to see the trademark disappear altogether, as the owners might decide to continue business under another banner.
Frankly, I like them so much that if I thought I could keep my ‘batting average’ up, I’d order four more……but I think I’d better not push my luck.
I’d take a chance at $10 and try cw.