[Review] Wuben TO46R ( 3 x XP-G3, 18650) ~ My new favourite EDC

The flashlight was provided by Wuben for review.
Here's the product's page: Wuben TO46R

Starting with the packaging, the light comes in a fancy cardboard box.


The back side of the box briefly references the output levels and the runtimes.


Everything is neatly organized inside the box.
In total you get a Wuben branded 2600mAh battery, a spare o-ring, a golden microUSB cable and a lanyard.


Coming to the main attraction, you can see that Wuben has gone with a double electronic switch design.
Both the minimal knurling and the thick heatsink fins give the light a special look.


Opposite to the switches you get a microUSB charging port sealed by a rubber flap.


The triple XP-G3 setup and the TIR lens is protected by a mirror polished rubber bezel.


The tail threads are square cut, thick and come anodized.


A thick but flexible brass spring is all there is to the tailcap of the light.


The back side of the tail is slightly raised in order to allow room for a keyring.
Of course, the light can tailstand.


Once powered on, an indicator LED under the power switch informs the user regarding the battery's charge level.
Blue: Normal, Red: Battery is getting low, Blinking Red: Battery's empty


As said, the light can charged its cell via the integrated microUSB port.


The maximum current that I was able to record while charging was around 1A.
The included cable was then test on a 2A load and it seems that it's capable of delivering such current without a problem.
Once charging the indicator LED is again lit up to provide information about the battery's charge level.


The battery that was included in the package is a protected, button top cell that's supposed to have 2600mAh of capacity.


After a couple full charge-discharge cycles @ 1A in my Opus BT-C3100, it turned out that the specifications are correct.


Since I was already in there, I decided to also measure the internal resistance of the cell.
As seen, the IR is close to 150mOhms ~ Not super impressive but more than enough for the light's power requirements.



The cell weights 46gr.


The TO46R is quite lightweight at around 88gr.



User Interface

The flashlight is using a nicely thought out and simple user interface.
Thanks to the dual e-switches, there is a separation between the power on/off and mode switching actions.

Power on/off: Single press of the lower switch
Cycle modes: Single press of the upper switch ( Moonlight -> Low -> Med -> High -> Turbo )
Quick Access on Turbo: Constant press of the lower switch while powered on
Momentary Turbo: Constant press of the lower switch while powered off
Strobe: Constant press of the upper switch while powered on
Momentary Strobe: Constant press of the upper switch while powered off

The output regulation is accomplished through the integrated temperature monitoring interface.
To put it simply, once the body of the light exceeds 50C the flashlight will start dropping its output in order to keep the temperature to a comfortable level.


Performance


My measurements were taken using a fully charged 25R cell and a multimeter.
Mode - Current (A)
Moonlight - 0.01
Low - 0.05
Mid - 0.30
High - 1.14
Turbo - 3.20

Also, here's a ceiling bounce test of the different output modes.


And here's Turbo mode compared to my other lights' highest output.


Provided that most of my ceiling bounce test return around 10Lumen/Lux, the Wuben TO46R should indeed push around 1300 Lumen.


Beamshots


Thanks to the triple XP-G3s and the TIR lens, the flashlight produces a very wide hotspot that's excellent for EDC purposes.
Here's a few wall beamshots with locked exposure to help you understand mode spacing.
For some reason the color temperature of my shots is way off. In real life the tint is closer to Neutral White.

Moonlight


Low


Mid


High


Turbo


As you might have seen from the title, the TO46R is my new favourite EDC light.
That's because it provides a very usable beam pattern, it's efficient thanks to the triple setup and has an easy to use UI.
Its brightness is more than enough for daily tasks and, even though it's an subjective thing, I am really digging its appearance.

Swapped out the xpg’s for Nichia 219C 4000k high CRI in mine. Much better beam. It’s nice that nothing is glued on this light.

Nice little mod.
I am thinking about swapping the XPG3s for some XPL HIs just because I want to mod something…!

XPL HI’s might be pretty nice. I don’t know where Wuben gets the 90cri from with these XPG3’s, unless Cree is telling them that. Either way, it’s not true. Not even close to hi cri.

When I pulled the XPG3’s out of my Wuben, I sent them to Maukka for testing. (CaptRon25 is me over at reddit)

Hey man,

Nice mod! I will receive my TO46R soon and will probably want to do this mod as well because I’m a big fan of the Nichia 219c (thanks to my Emisar D4 Nichia 219c).

Where did you source the MCPCB from? What’s the size of it? And does it come with the LED’s pre-soldered? I’ve done some mods but I feel I’m still noobish. Any help will be appreciated.

Kevin

The MCPCB and emitters came from Mt. Electronics in the US. If you haven’t purchased your Wuben yet, add yourself to this group buy. They are having Wuben put in verified hi cri 5000k emitters as a special order. Group Buy: Wuben TO10R and TO46R (real 90+CRI triple XP-G3) - CLOSED!!

Wuben also sells a version of this light with traditional diamond knurling: the Wuben L68

Thanks, this sounds great. I sent a PM so I hope they still have an opening on the group buy. If so, I will eventually end up with the XP-G3 and Nichia 219c model.