Boruit Headlamp Review D10 (aka. EHL0628) - King of the Budget Headlamps?

I got mine in today. Ordered on Feb 5th and go it 10 days later. Really fast!

It is quite nice. Not heavy at all. It’s surprisingly light and doesn’t really need the 3rd strap over the top.

I’m pretty sure it’s less blue tinted than the RJ02. I don’t have it handy to compare them. It’s a nice white, though.

The UI is great. No problems at all using it.

I had to install the 60° tir from MTN Electronics. The stock reflector is 18.8mm wide as mentioned before and about 10.5mm tall. The tir is about 19.7mm wide and 11.8 tall. So I filed it down some to make it fit. I filed the edges and the narrow bottom. I removed the plastic centering ring. The tir sits on top of the white emitter package, not the mcpcb. This seems okay.

I got the optional Boruit 4,000mah battery as well. It’s only 67mm long which is pretty short for a “protected” cell. Maybe it is protected, maybe it isn’t. I can’t say for sure.

Here it is next to a Evva protected Panasonic NCR18650B at 69.5mm.

I’ll be testing it’s capacity soon.

I ran the Boruit battery down until the light turned off. That should be 2.70 volts, but when I measured it, it was 2.78v. Then several minutes later it showed 3.2v.

I put it in the Miboxer C4-12 charger at 3.2v and it very quickly started charging. Internal resistance showed 98 ohm. Capacity ended up being 1570mah. I was hoping for at least 2200 or so. Oh well, it was only about $2 extra.

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Glad to hear you like the light!

-Garry

Did a capacity test for batteries that are bundled with flashlights:

Also did a capacity test of the Boruit “4000mAh” (discharge current 0.50A, cut-off 2.50v) - ordered with Boruit RJ-02 “kit” (it weights lighter than many standard 18650s — coming in at only 40 grams) ~1639mAh capacity

Above pic also shows the Sofirn “3000mAh” 18650 included with SP32A flashlight+battery kit under the same conditions - discharge 0.50A, cut-off 2.50v) ~ 2641mAh.

The Sofirn “900mAh” 14500 (included with SP10B flashlight+battery kit) was tested with discharge 0.25A, cut-off 2.75v ~ 804mAh.

(the Boruit seems to self-discharge quite fast since I hadn’t removed it from the charger after it completed the test)

Yeah, it will probably be the new go-to headlamp, replacing the bigger RJ02.

is the rj02 noticeably bigger than this? I am torn between those 2 lights

Yes. Heavier, too.

It’s a no brainer. Here are the advantages of the new one:
Lighter
Smaller
Has low voltage protection
No visable PWM
Whiter light, less blue
Better sealed against water
Pops out of headband holder with no fuss
Easy to swap a new emitter in, nichia, sst40, etc…

The only advantages the RJ02 has is:
Infinite brightness adjustment, but the new one seems fine with its 5 levels.
The motion activated switch, it’s only between full power and off and I never found it useful.

Awesome, thanks for the heads up!

I finally have approximate lumen measurements from my DIY foam sphere (light still in stock form):

Level @Start @30secs

1 17 17

2 58 58

3 149 148

4 293 290

5 573 547

Pretty stable outputs in the first 4 mode levels (at least for 30 seconds). I'll add these to the O.P. too. If I do an emitter swap (219C) I'll post those results too, but that will be awhile. -Garry

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Looks like I’m gonna swap in an XP-G3 5C on a 16mm star. I looked all through my parts envelopes and don’t see where I ever ordered XP pcb’s to reflow a 219C onto. Of course I could reflow the 219C on to the board containing the XP-G3, but I’m going to try the XP-G3 out first.

-Garry

EDIT - I never proceeded with this. I waited on new XP pcbs.

Inhave bought several now and find them excellent. The switch is positive and machining is good. It’s plenty bright…by my estimate around 900 lumens. The charging works well. This thing is a great bargain for $11.

I think 900 lumen is too high. It’s only drawing 1.9A and not even a genuine Cree led. I was thinking 500 to 600 lumen.

Well after over a month of waiting I finally received my order from KD containing DTP XP boards! I reflowed a Nichia 219C onto a 20mm board and swapped it in. I accidentally broke the ends of those short emitter wires off when I was breaking the old pcb loose, so I soldered and heatshrink wrapped some extensions on them (would have needed to do anyway). I did have to file down the side of the KD pcb to fit it by the wires. It all worked out well (finally a mod that went fairly well). For now I only have the stock reflector in it, but expect to try a TIR optic at a later time. I will run it through my sphere again very soon and post those numbers. I did however re-check tailcap currents (though these were measured with a good high-drain cell vs. the old Trustfire I did the first measurements with):

Original #’s:
5 Step Quasi-Ramping:
Level 5: 1.87A
Level 4: 0.84A
Level 3: 0.40A
Level 2: 0.13A
Level 1: 0.05A

Newly measured#’s:
Level 5: 2.11A
Level 4: 0.99A
Level 3: 0.47A
Level 2: 0.17A
Level 1: 0.05A

So not very different and could be the different battery.

Some photos:
My extension wires soldered on:

Heat shrink wrapped:

KD DTP board fit, filed edge at wires:

Soldered up;

Put back together:

Beamshot (cell phone camera):

Beamshot comparison with cool white Zanflare F1 on the right (cell phone camera):

-Garry

Nice mod :sunglasses:
A better tint and beam as well!
I’m still using mine with the original LED, but with a pebbled TIR ! Maybe someday I get inspiration from you and swap a NW or WW tint LED !

Thanks for sharing!! :+1:

Ok, I have new lumen measurements after the emitted swap to the Nichia 219C. Numbers are down from the fake XM-L2 emitter measurements (which I guess makes sense). All taken @ 30 seconds

Level 1: 12.5
Level 2: 45
Level 3: 115
Level 4: 228
Level 5: 448

According to djozz’s Nichia 219C test (bin difference???), he measured about 675 lumens at 2.0A. That’s without any losses, so if we guess 20% loss 675 - 135 = 540 lumens. I wonder if I damaged the emitter during the reflow (took me a couple tries to get it on right).

-Garry

finally got mine and i swapped it with 5200K tint + 90 degrees TIR optic lens, my most used headlamp right now :+1:

What are you using to measure the lumens?

Did you find a TIR that fits, or did you file one down?

Extensions leads are the way to go on this headlamp.

I tried soldering new leads onto the driver, but I’ve had to put the mod on hold until I get some thinner silicone insulated wire. Getting the wires into the channels in the battery compartment is a pain, and there’s no room for any slack at the driver end.

I had to file one to fit! I used a TIR lens like the ones used for Convoy S2+, but it didn’t fit well, so I filed it on the edges and it’s good now :wink: