Review: Blitzwolf BW-ET1 Review AA/14500 Flashlight

There is only a groove for the pocket clip on the extension tube but not on the first tube in single battery configuration…

Light is not even hot at 500lm. With this body, BW should have push its output all the way to 750lm.

Nice review, thanks :smiley:

Yes, I think they implemented a 3-minute step-down, based on using a 14500 battery. It makes sense in that case. But with 1xAA or 2xAA, it is certainly not needed and I would have preferred it to maintain maximum brightness until the battery is depleted.

If you use AA batteries, you’ll get very long run-times, but not a bright light. If you use a 14500 battery, you’ll get a much brighter light (but correspondingly reduced run-times of course).

I find it’s not bad on AA batteries, because most of the time I usually only use 50-100 lumens on all of my lights (except dedicated throwers). With the diffuser on it, it provides a very useful amount of light in a small room (or tent), even on AA batteries. But if you want the option to use it as a bright light, you’ll want to use a 14500 in it.

One thing I am thinking of doing, is painting the diffuser red (with some kind of translucent ink), then using it as a rear light on my bicycle. It has a strobe mode (triple-click), which would really stand out in traffic with the diffuser. The diffuse light would be seen flashing from all angles, but not be a distraction to drivers by shining in their eyes. On a AA battery, it would run for several hours.

Nice review, thanks! Was looking into this light and wondering if it was really NW tint. Has anyone received an actual production sample and can confirm?

-Garry

Mine is not blueish cool white but not warm at all. I would guesstimate 5500k. It’s one of the coldest NW I own. So yes it’s neutral but on the colder spectrum, closer to cool white than warm white.

Thanks for your response. How easy would it be to do an emitter swap? (i.e. Glued head?)

-Garry

Will this flashlight work with flat-top 14500s?

The neutral white tint looks good but the low AA output and stepdown on AA killed it for me.

It seems to, though I’m not sure if it’s designed for that. The head has a flat area for contact, not a spring. So, it may be hit or miss whether there’s enough contact with the positive terminal for it to reliably work. Maybe there’s just enough of a raised portion for it to work, but that’s just from my quick test.

Ok, purchased this to try as it has a heavily discounted promo code currently.

Testing it with my flat-top 14500s (PKCell ICR14500), it does not work at all. I need to put a small disc magnet on top of the 14500 to make it work.

There really is a big difference in lumens output from 14500 to AA (I think with other AA/14500 lights that I tried, usually the AA is about half the lumens compared to 14500 configuration, but for the BW-ET1, the lumens based on specs is about 1/4th only from 14500 to AA. But the listed runtime is extremely long for AA, even more so when using the extension tube.) So it seems this light is used in 2 different ways: for very long runtime, use AA (but get dim light), or use 14500 and get a fairly bright light (for this size flashlight) but reduced runtime. (magnetic tailcap + bundled diffuser are nice features).

I often use a small portable fan to check for PWM in flashlights. The BW-ET1 seems one of the very few I’ve tested that I couldn’t see any PWM (ie. shining the flashlight in lower brightness modes thru the portable fan blades won’t show ‘ghosting’), the few other flashlights I tested that I couldn’t detect PWM using this method are only the Wuben LT35, the BLF A01 copper / CPF Italia A01 (Manker driver), Lumintop Tool AAA… so now I’ve added BW-ET1 to my list of “no PWM detected” flashlights…

Yes, the difference between NiMH and lithium-ion is huge on this light. It’s a similar difference as another light I have, the Reylight Pinapple. Both those lights really benefit from running on a 14500 cell, if you want high output.

does the graph show single or double AA?

Graph is around 4 hours, so it’s single AA. 2xAA seems to slightly more than double the runtime.

since the cells are in serial they add up the voltage and not the capacity.

i'd assume that the output increases towards the lithium numbers..

Actually, that’s not what happens. Output is exactly the same whether you use 1xAA or 2xAA, even though the internal voltage doubles.

I found that odd, too. They must detect a threshold voltage above something like 3.2v, and switch over to high output. I don’t have lithium AA primaries to try out, but two of them (fresh) would supply about 3.4v, so maybe that would kick the light into the high output?

strange - i will need to play with my bench power supply when mine arrives ;)

It is disappointing that the output current isn’t higher for 2s AA configuraitons, but it isn’t all that odd, either.

The simplest thing is to have one group of output levels when the driver is running as a boost converter (as it must when the supply voltage is less than the forward voltage of the LED at the desired output).

I got this light with extension tube on a steep promotional discount a month or so ago. With a 14500, it’s a decent value for what I paid for it, but even then, I find the ramping a bit annoying. From low, is a bit too fast to start. Then, it seems to slow down a lot, too much, once you get past the halfway point. I’d almost rather it just stopped there and let me double-click to get to high. That’s pretty much what I end up doing now, but with the added annoyance of having a few moments of not knowing whether it is ramping up or down if I try to adjust from the mid-point.

As a dual-chemistry, 1s AA light, I think it falls short, outputwise of my UT01 and Sofirn SP10b. As a 2x AA light it is inferior to my Sofirn SF13 in most respects.

But, like I said, it isn’t a bad 1s 14500 light. I like the larger than typical reflector, the diffuser, and the magnetic tail-cap.

I was curious how this brand was since my dad ordered a variant for $15 (BlitzWolf® BW-T1 XP-G3 S4 750Lumen tragbare taktische LED Taschenlampe 18650 Sale - Banggood Deutschland sold out-arrival notice-arrival notice)

Got 3 of these for the kids now, last one was £8 from Banggood, a step down on any light is a good idea tbh just in case kids leave them on fully or bad things happen in your pocket or bag etc.
It’s not the end of the world double tapping to engage turbo again after 1-3 mins etc