Both are basically a battery plus a 5mm led (the reflector adds just a little to the beam, most light exits the light directly). The best version button cell light, the Photon freedom micron, puts out about 5 lumen, while our Sofirn light will put out about 8 lumen. Not that much difference.
The difference is not in the beam but in the runtime, the durability, the universal availability of AAA batteries and that those button cell lights are ugly.
I can’t watch the videos due to a web filter at work, but I’m eager to get home and watch them!
It’s hard to interpret what he meant, not knowing the camera settings.
For a rough idea what to expect, put a layer or two of matte finish tape (eg- Scott Magic) on a ~10 lumen light.
This will not be a throwy light, nor high output. but it should be fine for finding your way around the house, checking your glovebox, helping use your keys, reading, and many other uses.
Ran over by a car, fell off the core support and slung across the shop, fell out of my pocket doing 60 on a motorcycle. Yeah my old light was beat to snot and well used. Reason why my my brand and even model of go to light hasn’t changed.
Yeah the motorcycle made my stomach turn. Was surprised it only slide over to the ditch without doing anybody any damage. Bigger surprise we even found it. You see me you might laugh but it’s the reason why I have everything tethered and clipped down.
Actually, there’s not much in it. The Yuji LED puts out about 6lm at 20mA and about 3V. That’s about 100lm/W, so efficiency is OK.
Output is low compared to a similarly-sized COB, but this is meant to be a last-resort light, so there’s a tradeoff: lower output for more runtime.
The 5mm LED also has the significant advantage of being completely encapsulated in all directions, which helps with robustness - another desirable characteristic of a last-resort light. The shape of the package even gives it a built-in lens.
That’s close to the worst case specified performance. Best case is 2.7V and 8 lm at 20mA, which would be 148 lm/W.
Considering this is a 95+ CRI emitter, anywhere in that range is pretty decent, and the high end is good enough to be hard for me to believe. When djozz tested an 80+ CRI Nichia 219C, his numbers at the closest datapoint to the rated current worked out to 139 lm/W.
Why not have three of them and get read of the useless reflector to triple the output?
That would not add much complexity and should not impede robustness either?
Sorry about the argument but i’m having a hard time wrapping my mind around a new 2018 light putting out only 8 lumen…
It is much more about runtime as it is about output, it is build as a last resort light, 8 lumen compared to no light at all is huge, also in 2018.
But what that 95CRI does in a last resort light is highly questionable of course