Sofirn Q8 group buy (gb closed, but try PM to Sofirn for discount)

A Q8 in both hands and “only” 11,000 lumens? Seems so… ineffective. Both of mine, when used together, netted right at 19,000 lumens. :smiley: I do belief David EF is about to experience some of that joy for his B-Day tomorrow…. :wink:

There’s 15,293 lumens in that box I sent yesterday… wish I could see his face when he experiences that the first time. LOL

19k lumens of Q8 would be very nice! It’s not an extremely high figure of coz but we also gotta throw in the lux and most importantly the cost as well. :slight_smile:

Well, 11k lumens is right about there for stock and excellent batts. Bypassing the spring gives you like 13k conservative for 2 of them? Unfortunately to squeeze out that last 2k+ lumens, the light has to operate in relatively ineffcient lumens/watt territory, a no-no for 29-31 deg C nights here in the tropics. It will be the same even with your SST-40s. Some hotter places have 34-38 deg C nights. :person_facepalming:
Wouldn’t take much to hit 55 deg C even from a cold start.

I can only dream of running lights in winter temps like in N China, Seoul/Japan, N Europe, N USA, Canada.
Heck, even spring is good in those places, even at just 5 deg C we are talking about doubling the Turbo runtime vs here.
Putting it into the freezer before using it is useless as the lens initially fogs up with the very high dew point temps (26-27 deg C). I used to play with things like ice and even dry ice with my pocket rockets last time, spot cooling the head behind the lens part.

Sofirn was a manufacturer without an own brand, they made (still make?) Thorfire flashlights, and thus also they made the Q8 for Thorfire. A year or so ago they started an own factory brand Sofirn. They asked the BLF-Q8 team ( :+1: that they did that) if it was ok for them to make new versions of the Q8 under their new flashlight brand name, and so it happened.

Hey djozz did you ever figure out which tint bin are in these?

Barry asked me to tell that people who currently still want to receive a discount for the Sofirn Q8, can contact Tracy: http://budgetlightforum.com/user/23289

I also wrote this in the OP.

I did not get an answer from Sofirn as I remember, but I did measure it on my sample. I posted it before, but that got of course buried in this vast thread.

post #357: “For the record, I measured the light quality of the hotspot at max power: 70.5 CRI, 6550K, almost on top of the BBL (Duv=+0.0021)”

So that should be an 1A tint.

Oh neat! Curiosity satisfied, thanks :smiley:

I finally received my Q8 from aliexpress today :slight_smile:
I was just about to solder buttons on my flat top 30Q’s, but just as joke tried those on my flashlight first and it turned on no problems. Is there something that I am missing? Why do they say that I’d need to use button tops?

Put solder on your Batteries - maybe only one battery makes contact and get’s overloaded.

Most flat tops will not make contact with the brass ring due to the wrap being too thick with the flat top falling below that, if your cells work without solder blobbing that’s great, use em!

I decided this morning to slice the domes off the XP-L2’s in my Sofirn Q8 and dice the remaining phosphor from the sides of the die to clear the substrate of unnecessary phosphor (to get rid of the ugly aura) This did cost me some lumens, but the resulting hot spot is tighter and easier to look at the aura… the aura is warmer than the hot spot but it’s not the odd sickly weirdness usually present from the flip chip technology. Where I was at 9936 lumens it now seems to be at 8522, charging the Samsung 25S cells to do another run on the box but I think it’s worth the loss, hot spot gains alone with the throw being at 91.75Kcd for 605.8M throw.

Edit: With fresh charged cells it’s now making 9142.5 lumens and at 30 seconds it has dropped to 7210.5 lumens, quite hot stuffed in the light box with no air flow! Thermal step down is probably the greater cause of the drop, Anduril is pretty effective in the Q8.

Both ends of the spectrum:

It could wear down the wrapper and create a short or it could be as harmless as the light turning off with a slight bump, and probably a few other scenarios in between.

Make sure all 4 batteries are making contact. In most cases, using flat tops; they won’t be. :frowning:

That is why button top or solder b(. )( .)b cells are recommended.

I did this and was able to pick up a Sofirn Q8 from Amazon for a friend. Not the exact same price as the original group-buy, but a very good price nonetheless. Thanks to djozz and Sofirn.

My second Q8 just arrived. This one has some minor imperfections in its anodization (e.g. cooling fin has obviously touched something hard) and threads must have been greased with something "sandy" as it sounds terrifying when unscrewing the head from the tube. I guess I need to clean those threads and relubricate them with nyogel. So, certainly it will not end as a shelf queen. Apart from that it's a great flashlight and works properly so far.

What has also come to my attention is something strange to me. Maybe some of you guys can doublecheck with your Q8s if this is absolutely normal and the same with every Q8. When I look into the reflector from a centered position I see that the outer rim or this "black gap" between reflector and bezel ring is differently wide, see picture below. I'm not sure if this can be fixed or if it need to be fixed at all as I did not see any influence on the light beam so far. Both my Q8s look very much the same i.a.w. this gap. Unfortunately, I did not manage to take a real good picture to show the effect but I hope it still indicates what I meant to say.

@ Lux-Perpetuam, that’s supposed to be the black O-ring right? It’s for water-proofing/water resistance of the light.

It should be quite uniform in thickness, but maybe you could try untwisting the stainless steel bezel (counter clockwise) and then tightening it back, with just enough torque? You don’t need too much tightening torque if you are not going to put it into rivers or something like that, it will still be splash proof and rain-proof.

Try to use a rubber glove if it’s difficult to twist.

[quote=Lux-Perpetua]

My second Q8 just arrived. This one has some minor imperfections in its anodization (e.g. cooling fin has obviously touched something hard) and threads must have been greased with something “sandy” as it sounds terrifying when unscrewing the head from the tube. I guess I need to clean those threads and relubricate them with nyogel. So, certainly it will not end as a shelf queen. Apart from that it’s a great flashlight and works properly so far.

What has also come to my attention is something strange to me. Maybe some of you guys can doublecheck with your Q8s if this is absolutely normal and the same with every Q8. When I look into the reflector from a centered position I see that the outer rim or this “black gap” between reflector and bezel ring is differently wide, see picture below. I’m not sure if this can be fixed or if it need to be fixed at all as I did not see any influence on the light beam so far. Both my Q8s look very much the same i.a.w. this gap. Unfortunately, I did not manage to take a real good picture to show the effect but I hope it still indicates what I meant to say.

Try breaking the bezel loose enough, but don’t remove. Then remove the (2) screws the hold the driver to the head, remove the driver, the wires are long enough to access the back of the driver so it shouldn’t be a problem. to drop the driver a bit. Look inside the head. There are (3) screws the hold the reflector to the mcpcb to the head, loosen them, don’t remove them. Now tighten the bezel, it should center the reflector, then go back and tighten the (3) screws gently, evenly, in stages, reassemble the driver. I have had mine apart several times, it works for me… good luck.

“I’ve had mine apart several times, it works for me…”

Indeed! :smiley:

Anybody have a picture of the driver in the Sofirn Q8 specifically the MOSFET? Or know the number on the Q8 FET? I modded Q8 and also changed the stock mosfet to a Infineon FET, never paying attention what the stock FET was. But I have a used one laying here and I don’t know if it was from the Q8 or the C8F 21700. Wondering if Sofirn used the same FET in both lights?

:smiley: Hahaa Dale! “Indeed” :+1:

My first reaction is they have to be different since the Sofirn Q8 performs exactly as it should. Here are my two lights. They are similar, but not the same.

I looked at Sofirns store where they sell the driver and it clearly shows 2 different FETs in the pictures, but I can’t read the writing on them.

I received my Sofirn Q8 from the GB

With a KD AR Lens my sphere shows a 330lm gain in turbo.

Measured at 5500lm and 680m with the AR Lens.