My experience with the XP-L HI wasn’t that great. It showed significantly more abrupt CCT shift in the beam then either my 219C or SST-20. The color temperature was also about out of spec. to. I had a 2700K model, and it’s actual CCT was over 3000K. The yellowish rings in the beam were in the upper 2900K range.
The SST-20 delivers its promised CCT better then the XP-L, and it has far less chroma shift about beam to.
The 18350 proportions look off to me. Functionality wise, if you are carrying such a big light, may as well use 18650’s and have a good grip on the light.
On the other hand, I suspect alot of people would want to buy the shorter tube for a few dollars extra as a secondary option. I would be curious even for myself! Could make a cool table top lantern. That would actually be a good accessory for it, a lantern diffuser made to fit.
3 x 21700 are about the same diameter as 4 x 18650 and only have a tiny advantage over 4 x 18650. Hank wanted to keep the light small.
It does require at least raised flat tops. It should have a ring on the driver like the Meteor and Q8 (based on the battery tube spring board). There are a few raised flat top 21700 on the market, but not too many. There’s even less button top 21700 currently on the market so 18650 does make the most sense.
Hi Hank, for me there is no interest in a 18350 Tube but a big interest in having a 3x 21700 tube. Ist there a chance to get it? 3x 18650 instead of 3x 21700 is the only reason for me not to
buy this great light.
Right, I remember that now. That was weird. I don’t think that sort of thing is likely to be common though.
Yeah… it’s one of Cree’s new rainbow emitters. Someone on reddit posted a 70.2 beam shot recently:
… which is pretty much the entire reason why flashlights are using emitters like SST-20 and LH351D now instead of Cree.
The issue TA ran into is something only TA has had. I’ve never seen it happen, and I’ve tried. More details are in another thread. All tests so far suggest the D18 doesn’t have any issues like that.