MecArmy SGN1, finally an affordable rugged keychain light .530 lumens!

Hi, everyone.Today I would like to share my experience with the latest keychain light from, Mecarmy, SGN1.
The main attraction towards this light was the solid build ,literally tank like construction .


The light shell is made by die casting and the head portion is press fitted to this shell.This keychain is specifically designed to take on all your daily keychain carry situations like drops ,scratches. etc.
The stone wash finish of my model is not for asethetics (but I really like this bare metal look, simple but elegant) but for practicality.The finish looks tough to take on any scratches and drops ,while every day carryings.There won't be any changes in looks of the light even after regularly carrying it on the keychain, due to this finish.

The usual, aluminium keychain lights anodized finish gets easily scratched and loses its anodization pretty easily
The weight of the keychain is little higher , as the zinc alloys are heavier that aluminum counterparts.But zinc have more corossion resistance and thermal conductivity.

The light has a sturdy key ring hole to attach your keys and stuffs.

Comparison with other keychain lights.The length and width is same as nitecore tube.The thickness is same as the Lumintop Geek.

specs from manufacturer

The light packaging is really simple retail packaging,nothing fancy.


The light contains a keyring attachment,a usb cable and instructions manual as accessories.

The usb cable is small but made of good quality material.
The light utilizes a cree xpg2-s5 led,which produces a very bright 530 lumunens.The tint of the led is cool blue.The beam tint is similar to what we saw in the nitecore tube.
It has a very wide beam profile perfect for keychain lights.


light has a 230 mah lithium polymer battery.The light charges via a micro usb port and is snug enough to prevent dust and water ingress.Though I found it is little flimsy to open and close.


It charges at .16 A takes around 2.5 hours to get fully charged.
When charging the sideswitch indicates red colour.The light allows to use all mode while charging.



battery gets full, the switch turns green for three seconds and goes out.I would have preferred the green light to stay on rather than going out ,to indicate charging completed.


I tried to get it open,but it was tough.For now I plan to carry it daily on my key ring and will try to force open only if something happens to the light.
Operation
To turn on the light you need to double click the side switch.
To change mode, you need to press once while the light is on.
Press and hold for 1 second to turn the light off

This light in particular donot require any electronic lockout method as it takes a quick double press to turn on this light.
The light doesnot have a mode memory so every time it turns on at low, which is ok for keychain lights.
But you can directy access turbo by triple click from off/on state ,which is a smart design.
In turbo if single click again it goes to strobe.

The turbo at 530 lumens will quickly taper of to high inorder to prevent stress on small capacity battery.
The manual explains things differently, but in my light I required only single clicks to move to other modes,not press and hold like the manual says .

Hidden feature!
The manual does not explain this.
From off if you press and hold the switch for 3 sec you can directly access a steady low light.But if you want a steady medium or high just keep on holding the switch, it will cycle through low medium high.When you want to select a mode just let go off the switch.Further clicks does not allow changing mode.(you are kindoff stuck with the selected mode)
To turn off just press and hold for another 1 sec.
You cannot access turbo in this steady on condition

To Sum it up
pros


1.Build like a tank, specifically for endurance.
2. No accidental light turning on.
3.Very bright and floody beam, with no artifacts
4.Direct acess to turbo
5.Will not crush or break like other lights.
6. Micro -USB rechargeability, with tight port cover
7.Strong key ring hole
8.Wear and tear resistant finish.
9.Chunky but easy to carry size .
10.Good heat dissipation.
cons
1.No real moonlight mode.(low is at 5lumen.
2.No battery charge indicator ,also
battery capacity could have being better(230mah is little less)
3.Micro usb port cover doesnot feel sturdy.
4.User interface requires more fine tuning.A momentary mode could have been added,to turn on the light instantly .

Product link-

Mecarmy-https://bit.ly/2IyicxG

Amazon- https://amzn.to/2AQVcWH

How’s the PWM on lower modes?
I had the SGN3 and it was unbearable.
Hope they took care of that because this looks like a great light!

Also, any chance of you adding some pics with it next to some other lights?

No pwm in my observation.I guess it is current controlled.

Will add pictures for size comparison shortly.

The length and width is similar to nitecore tube.The thickness is almost the same as Lumintop Geek.

Nice light, thanks for the review and the cool pictures! :slight_smile:

Thermal conductivity of zinc is ok, but that of aluminium is higher and not lower, this is probably also true for the various alloys of zinc and aluminium around.

Crushing and breaking is not typically something that happens at all with flashlights, if flashlights fail it is seldom because of this. I think the tank-like construction of the SGN1 looks pretty cool, but I do not think that the plastic Tube on my keychain will ever fail from breaking either. Worrying is the choice for micro-USB charging, The socket may fail long before the body. (it happened to my FT02 :rage: ). USB-C could have been a more solid choice.

Thanks for the additional info and pics!

Cool review, straight to the point! :+1:
Seems a decent light! I use the Nitecore TIP, that is somehow similar, but this one seems to have the “advantage” of having a true USB cover. It doesn’t have the clip, though. And the LED could be somewhat “better”!
Thanks for the information :+1: