Review: Convoy S2+ (the red one!) – Fantastic 18650 EDC

Thanks for the feed back! I have both this version of the clip and the newer stonewashed steel one. The newer one seems stiffer and stronger, but I need to verify this to be sure. It looks better too but comes with Philips head screws instead of hex screws, so that is a drawback.

I just got mine today. it is supposed to be a xm-l2 u2 1a cw
but… it is the warmest tint light that I have. I figure it cant really be 1a. I don’t really care as I think the light is a bargain.
my question is? (yes I know I should already know this) is there a way to tell what tint the led is by looking at it? thanks.

Neutrals and warms will light up orange under a UV light, while cool whites stay pretty much unchanged - yellow. I've been trying to figure out if the shade of orange could differentiate them at a finer level, but just can't see a pattern. Think the heavier warms show different.

Here's some 4C's and a stock cool white XML under a UV (actually the UV LED Richard sells in a S2+ shorty host). Notice the 4C's glow:

that looks cool. you said that Neutrals and warms will light up orange under a UV light. the ones in your pic are off but I can see a difference. so? do the tints really look different if lit in say a room with a blacklight?

Dunno, sorry. This is one definite way to tell a LED is a neutral/warm vs. cool white - that's all. Not sure bout black lights - think they are the same as UV, dunno. I compared the beams of lots of various cool/neutral/warm tints in flashlights side by side, so I can spot it usually, but you have to be careful - high currents cause tint shifts, and PWM's for lo/med modes don't help - it still tint shifts the same as Hi. Also zoomies in flood mode seem soo different from reflector light beam tint - hard to tell the same tint is in both lights when comparing, but you can definitely tell neutral from warm from cool in zoom floods.

Did you check if the dome is in tact? I've had domes loosen and it shifts to the warm/yellow tints. If you got your light from FastTech - no surprise, but from Simon or Richard, I'd expect better.

btw, how do you like the switch?

the dome is intact. the switch does feel like a piston. better then rubber and WAY better then the titanium switches on the other brand’s switch. ( I probable shouldn’t mention the brand name. people get crazy if you don’t like some makers product. but I am sure you know the switch I am talking about. LOL)

I think it rhythms with fun day han

LOL gunga is a really bright guy.

Any chances to get the runtimes on those?

I have run mine for 60 minutes. (BTW I now have 2 of them. the newest is the 8 chip model. a little brighter 2.8A VS 2.1A and C/W)
it is hard to hold after 20 minutes so it needs to be dunked in water a few seconds to keep it running. I never got it run down even at an hour. I ran it on one of my blue top sanyo 2600mah lap pulls. I give this light my thumbs up. a real bargain.

Hum 20 minutes of high runtime is not going to cut it. That looked one fantastic flashlight though….

I didn’t mean to sound like 20 minute limit. it has a great mid mode. all small tube 18650 lights get hot on turbo. I was trying to say this is a great bargain.

Ha! That beats my s2g mtg2 that starts to burn your hands after 25sec

Do you need a long runtime spread over different increments? Or a long time all at once?

I’d say if you want to run a tube light continuously without overheating you’ll want to keep it around 1.5-1.8amps. (Like medium mode)

I wanted to couple this to my fenix bc30 for a bit more throw…But it needed to be run on high. medium would not cut it. 1 h runtime is great. IF I needed more, I’d cut to medium…

All of this is relative. The “medium” on some of my lights is way brighter than “high” on many lights. I’d rather use my light on “medium” and still have a higher mode if i need it for a short burst, instead of lowering my “high” mode so that it can run longer.

It isn’t a problem of power efficiency, the battery isn’t going to die after 20min at 3amps, but the small light will get too hot. So if you need to have a light run for an hour without stopping, your option is to use a small light at less current, or get a bigger light. This isn’t a matter of a bad design by Convoy, its a matter of physics.

Exactly, less amps lead to more efficacy (light(lm)/power(W)) so it might be considered if you have the needs covered.
Use-case plays a role in that too.

Biking and warm -> no problem
Mild weather, a little wind -> might get hot or pretty warm.
Winter, windy, sub 0°C(32°F) -> no problem with temperature. Winter, windy, sub 10°C(14°F)> you’ll need the high current to get temperature in the battery, to get the amps and charge out.

plus 1… this is exactly what I was trying to say.

TBH runtime is going to be the same on most lights that pull the same sort of amps from the same capacity battery.

Ok driver efficiency will vary, but probably not by a huge margin. This all means, it doesn’t really matter what make of torch it is, if it pulls ‘x’ amps from ‘y’ battery, the runtime will be pretty similar.

Larger hosts will handle heat better if you are pulling high amps, so may stay more efficient. But again, I think the differences are going to be minimal.

If runtime is important you’ll need to look at 26650 lights as they have more capacity, or multi 18650 lights, again because they simply have more energy, be it series or parallel configuration.

But do remember modes such as High or Medium don’t mean much without some context. For example, the red Convoy in this review it has the 2.8amp driver. On high it pulls 2.80-285 amps at the tailcap. On Medium it only pulls 1.15amps.

If you opted for the 1.4amp driver instead, then on high it would only be marginally brighter than the 2.8amp driver on medium. (output modes are normally a percentage of the max output). I don’t have a 1.4amp driver, but I suspect the medium mode on it would be a lot less than 1amp.

Fyi, everyone, thanks to BLF'er freeme, who, I think, runs the freedailydeals.org site. I just ordered one last night from the link below. This one is a nice neutral tint LED of T6 4C, my favorite neutral tint. The exact same configured light goes for $18.44 at FastTech here, which is normally a good price.

For $13 shipped: http://www.gearbest.com/led-flashlights/pp_154256.html, use coupon code: S2490,

advertised here: http://freedailydeals.org/2015/05/convoy-s2-1000lm-cree-xm-l2-t6-4c-3-5-modes-led-flashlight-torch-12-99/

Not sure how long the coupon code will work for though…