Review: #3 Noname $3.60 XPE-Q5 single AA/14500 zoomie

Lottery! I have exactly one with a solid pill, and it came with a 16mm emitter; I have going on a dozen with hollow pills, most of those with sort-of-15mm emitters that are probablyjust cut down and filed down. Those are the ones with the rough cut rectangular notches for unscrewing the pill that look like they were put in with a chisel ….

Sure would like to find solid pills reliably. I put in one 10mm square Luxeon PC Rebel board and it fits perfectly on the solid pill — leaves the wire holes unblocked, and self-centers with its corners right at the circumference of the cutout. (I’ve stuffed 16mm copper disks from Etsy into the holes on other ones.)

Has anyone bought the gearbest version and how does it seem to compare to other versions? I’m thinking of picking some up next time I order from them.

3-modes usually have a solid pill… but they’re 3-modes :confused:
search ‘xpe flashlight’ on aliexpress to find them.

I think they are all 3 modes aren't they ??

i know gearbest says one mode but I assumed it was just a bad description on their part .

wallybuys ones were listed as one mode and 11 lumens ...but ended up 100+ lumens and solid pill three modes

Has anyone bought any of these from Gearbest ?

Inductor core is busted

Gearbest doesn’t know what they’re selling and aren’t allowed to open one up far enough to tell.
I’d assume it’s a hollow core.

Going by how the tailcap and the crenelations in the mid section look, I’d also say the gearbest is a hollow pill 1-mode.
Btw. the AE 3-modes are (subjectively) slightly brighter. You could buy several and try to pencil mod them to 1-mode (several capacitors on that PCB) if you don’t mind the effort.

I bought 2 from Gearbest, silver and black.

http://www.gearbest.com/led-flashlights/pp_172292.html

They separated my order so I received only silver, black is still in transit. You’re right, silver has 3 mode and it doesn’t work on AA battery but it works on 14500.

Also led doesn’t look like XP-E and is less brighter then my SK68 from Bangood.

Other than that; body, zoom and switch looks ok. Its much lighter and smaller then SK68 and feels better in the hand.

Bought one of Ebay ; new record in blue tint and low lumens.Tailcap tread did not fit my extensions.
With Cree it would have been a nice flashlight.
A year ago I got two that where weak but OK.

Looks like another Lattice(Blue)“Bright” fake… yuck! :Sp

I just measured tailcap resistance on different (bg/AE) models, the readings explain the lower output on the former: banggood version tailcap has ~4 (!) Ω, for Aliexpress it’s <0.5Ω
Tailcap current is ~300mA with NiMH AA. The multimeter I used is probably twice my age (analog scale) so idk how accurate that reading is.
Edit: This is how it looks disassembled:
I soldered the spring to the switch and also added some solder to the contact pad on the side.
The 4 ohm one went down to 0.6 ohm, another measuring 30 ohm went down to 2 (it’s still a bit dim).

I have one of these that’s branded ALETO N1, it’s easier to carry in your pocket because it’s so much smaller & lighter than the sk68 clones.

Same problems as you guys have, blue tint, pocket clip scratches the body and mine eventually snapped.

Switch gave up after a few days and it doesn’t tailstand very well

I use these as hosts for the BLF 15mm driver, and 10mm Rebels (which is why finding the very rare solid pill is helpful — the 10mm square fits almost perfectly into the round circle on the pill. Usually have one of these lights in a pocket and more all around the house. I’ve come to like the “lime green” color Luxeon LEDs. But, ya know, they’re all kind of nice.

Filing back the slidey part by about 1-2 mm (on the battery-tube side not the lens side) lets the lens come closer to the emitter, making a much bigger flood circle.

To put a square board in a round hole, only the corners touch, so you have to fill the hollow pill with a little copper disk (Etsy is one place).
Doing that raises the emitter slightly — changes the narrow-beam focus slightly to a rounded-corner-square, but the Luxeonstar emitters aren’t visually interesting enough to worry about having them perfectly focused anyhow.

SOME of these have threads that will Lego with SOME of the “3W Police 2xAA” light tubes — to make a 3xAA light that’s nice to give people who aren’t going to use li-ion cells.
But it’s a lottery at every step of the way.

I got one of this from Gear Best. It is single mode, and I believe it has a much better tint than the “UltraFire UK68”, also from Gear Best, which is some “SK68” clone, maybe fake/discontinued/unlisted UltraFire trash product.

I have been testing it with my Sony LSD NiMH batteries (2000mAh, around 6-8 years old, from Japan and China) and they are doing between 02:20 hours to over 03:00 hours. These batteries usually go to 1.39/1.41v when charged, so they will drop below 1.10v faster than those from Fujitsu plant in Japan.

The led is supposed to be Cree XPE Q5, the tint is pretty neutral white, quite pleasant. I’ve read about Latticebright “CREE clones” and if this is the case, it is one of the good ones. I believe it does something like 60-80 lumens with a NiMH. Also, mine came with glass lens. The zoom slides very easily and make me wonder if it will become too loose in the future. I haven’t managed to scratch the anodizing yet. I paid around $2.20 and for the price I would choose them if I wanted to gift people useful lights.

In comparison, the “UltraFire UK68” comes with a horrible purplish tint. The led has the same shape of the XPE Q5, it is most certainly one of those said to be from Latticebright that somehow didn’t meet tint standards (is it possible that they do this on purpose?). The UK68 also has more lumens (I’d say around 100-120 lm in high mode) and the low mode is probably around 30 lm. It has plastic lens and the zoom is a lot tighter. It is also heavier and the anodizing is starting to be scratched off, but the body design has a lot of edges that is probably making it easier to flake.

I will give away this UK68 to my family since they are used to worse flashlights, now that I learned that there are way better leds and I ordered other flashlights. But the zoomie this topic is about is a keeper to me, it will be the flashlight I don’t mind lending, leaving in bags and kicking around.

Edit: I had put very incorrect information before, rewrote everything.

I was asking about the sk68 and heatsink on the modding forum, and I was told that you didn’t need one up to 6A. And at least 1 person even seemed irritated I asked.

So my understanding is, you don’t need a heatsink.

Is that a real cree emitter? I like WW, but maybe I’ll get some of these. If I want super bright, a C8 is better. An sk68 was doing really well for brightness, but the 18650 does have more mah.

I like the slim design.

Is there a low voltage cut off or any protections for 14500 cells?

Nice driver. I use them in any “match-mods” I make.

Pair it with a nice emitter and nice host. Don’t waste your time with junk.


beamshot 14500 vs nimh

According to my tests it outputs 44 lumens and runs for 1hour 10minutes with standard Eneloop. Other lights with similar output run 4 times longer.

I bought 2 this yr. Blue\Silver.
Also have coupla Ultrafire SK68’s 3 mode.$4.75 AUD del for pr.
Much lighter build than an old single mode original Ultrafire.
The 68 beams would be, with same AA Battery. a min of
45 to 60% stronger beam than the no names. with same battery.

68’s are slightly bigger. heavier. Same battery lamp with MUCH better beams.
They also fit in my shorts pockets fine. no comparison as a torch.