Review: Uniquefire F12-B XM-L U2 Flood-to-Throw

UniqueFire F12-B

Battery 2XCR123/RCR123/16340/*now 17670 (with work)*
Switch Reverse Clicky
Modes 5 - No Memory H/M/L/Disco/SOS
LED type XM-L U2
Lens Aspheric Plastic
Tailstands Yes, a little wobbly
Price Paid $19.59
FTT method Smooth Twisty

Pros:
Extremely Bright.
Smooth, One handed Twist for Flood/Zoom
Very well built
GREAT pocket clip. Springy and low profile.
Dunkable! First Zoomy I have owned that would do this.

Cons:
Had hoped light might take 18650s, or 17670s at the least. Inner diameter of tube is too tight for even unprotected 17670 cells.
No memory.
One undersized O ring.
Horrible pink tailcap that was quickly replaced with a 14 mm GITD one.

Summary:

Fantastic! Pocketable waterproof Zoomy with Clip. Hard to put down.

Inspired by JohnnyMac’s excellent review of the Trustfire Z8 HERE, but not wanting to get into a battery format that I don’t own, I rolled the dice on this one, which looked by the pics to be close.

After tearing this one apart, it does not appear to be quite up to the square threaded perfection of the Z8, but it is an extremely well built beast.

Features / Value: 5 stars

Best made Zoomy I own. Hands down. No contest.

Design / Build Quality: 4 1/2 stars

Great design. Excellent anodization. Smooth threads. Easy to zoom one handed, with one turn of the head going from full zoom to full flood. Only sloppy place I found were the holes drilled in the piece that holds the tailcap in place.

Really well done pocket clip. Springy and low profile. Doesn’t get in the way when you are holding the light.

Only thing that prevents 5 stars is seeing JohnnyMac’s pics of the Z8

Battery Life: TBD, but over 1 hour on 2 16340s on high.

Will get runtimes if there is interest, but here are the tailcap draws:

High: 0.55 A
Med: 0.25 A
Low: 0.02 A

Good, useable low. I have never taken draws on multi cell lights, so someone speak up if these seem crazy.

To me, they seem very low for the amount of light that it is putting out.

Light Output: 4 1/2 stars

A wall of light in flood mode. Big emitter beam in zoom. On par with my other 18650 XM-L zoomies.

Summary: 5 stars

It is hard to put down. I have been coming up with lame excuses to use it outside at night. Well done light that could be better with another 1 mm of ID, so that it would take 17670s.

Now for the important stuff:

Comparison shot L to R - Lumapower Incendio, Unbranded 18650 Zoomy, Ultrafire HD2011, F12-B, C8

In Hand

Nice Threads

Close up of Twisty mechanism

Fully disassembled

With bezel removed - Nice GITD O-ring

Close up of Clip

8 mm thick Plastic lens

Business end

Money Shot

*Edited to reflect change on 17670s.

Beamshots if anyone is interested.

Nice! I have an F12A that should be in the mailbox tomorrow for review. Good to see i can expect a decent light to show up.

It will be interesting to compare it with your Z8, and see if the T6 vs. U2 buys you anything.

Best of luck.

I have a few 17670s lying around for my UF-H4, and given the fact the cells would fit in backwards up to a point, I went to work with a Dremel last night.

About 10 minutes later, the light now accepts unprotected and protected 17670s.

There is a ridge on the ID down toward the tail that just prevented them from going in.

No noticeable difference in brightness between 2X16340s and 1X17670.

Thanks for the nice review, Sharpthangs. Very similar, at least in form, to the Z8. JMac, looking forward to your comparison of the two.

The review on Manafont suggests that the F12-A has some problems that I have not seen on the F12-B.

It will be interesting to see if there really is any difference in the UI of the two.

My F12-B always starts in High, even if only left off for less than a second.

I dont care so much about these UI issue in this kind of light (way you change modes), that’s side issue for me.
Im looking forward to my F12-A :slight_smile:

I'm afraid I have to disagree with some of the positive comments expressed here - but I'm prepared to accept that perhaps I've been unlucky and it's just mine that is substandard.

Recieved mine this week after reading this and other reviews, but I'm afraid I was very disappointed with it.

The beam was very weak I thought, really didn't seem to be a whole lot better than the Sipik SK68 I got in the same order. Dull and purple in comparison to pretty much all my other lights, though not quite as purple as my Fenix E01. I know "Chinese Lumens" are probably about 4 to 1 "real" lumens but even by this standard it was pretty poor. Especially since it was running two good quality, freshly charged, protected RCR16340s. Nothing even remotely like the claimed 800 lumens output.

I decided I didn't have much to lose by pulling it apart. When I removed the pill, I noticed that the driver pcb was supposed to be soldered to the brass pill housing in two places but that one had broken completely and the other was looking pretty dry.

Long story short, with an upgrade to my Scope Iron, I've managed to resolder it. In the process, had to carefully remove the driver board and frankly, I think the wires running from the driver board to the emitter seemed very thin and cheap. I also put a blob of solder on the (very thin) spring.

OK, so it's a budget light. No, I don't have access to an integrating sphere; just a multimeter with a lux capability. After my repair, the brightness of the (larger XM-L) emitter hotspot at about 3m is only about 30% more than the Sipik SK68 running an eneloop. And less than half of a Sipik 68 clone running a 14500. - Yes, I realise it is covering a larger area and therefore hotspot readings are not entirely valid.

A very unscientific ceiling bounce test gives me about 13 lux from the Uniquefire F12-b compared to about 11 lux under identical conditions with my Dereelight Javelin XP-G. Note that these readings are just for comparison in my own living room, not under any kind of controlled test.

I'm just starting to dabble in budget lights. Fairly impressed with the SK68 but I really think this Uniquefire is a major dud!

Does anyone have an opinion about changing the driver in this one? My tailcap current readings are 550, 257 and 71mA for H, M, L. Given that current is at nearly 8V, I'm guessing the emitter is seriously underdriven. The heatsinking and other construction of the light seems good so perhaps I could build another pill for it.

Can anyone tell me anything about where to get the parts to make an upgrade? I'm kind of familiar with P60 standards, but this pill seems larger. Is it a standard size or something "one-off" to this light?

I really feel the light serves little purpose "as is" so I might as well use it for my first modding experience.

Anyway, I hope I haven't rained on anyone's parade but this is my 2c worth.

Cheers

Thanks very much for the review! Frontpage’d and Sticky’d.

My review along with a brief comparison can be found here: