Not long ago this new light at dx caught my attention because it seemded to have a xpg-type uv-led I have not seen before. It looked nice and it was only $11.50 shipped, so I bought it and here is even a small review :
So it is a small 1xcr123-sized flashlight with indeed a xpg-sized led in it:
Nice smooth reflector with a pale led in the middle. The led-board they use is marked Cree, so the footprint will indeed be xpg/xpe.
So what does it do? It is 395-410nm, so the light is just in the visible range, for GITD-stuff it is excellent, for clues on banknotes a shorter wavelength is nicer (365nm) because different colours show up better then and with less purple glow, . Affordable leds at this wavelength still have decent output, so I expected good performance, but I was taken by surpise by this little bugger, a beamshot 6 meters from the corner (battery is Nitecore NL166 RCR123A):
Very very good output indeed, and without calling a small light like this a thrower, the smooth reflector makes a nice hotspot that makes things (like white paper) light up at a respectable distance (bleached paper in the dark at 40 meters easily). The light even gets a bit hot after a few minutes . I'm very pleased with this little gadget UV-light.
Just one more thing, at this price this light also makes for a nice host. It is very similar to the famous $5.60 Fasttech Ultrafire 602C host that was reviewed by apt323 at BLF, but for a few dollars more it has a few advantages:
First it is smaller without feeling less quality (for already small lights like these it is a big plus that this one is even smaller ). It has less tolerance for battery length though, but my Nitecore NL166 RCR123A (length 34.7mm) fits just ok.
The lens is thicker than the Ultrafire lens, the ring that squeezes the tail cap tight is of better quality, but most interesting is that the reflector is a nice smooth xpg-type, and is not flat on the underside, but leaves good space for the solder blobs of the led wires (=modding heaven :love:). Only con is the flimsy tail cap. I replaced it with a different one, GITD (appropriate I thought ) and it now tailstands as well. And last but not least: when you use it as a host you are left-over with a nice spare multi-usable uv-led on a 16mm board that can be enjoyed again in other projects .
Hope you enjoyed the review, thanks for reading