When I help my friend to choose a flashlight, he demanded to have internal charging flashlight SET that is CHEAP. So I found this at BG at low price, which seems having a great value. Since all these ‘cheap’ light have alot of cons and some ‘fatal’ problem, then I should test them and see if it can be used by my friend. So here it goes ~
BG Lotus Head Link
I choose it because it seems unique it its design, I mean artistically. A lotus Head 
more details on the head later on
Packaging
Quite standard package, with all individual. Consist of :
1 x Lotus Head Flashlight
1 x Battery Tube for 18650
1 x Battery Holder for 3 x AA
2 x Ultrafire 3800mah (obviously isn’t high capacity…. don’t be fooled)
1 x Wall Charger US
The battery is nicely packed (avoid aciddentally shorting or moisture interference) and measure voltage around 3.8V.
Flashlight’s Selfie
A close up view ~
We can see the tailcap threads aren’t anodized, but have a big loose spring. Well…. anticipated from a cheap torchlight.
Head side view of the tube, oops… where is the tailcap button ? unfortunately it is side button of reverse clicky.
Interestingly… the external thread of tube on head side are anodized… which is attaching part to zoomable head that is not part of circuit.
ah… thats in the charging hole…. with a ‘dust cap’ of rubber material, works good.
This is the spring side of the pill, which goes into the tube at the left side. They use a 2 larger size circlip to hold charger interconenctor, there is no groove for circlip.
This is the LED side of the pill, nothing much. I couldn’t take out the white plate/holder for LED to further investigate, Don’t want risking to damage it (very soft plastic)
You can see the LED is out of centered alot. (highest record among my torch) but picture taken a bit out of focus.
Front view of the Head, looks dazing for me.
Mechanism
Notice the ball and the spring beside the head (again out of focus), it is use to provide friction/feel to rotating mechanism of the lotus head, into the hole in the picture. (approximate 7 o’clock position)
Internal view of the head, if you notice there is a slot there where thread for manuever the zooming head.
Side view of Lotus Head in extended and retracted position, my favourite part.
The retracted position is just nice to know when you accidentally left the torch on with heads down, but
the extended position can do serious damage…… if you stab or ‘grace’ something …… awesome artistic self defense mechanism.
Here is the tiny cute charge port interconnecting. My first time having such light, a must to dissect it. It is just a VERY simple mechanism, charging polarity parallel to torch circuit. I thought I may saw something amusing, but nothing…. (maybe a charging circuit ??? nah… not in these cheap torch)
Testing
The light put out:
2.6A on high
1.3A on medium
0.65A on low
Assuming highest output roughly at 700-800lumen (sorry I don’t have equipment to measure)
I couldn’t measure the temperature due to lack of equipment, but I tested using my hand.
When fully assembled, the heat management is BAD…… really bad. because there is a large airgap of pill to zooming head, I could say almost no heat transfer. Just like how you put your hand beside a hot stainless steel pot without touching it….
During high setting, I don’t feel any heat until few minutes passed. even so it is rising very slow, without getting warm… because I worried about it, I stop experiment.
After some time (10-30 minutes) the heat still there (not even warm), while other comparing light already turn COLD.
Decided to take off the head a test, directly feel from the pill, its warm after this long. Testing conducting with bare pill using soaked paper coil around pill to cool it, and supple water time to time. The LED still get hot easily on high, so I decided to use small cooling fan in addition to soak paper. now the LED is cool at all time.
Battery estimate around 900-1200mah(wild guess from time test), but definite lower than 1300mah.
Finally test to test, but found something that is fatal ! wall charger put out astonishing 4.44V resting voltage of charger (maximum regulated voltage) which is a serious bad*ss …. so I don’t recommend anyone to use this without modification. (charging battery more than 4.2V on ordinary li-ion is dangerous, even 4.35V is the highest for some specialised Li-ion chemistry)
Modification
After tracing circuit in the wall charger, I change the sense resistor. Of course alot of testing to assure the correct voltage level. I set it to 4.19V, which my friend (assuming no brain) can charge overnight without putting a potential bomb in the bedroom.
Sense resistor is R10 in my unit,(top left) which changed from 150ohm to 300ohm. Forgot to snap picture of moded circuit (and after some testing, then glued…)
Conclusion:
Don’t use this flashlight unless you make sure charger is supply less than 4.25V, provided your unit is perfect, manufacturer changed or moded.
If you want a light for self-defense, and occasionally use to illumination for short period, and you like/ :heart_eyes: the design, its suitable for you.
However, its not a decent price for its value. Ala carte at $10.99, it is just averagely priced torchlight.