UltraFire WF-501B MC-E (BIN M) 5-Mode 800-Lumen

Review to follow in due course. It just got here an hour or so ago

800 lumens? That will be right!

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.39359

Cheap for the dropin alone - an essentially free body goes with it. Which is about what it is worth IMO.

The light. Nice looking enough.

As 18650 lights go, it isn't large - there are few P60 lights smaller than this.

It fits nicely in the Ultrafire 6.5" holster which costs less than $1.50

Pretty standard switch - could do with a bit more threading IMO, but this does mean it takes longer to get on and off. Tastes vary, I suppose. "De gustibus, non disputandum" if I remember my Latin which I probably don't

Not a lot of threading there

Body tube at tailcap end. Threads lubed.

Tailcap off and bezel/front of head off.

Unusually the head is also removable as well as just the "bezel". This is probably to save materials and could only happen in places where labour costs less than materials - it wouldn't make sense to do it this way in most of the West. It is the default Chinese approach though. The downside of this is poor thermal contact - especially for a high-powererd LED. There is a very small amount of contact at the throat which has to serve all the heatsinking duties. For a high powered incan this doesn't matter and makes it less likely to burn your hands. It is not a good idea with LEDs.

Thermal contact, or lack thereof.

The LED - it is bright. 5-modes - H M L strobe SOS. That's an M bin MC-E according to DX and they claim 800 lumens. We'll see. At first glance it is pretty bright.

The stripped body tube. Yep, it is lubed. Excessively so at the head end.

It works

Beam at 2" on low so as not to dazzle the camera. This isn't as bad as some.

By 4" the hole is gone.

The light does look pretty good, hows the beam on your tree in the backyard, would love to see how the beam profile is.

I'll try for some beamshots tonight, weather permitting. I'd like to compare it to the other quad die modules I have to see how it does. I think I'm going to put a single mode R2 in that body as the heat from anything more powerful has nowhere to go.

Hey bud thats what your hands are for......would make a good hand warmer in the winter i bet.

Problem is...

The heat doesn't make it out to the body - it cooks the LED and driver instead...

Even if you were to stuff the empty space with tin so the heat will transfer over.

Already done - but this design will never heatsink as well as some of the more recent ones.

Gotcha, might make a good light for short term use especially if your looking far in the distance and want a compact thrower along with your edc.

Any of the L2 clones with this dropin will do better

Pity the dropin isn't yet available separately.

I noticed today that DX now offers a Bin K MC-E in a 502B host. They claim 700 lumens instead of 800 for the Bin M in the 501B you bought. Looking forward to some output measurements. So you aren't noticing a + in the beam at more than 4"? That sounds pretty good.

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.39736 1-mode $22.20 MC-E K Bin

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.39738 5-mode $23.10 MC-E K Bin

How can you tell if your 502B has a Bin K MC-E? Would it say so on the drop-in? My drop-in just says, 'Super Bright R2'.

Well, the MC-E bit is obvious from a look at the LED the four separate dies are very obvious in the head on shot of the dropin. P7s tend to look "cloudy" and have the four visible dies. Before about P4 (This is from memory and could easily be wrong), Cree XR-E emitters had the phosphor over everything inside the ring, later ones only over the actual dies.

The binning is mostly a matter of expensive test gear. If it is an R2 in it, it'll produce around 130-139 lumens at 350mA - more at higher currents. There is no real way to tell other than testing.

Setting up beamshots now - hoping it gets a lot darker soon (It won't)

You can't tell. As I understand it, Cree doesn't even know what they will get until it comes off of the assembly line and they test it. Then they don't label the LED so you will know (though they do label the container, so if you order from Cree you should be getting what you ordered). So these K bins may be the same as what the M bins, or they may be different, but as a consumer, you don't have a way to tell without some calibrated testing equipment.

And it has even stopped raining... This time, here are most of the lights - time permitting (I have to be up for work in less than 8 hours - just as well I don't sleep a lot)

Piritlight SG-L8 (MC-E driven hard), Ultrafire WF-501B with an M bin MC-E dropin, Ultrafire WF-503B with a DX MC-E dropin from a couple of years ago, Ultrafire Wf-504B with a mystery KD MC-E dropin, Solarforce L2M with a DX P7 dropin, Uniquefire R5 with a 5 mode XP-G R5 dropin, Ultrafire WF-502B with an old R2 single mode dropin, Ultrafire WF-504B with the 5 mode R2 dropin it came with, Solarforce L2R with a pair of Eneloops driving a single mode Solarforce low voltage R2 dropin, Ultrafire C3 stainless steel running a 14500, MX Power ML-310 running a 14500, an old Ultrafire C3 on a 14500, Trustfire R5-A3 again with a 14500, and not in the picture, a first batch Aurora SH-034 (RCR123) and the C3 ultra-budget clone (2 Eneloops).

AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Safari crashed just as I'd got all the pics in an article. Will rewrite it tomorrow. Off to bed now.

I like the way you put the SHO34 as the first batch....lol. Now that sucks when a program starts to take a dump on you, i have had many of those in my time.

I put that in specifically because you said your second one was brighter. If it wasn't for the Cree rings in mine, it'd be pretty close to the perfect light. And it has a really low low - can't really see the beam in the pictures at 50 feet.

I will stick this lot on the lightbox and get some hard numbers for them tomorrow. I'll be interested to see what it says. From the beamshots, this is the brightest of the multi-die dropins I have so I'll be interested to see what the lightbox says. I need another tripod so I can fix the lights in place and do 50 foot meter readings. Will look for cheap tripods soon.

The beamshots - remember it isn't even close to fully dark, but is as dark as it is going to get. It is frustrating that they are all out of focus despite going to a lot of effort to set up the focus in daylight as the camera hates trying to focus itself in the dark.

Control

Piritlight SG-L8 with an MC-E - pulls 3.2A out of the cell on high.

Low

Medium

High

It is actually a lot brighter than it seems in these pictures - but needs more range than my backyard has available.

Ultrafire WF-501B with M bin MC-E dropin

Low

Medium

High

Ultrafire WF-503B with older DX MC-E dropin

Low

High

Ultrafire WF-504B with a KD MC-E dropin - this dropin wasn't what I ordered so I'm not sure of the precise details about it.

Low

Medium

High

Solarforce L2M with DX P7 dropin

Low

High

That's all the quad-die dropins I have so I did another control and some shots of other lights. It seemed to be a bit darker so I did another control shot

Uniquefire R5 with a 5 mode XP-G R5 dropin, not the original as I burned it out early on

Low

Medium

High

Ultrafire WF-502B with the single mode R2 dropin it came with. I thought this was horribly dim for a long time till I discovered it threw really well for such a small reflector. This was my first P60 light and contains one of those generic "Super Bright R2" modules. It dates from about the time that R2 LEDs first became available. This one is actually pretty good.

Ultrafire WF-504B with the 5 mode R2 dropin it came with.

Low

Medium

High

Solarforce L2R - a bit of an oddity this one, it is a 2AA body with a P60 head. I got an 0.8-4.2V single mode R2 to put in it which is my most recent R2 dropin. The only one of the P60 lights not running on lithium fuel. Pity it has that annoying spiky bezel - will get some more non-spiky bezels soon.

Ultrafire C3 stainless steel - I really like this light, especially on a 14500 even if it will burn your hands

Low

Medium

High

MX Power ML-310 - which clearly shows the unusual beam from the optic it uses instead of a reflector

Low

High - no spill worth mentioning, but look at that huge hotspot.

The Ultrafire C3, true to form, refused to work. Ah well.....

Trustfire R5-A3. This one is bright!

Low

High

Aurora SH-034 - a lovely little light

Low

Medium

High

And finally, a super budget light, the Small Sun "5W" C3 clone. Unlike a real C3, it actually worked. The only other light using Eneloops. Hardly fair on the poor thing as this is not the sort of use it is intended for.

What is the difference

http://www.popbuying.com/detail.pb/sku.28324

Old P4 LED.