I too would love a warm or neutral white Osram emitter, but I don’t believe they are manufactured any warmer than 6000K. Maybe someday…
For now your only option is the xpl or sst, or maybe the xhp35 when Hank offers that one. None of those will be nearly as throwy, of course.
I see. Thank you.
Just a quick question. Why does the K1 pull so many amps for just 700+ lumens?
It's not a very efficient LED?
Just curious
At low currents it’s somewhat inefficient, at high it’s very efficient.
Please let me explain…
All LEDs are more efficient at low currents than they are at high.
As you driver them higher, output increases. Similarly and more importantly for comparisons - surface luminosity increases. To reach high luminosity you need to sacrifice high efficiency. Now…some emitters lose efficiency faster than others. White Flat starts not very efficient, but its efficiency drops relatively slowly.
The peak output is achieved at about 50 lm/W. In general - horribly inefficient. But then - no other LED gets the same luminosity with higher efficiency, so is it bad?
Here you can find surface luminosity vs. efficiency chart. White Flat is not there but there are the previous generation emitters. White Flat is more efficient across the range, the curve shape is similarly flat.
So…it’s modestly efficient at low surface luminosities, but compared to other emitters - somewhat inefficient.
At higher luminosities it’s very inefficient but compared to other emitters - very efficient.
Yes, the die of the W1 is 1mm square, and the W2 is 2mm square which are both much smaller than many common emitters.
As Agro said it’s actually very efficient for cd/W though, just not so much for lm/W… compared to larger emitters anyway.
True, actually its very efficiënt compared to any emitter.
The surface is almost 9x smaller than a XPL emitter
Imagine the possible output if it were the same dimensions
More like 3 times really, 1.0609 mm² White Flat 3.55 mm² XP-L HI.
I received my Noctigon K1 (W1) yesterday. I was initially a little disappointed with the output, but 900 lumens is 900 lumens, no matter how tightly focused, and is a whole lot less than, for example, my D4v2 or D4S. But shine it at a distance and man… what a tightly focused beam! The only other throwers I own are an old ThruNite TN32, a ThruNite Catapult V6, and a CPF Italia Cometa. I once also had an Olight SR52UT, but I sold it some time ago. Anyway, this K1 just destroys all of those of course.
I walked home from work today and took a few impromptu beamshots. I didn’t have a tripod, which made it a bit difficult. There was also a near full-moon and a bit of overcast haze. Following are two animated GIFs showing the same set of images, the first the full image, and the second zoomed in at the pixel level of my 24MP camera. The camera was precariously balanced on a bridge railing (Cambie Street bridge in Vancouver, Canada) and I handheld the light, which might have wavered around a bit during the just over 1-second exposure. The beam spot size on the building and intensity might have been better had the light also been locked down. These shots are fairly representative of what I saw with my reasonably dark adapted eyes, although a wee bit brighter than real life I’d reckon.
In any case, the K1 has no problem visually hitting the side of a building that is near 1 km away on a moonlit night in the city! 
Here is a Google Earth measurement, the red dot on the left is where I was on the bridge and the green dot on the right is the target…
Here are links to larger JPEG versions of each image, the control and the beamshot.
Lastly a few more points… I should add that my Samsung 40T battery was at 4.0v (as reported by the light) and the temperature outside was about 4 Celsius. Also, the numbers shown on the animations are the manufacturer’s specifications since I have no way of measuring them myself. When I received my K1, the beam focus looked a tiny bit off. The SS bezel was not fully tightened, so I smacked the end of the light in my palm a few times and sure enough, I managed to improve the beam focus, after which I tightened the bezel down. I suspect the focus was probably good from the factory, but during shipment it might have shifted a little?
Here are two more beamshots from tonight, but no fancy animations this time. They take too long to do and it’s getting late. You can click on each image to open larger versions, 3000 pixels on the long edge.
This one is also from the Cambie Street Bridge, and in this case the building I am hitting is about 410 meters away, according to Google Earth. The beam sure is bright on that building…
This one is from False Creek, hitting the 160 meter high top of the weird new twisted apartment building. This is 950 meters away according to Google Earth and the exposure is different than the previous ones: handheld (not propped) at ISO 3200, f/3.6 and 1/4 second…
The math checks out.
The K1 W1 is rated at 650 kcd and ~900 lm, though I’m guessing the lumens may be slightly lower like 875 or so.
The K1 XP-L HI is rated at 290 kcd and ~1300 lm.
So the XP-L HI makes about ~1.45X as many lumens, but it’s spread across ~3.33X as much surface area. This makes its surface brightness lower. And ~1.45 / ~3.33 * ~650 kcd = ~283 kcd… pretty close to the spec of 290 kcd.
I just think it’s neat when some quick spec-based math actually gets so close to the measurements.
If there was a prize for best K1 beam shot, I think you just won it. I haven’t seen any other photos which so clearly demonstrate what this light does… and it’s also generally just a great picture.
I couldn’t resist and K1 W2 just arrived.
First impressions as usual, positive. Good but not perfect. The mirror has a small flaw but only on the edge, probably without affecting the final effect. Glass with a nice anti-reflective coating but slightly hazy from the inside. Unfortunately I can not clean because the frame is glued.
First measurements. With Lii 40 because I only have 21700.
Lumens 1160 (a bit too little but … it doesn’t matter because the beam is so focused that the end result is great anyway.)
Lux 445K
Range 1335m
Current consumption 8A in turbo. On standby without backlighting the button: 33uA
Color … Hmm, turbo is blue, 8835K. You can see that the LED is heavily distorted. Just slide down a bit with power and we have a nice pure white 6489K.
By setting the temperature threshold to 75 degrees Celsius, after 6 minutes K1 reached 60 degrees and there is practically no descent from the turbo, only as much as the voltage drop on the battery.
Compared to TN42, the beam is slightly tighter but they look very similar. As for convenience, it is known who wins.
Charging works very well. I had 1.7A charging current and the charging took just over 2 hours. Emergency can be useful.
So much at the moment, as I take pictures will complete the entry.
Interesting finding,it is the led overriden too hard?
Time will tell. But I think that this is really the limits of this LED
I am hoping vinh can come up with some performance tweaks… I’m on the fence, buy now or wait for vinh’s numbers
Im too on the fence now(and im not a big spender too).Im planning to order after CNY.But let see how it goes.
If we as flashaholics keep shining super throwers into buildings our lights are going to become outlawed. Just saying.
Yes the shots are pretty, but no they should not be taken like that where inhabited buildings are concerned. Discretion is key…
Okay so I am at a loss for what to do about my K1. December 16th was the last tracking update from DHL Ecommerce saying transiting the postal network from JFK. Since then my tracking number is no longer in their system, And USPS never received the package from them. No one is helping me. Cant file lost package with USPS because they never received it, DHL “cant” do anything for me, but says it updated as leaving Jamaica on the 20th of december?
I’m with you on this one. Shining at people’s windows is very unkind.
