TK's Emisar D4 review

For evenly lighting the inside of a long narrow duct, I’d select a light almost entirely based on its beam pattern, not its CRI. And you’re going to need a thrower, not a flooder. The D4 is a flooder.

A D4 will only really light up the near end. Even though it can throw light 10m without trouble, the near end will be so overexposed that you probably won’t be able to see the far end at all.

So instead of a D4, you might want to consider the D1. It’s much more throwy.

It’ll be hard to find anything with the exact beam pattern needed for this particular use though. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything with a beam which would evenly illuminate the inside of a duct. You would need a very particular beam pattern to make that work.

Maybe you could use a D1S (even more throwy) with some DC-Fix on the lens. Or maybe on part of the lens. That might make it able to reach both the near end and the far end at the same time.

Blue Sword, the Astrolux MF01 uses XP-G3’s which are known for producing odd colors in the aura and spill, not exactly good for taking pictures inside a tube. Way overkill for that, I’d think.

I mean, he’s still almost point blank at those distances he’s stated and after all, the light can’t go anywhere but down the HVAC tube, right? So no light is escaping. 30 feet long? Child’s play for these lights! And the Astrolux is 3 times the price as well.

I’m just thinking he may want a light that has either a good choice modes or ramping. I’m not real sure shinning a light down a enclosed duct with a couple of thousand lumens is gonna make a good pick that isn’t flooded with light. Using ramping you could get the light amount just right for the camera. I do this very thing taking close up pics with a variable brightness control ring Sunwayman V10R modded with a high cri led. Most pics only need 5 to 20 lumens close in, I can dial the light in to produce the best pic as to what the camera needs. I’m just guessing 500 to 1000 lumens maybe the sweet spot.
Just my 2 cents :smiley:

That’s a good point. If the duct is clean, a lot of the flood area will probably bounce off the walls and continue along the tube. Throw will be artificially increased by the hall of mirrors effect. So something floody may be feasible in that case.

I was picturing a dirty old duct with gunk all over the sides, which would absorb the light instead of bouncing it along. Because the last duct I needed to look into was a clogged laundry exhaust. I needed something really throwy for that.

The area his trying to illuminate is only close to equal the area of a small bathroom. A 60 watt light bulb does pretty good there at around 500 lumens.

on the other hand moderator, you can adjust the camera settings to take the right exposure almost regardless of lumens in use. Even if 25,000 lumens were firing it up… a 1/50,000th of a second shutter would adjust. :wink: Tit for tat, as it were.

So what we are getting to is the big question, are the HVAC tubes typically clean or quite filthy? I would think that even very dirty we’re only talking about 30’ away, a $3 zoomie can do that. So in the end a variable brightness as in ramping, and enough cell capacity to use the duration of the job at hand, be that a 15 minute inspection or a day’s worth of those.

Maybe the newer D4S with 26650 cell would be a better answer over all? Fully capable of the distance, the brightness level, and the duration of use? Next step up may be something like the SupFire M6 with 4 18650’s for capacity. (or a Q8 for that matter)

Another question comes to mind, would it be important to be able to highlight something in the tube at a distance, say if there were an obstruction on one side at 20’ away, would it be important to be able to point that out for the photo? Then a spot might come into play. So a zoomie may indeed come in handy with the ability to go from a broad flood to a tight zoom to cover whatever arises. Something like the Jaxman Z1 for example. It uses an 26650 cell for run time, yet can do flood or spot or in between.

Edit: I should also point out that the camera will have different lighting requirements the length of that tube, dependant on the quality of the sensor, the quality of the glass in the lens, and the use of f/stop and ISO ability. The focal point for the shot will determine, after all other things are considered, how much light is needed at that point. (or, more precisely, the amount of light reaching that point will determine the settings needed… provided the equipment is up to the task)

I don’t have a way of measuring output, and I don’t have a clamp meter to measure current.

I built this D4 knowing that it wouldn’t be a powerhouse. It’s running ToyKeeper’s Andúril UI, which has a customizable ramp ceiling. I’ve set it to 50 levels below turbo, which visually appears to me as roughly half the brightness of turbo. Even so, I’ve been keeping it in muggle mode, which limits the highest output even more.

I admit that I’ve run the R9080 D4 in turbo a few times for just a couple of seconds. :stuck_out_tongue:

My D9080s are from Clemence’s most recent group buy. They’re NVSL219BT-V1 sw45kD220L2R9080 according to the box’s label. Click to embiggen:

A discussion in the Q8 modding thread about Nichias in a Q8 led to djozz mentioning:

djozz also shared a link to his thread about testing 219B emitters.

I love the 4500K R9080 tint. In addition to a D4, I have one in a Zebralight H51w, one in a Lumintop IYP365, and a loaded triple board waiting for the FW3A. :wink:

I also modded one of my D4s with 219BT-V1 sw45k-D220-L2-R9080. :slight_smile:
The tint with the 10623 optic is beautiful. In my eyes it’s perfect. :partying_face: It’s my daily driver now.
One easy thing with stock V2, to not worry about Amps and turbo is to use a low drain battery (GA, 35E etc). Of course it isn’t so bright, but doesn’t makes you nervous if you want to use turbo. :stuck_out_tongue:

Some whitewall shots, 5200K WB. All D4s are 1x7135.

Left: D4 219B 4500K R9080 10623 optic. Right: D4 219C 5000K R9050 10622 optic.

Left: D4 219B 4500K R9080 10623 optic. Right: D4 XP-L HI V2 5D-4000K 10622 optic.

Left: D4 219C 5000K R9050 10622 optic. Right: D4 XP-L HI V2 5D-4000K 10622 optic.

Note: In reality the Cree is not so yellow. It’s a nice yellow-rosy tint, but in comparison with Nichias… my phone :person_facepalming:

Great comparisons. The more recent batch of 5D XPL-HI in the flashlights I got from Intl is much more yellow than the older pure rosy 5D XP-L HI that I got from him.

Also that 219c 5000k looks wonderful, which I’m guessing is probably from an older batch because Hank said half a year ago that his current batch at the time had a lot of green in the tint.

I modded my D4 to sw40 9080’s, but it didn’t do it for me and I changed it back to 5D xp-g2’s. Usually I always like these emitters, probably the optic set the tint off a little???

Very happy with the 5d’s Again, gonna keep it this way. Now off to find an other host for the sw40s

What’s wrong with the tint? Too green/yellow or too rosy?

I also noted a tint shift with the quad TIR of my D4.
When I installed 4 LH351D 4000K 90CRI, I found them quite greenish… but in other lights I love them.

Thank you guys for your suggestions and various considerations. The ducts are old drywall & cement made, very uneven dotted with cement irregular dark inside wall surface, somewhat dirty, with some pipes running inside the ducts, definitely not smooth bright aluminum ducts. Access to the flashlight is limited once inserted into the duct via a narrow hole made in the duct wall. That makes it more difficult to adjust flashlight to zoom on a particular spot along its length. A portable endoscope camera with a circle of mini lights around its glass is inserted into the duct in a plastic protection pipe to push it through the duct. So the cam adjustability is limited too. What would be the best flashlight choice for these conditions? I tried an ordinary $5 CN flashlight, and it illuminates the duct just around its mount point, but the remote light is all consumed by the duct walls, so useless. The purpose is to assess pipes condition running inside the ducts mounted along the duct side and bottom walls.

Hmm, that worries me a little. I tried 3xLH351D 5000K 80CRI and found it also looks greenish. I figured the 90CRI ones wouldn’t have that issue though.

Maybe I’m just not running it at a high enough power to get good tint. Djozz noted the LH351D tends to get a bit green at low power, and most of the time I’m using only the 1x7135 power channel on a triple or a quad. So it’s 87 to 117 mA per emitter, and that might be low enough for the green effect. Not sure.

Most emitters are more white when running at higher power levels… but the range I care most about is under 150 lumens. And on a triple or quad, that’s only 40 or 50 lumens per emitter. So I guess I tend to select emitters for their tint at low levels like that. I should probably use single-emitter lights instead, but triples and quads seem more popular lately.

The LH351D 4000k 90CRI version is yellowish on the verge of green. It does get better at higher brightness but still not nice like the 219B 4000k. The two groupbuys for the LH351D used the T7 and T6 bin. If we can somehow get our hands on the T3 or T4 bin would be ideal for the FW3A.

I still think a throwy light like the Haikelite SC26 XHP35-HI NW or Lumintop GT Mini would work well for your purpose.

@DBCustom, you do know there’s a Nichia 219C version of the MF01, right?

I see green at low levels it seems… so it would be normal for this LEDs, and not due to optics then ?
I guess I’ll have to try the 3000K SST20 95CRI in my D4 when they’ll be there…

My 219c 5000k is from December. It has some green from moon to 1x7135 (only if you see it in comparison with other white/rosy tints on a white wall) from around there and up to turbo is a nice white.

Just received my silver/white D4 directly from Hank. Took 17 days from day of order . My first Emisar and loving it. The more I use side switch lights the more I think they will be the only type I buy from now on , especially with ramping. The UI is perfect and the thermal step down works flawlessly. Being able to get momentary on is also a plus. Tonight I get to put it through it’s paces if it would stop raining every single day. Emisars are actually more attractive than pictures do them credit. I see more in my future. :smiley: