Fireflies E07 Random issue + long term review

LED Flashlights – General Info 21700 Flashlights
1

Hi, I’ve had the Fireflies E07 for almost a year now, in particular:

- Raw Aluminum

- CREE XPL HI V3 CW 6500K

  • Blue secondary LEDs

I use it with 21700 batteries:

- Samsung 40T (4000mah) : maybe just a little brighter on the turbo mode?

  • Samsung 40G (4800mah) : it probably lasts a little longer but nothing too crazy

REVIEW

I use it for cycling.

The finish is quite good, well machined, no sharp edges.

The raw version is clear anodised and it´s quite durable but I haven’t been very nice to it.

The lanyard is totally useless, it is very bad quality and doesn’t even fit in the hole intended for it. I use a very good one that comes with Garmin. I had to thread it using a thread. Another option would be to use the groove intended for the clip

The clip looks good, it´s tight and springy but I don’t use it

The UI has a million options and you can configure the number of steps in ramp mode which is awesome, but I find it too difficult to operate from a bicycle.

It´s more on the floody side but still throws a lot. For me this is the perfect balance.

The amount of power it has it amazing! how such a small thing can make this?! Seriously. The LEDs are incredible, and the neutral white light is wonderful.

I have it set up with 5 ramp modes normally on the 2 and 3 for climbing or iluminated streets and 4,5 for descending. If I do so, I can easily get 2 hours with one battery.

I would use the bike flasher but it´s quite difficult to access it from the handlebar so I eventually use just the normal modes and change mode when I climb or before starting descending.

It gets really hot in turbo mode after 30”, but I don’t really use it on turbo mode or even grab it in my hands hehehe

It´s remarkably small for it´s power, and quite lightweight (125g without battery).

All in all. It´s not only the best flashlight I’ve ever owned but the best I’ve ever used, for my purpose, cycling. I also use it for camping and hiking but on the very low output modes. It´s fun to point it to people on the street, they don’t know what is going on when you do hehehe but I don’t do it too much, I’m not a terrorist.

THINGS TO IMPROVE

- RELIABILITY

- Decent lanyard

- Option for mounting a remote control

  • Easily programmable UI… it would be awesome to have a smart-flashlight that you could configure with from your phone via bluetooth. There are arduinos smaller than 22*22m that could fit on a 21700 flashlight and 5*5*1mm bluetooth modules, the flashlight would only need to be 5mm longer.
    The configuration APP, could well be a webapp with just the possible functions and click combinations/sequence. It could make for a very awesome project. I would be totally in if someone did it.
    Imagine you can have only the modes you like and if at some point you need one in particular, just take your phone and enable it right away.

Another cool option would be to make it ant+ smart light compatible but that would be more bicycle specific…

RANDOM ISSUE

I’ve been in love with this flashlight for the past 10 months but on my last rides I’ve been experiencing some very frustrating issue… sometimes, randomly, it goes into weird random blinking mode and the button stops responding or at least doing much. It goes to level 1/5 and starts blinking randomly, something similar to the candle mode but more random. Sometimes if I take the battery out and put it back it goes back to normal, other times it just doesn’t. Then I leave it alone for a while and put a different battery and it goes back to normal. After a couple of days I put the previous battery and it works fine.
To be honest I don’t know what the heck is wrong with it. I dissaembled the bezel and the connections on the main board seem alright. I don’t know what to do…
I’m an expat in Australia and I don’t have proper tools… :frowning:

I guess by now warranty is over… any suggestions?

2

BTW if someone is interested, the mount is a mix of:

- Flashlight to go-pro mount adapter with a Garmin rubber band and inner tube “liner”

- Garmin to 3-prongs-Go-Pro adapter + screw

- Garmin Quarter turn “female”

  • Garmin lanyard (just in case)

All that and the flashlight itself mounts to the new Garmin +
GPS mount which includes a “male” quarter turn below for mounting Garmin’s lights / Varia radar / extra battery

It´s ultra steady, light and you can mount/unmount the flashlight with just a quarter turn, no tools required.

3

Fireflies claims to provide 3 years warranty.
Mine broke couple of weeks ago (faulty switch) so I contacted them.
I was asked to provide a video of the issue which I did.
No response since then (12 days).

4

I will try… Thanks!

5

Remove the battery from the flashlight and clean the “-” contact with fine-grained sandpaper.
The flashlight should work. I had this on E07 and ROT66.

6

The original E07 had a 45deg optic. A year or more later, they updated to a 25 deg optic IIRC. Upcoming E07v2 will have an improved 10deg optic, which will throw MUCH farther. There will also be other major updates such as greatly improved driver regulation and efficiency.

7

Hi, It´s been 4 months since my last message.
After that I contacted Fireflies without response to date.
So I cleaned with 96% alcohol and a cotton swab all I could access without de-soldering anything. I let it dry, I wiggled the board a little, put everything back and… for whatever reason it´s “fixed”. I haven´t had that issue again. I think there must be a bad connection somewhere inside but as long as it works I´m not going to try to fix it permanently.

As for the batteries, I think I’ve ruined two already. Well I’m not sure if it was with the E07 or the F01, but I over-discharged them and now they are fried. Other devices don’t even detect them. Be careful, it doesn’t have any kind of protection for that.

About the flashlight being ideal for cycling, a part from the difficulty operating the UI from the handlebar, it’s missing one very important thing, a way of limiting the light on the top part. I’ve been looking for a diffuser but I couldn’t find anything that fits. Another option would be to fabricate something like a visor so the light don’t go up and disturb other people… if you guys have any idea…
thanks

8

Another option would be to fabricate something like a visor so the light don’t go up and disturb other people… if you guys have any idea…
thanks

On my Fenix ​​BC35R bike. Here is a video of me and this bike. Sorry for the bad sound.

9

Here's my bike setup since I do a lot of road cycling. I use a similar mount as the OP but I use a Wahoo instead of a Garmin.

The E07 has a nice, wide beam, but it's too big, and doesn't quite throw sufficiently for road riding unless you crank up the power. I've done a few two-day 400mi bike-packing trips and I need the setup to be as light as possible while providing sufficient light to last riding through a whole night.

I settled on the Sofirn SC31B. Note that this is NOT the SC31pro, where Anduril is a little complicated for bike cycling.

https://sofirnlight.com/sc31b-rechargeable-flashlight-1000-lumens-p0019.html

It has these specific features which are very important when I'm flying down a descent and I can't take my eyes off the road but realize I need to change the brightness:

  • Extremely simple UI with 4 brightness modes (press and hold) with memory
  • No SOS mode (unless I double tap which I don't use)
  • Very simple power indicator on the switch (blue light)
  • Side switch with very tactile feel (very important for use on the bike mount)

In addition:

  • Has USB charging, I don't mind micro USB since my bike computer and rear light uses the same port as well
  • Extremely lightweight, need to get that KOM (if you're a cyclist you know what I mean)
    • Also means I don't worry about it when I get on rough sections or hit potholes
  • Fairly good narrow throw being an orange peel reflector instead of TIR (great for nice pavement, not ideal for MTB though)
  • Removable clip (I use the same mount as the OP)
  • Very cheap
  • I'ved used it in a downpour, it's fine

I hardly ever use it at full brightness (1000 lumens) since usually level 2 or 3 is sufficient for me to get around.

For my taillight, I used the Zecto Drive Max. It's the only proper taillight that's actually bright, and has a mode with true 24hr runtime which again I need for 400mi rides and limited recharging time.

Otherwise, for day-time only rides, the 125 lumen flash is ridiculously bright and is good for 14 hours.

10

Not really an update, more flood may be more useful if you mainly use your light at close distance. There is a model with a single LED that will throw more if you want.

11

Thank you! I´ll take a look… maybe I´ll buy that one to have as spare. To be honest I´m quite happy with the performance of the E07. I also like to have a 21700 flashlight instead of the integrated battery one, so I can carry spare batteries and a magnetic charger (NITECORE LC10 USB Battery Charger & Power Bank with Light) to use the same batteries for everything (telephone, garmin, …) when I do bikepacking. But most of the times I use them for the short ride afterwork, 1-1.5h, and it´s more than enough capacity. As for flood/throw, this light is amazing. I made a top 10 on Strava on the Taronga Zoo downhill segment (pitch black dark), at 65kmh average, no problem at all.

About the KOMs I made my one and only single KOM using the E01 hehehe. My girlfriend has heaps of QOMs though, many of them using the E01… KOMs in Sydney are almost impossible to get for a guy, too many pros around.

As for the tail light I used to have the Lezyne zecto, until someone stole it from me, then I bought the chinesium version and I didn´t notice much of a change to be honest… then I passed that one to my girlfriend, I got the Cateye Wearable X and I´m very happy with it. It’s even lighter than the Zecto and it has more than enough power: WEARABLE X | PRODUCTS | CATEYE
The patterns it has make it more visible even with less power and it has the benefit of not being as annoying to other people, it lasts more than 24h, I charge it more often than I should.

The only problem I have with the front light is the “up-beam”. I wish I could find some horizontal fresnel lens of this diameter, that would be ideal… in the meantime I’ll keep annoying other cyclists, drivers and pedestrians hehehehe or maybe I make a plastic visor if I feel like it, we will see…

12

hehehe what a setup! it looks like the bat-cycle.
I’m afraid I’m more minimalist… but quite impressive nonetheless.
happy trails!

13

You can always change out the optic for a floodier one. It’s as easy as twisting off the bezel and twisting it back on. In fact I needed a 180deg flood monster for indoor photos so I took out the optics in my Noctigon M43 and used it as a mule for many months for that purpose.

14

Or you could install some DC fix original from boaz. I put some on my mf01 mini sst20 5000k, and it turned that light into a beautiful wall of light. though that may not help with cycling much, itll blind cars probably.

15

Probably not the E07 doing that, I at least have not managed to kill any batts with the lights I own, granted, the rot66 has never went fully dead for sure

16

Hi,
It’s been a while… yesterday I went riding at night and in the middle of a pitch black section I came across a bus, tried to change to a lower mode, hit the button randomly and ended up in absolute darkness. I stopped, went a little nuts with the damned button and ended up in a very weird configuration, from off (or what I thought it was off) 1 click got me nowhere and another click to the lowest setting. I went home with that, luckily I was close, and wrestled for 1 hour with it, I tried everything! The reset procedure didn’t work at all BTW… I ended up very frustrated and looking for a new light online… it will probably be the Ravemen CR1000, BTW.

This morning I gave it another go, and after some random clicks I identified the problem, for whatever reason I had mistakenly configured the ramps to start in level 0 (no-light-at-all) and have only 2 steps, being the second step level 1… I realised when I went from nothing to turbo with only a double click, then back to nothing and then to level 1 with 1 click. then back to nothing with 1 click and back to level 1 with another click.

How I “fixed it”:

- from on, 4 clicks to go to ramp config until it blinks and goes into fast-strobe-dimm-mode

- input lowest level: 1 click

- wait until it blinks and goes into fast-strobe-dimm-mode

- input highest level: 5 clicks

- wait until it blinks and goes into fast-strobe-dimm-mode

  • input number of steps: 4 clicks

I leave it here in case someone (or myself) has a similar problem…

17

BTW I improved the flashlight mount with two garmin gps rubbers and some strips of electrical tape on the battery. Now it doesn’t wiggle so much and the battery doesn’t make clicky noises anymore. I should have done that ages ago!