Blast from the past……
I bought this LusteFire U2-X3 many years ago. It’s big and heavy but performed well at the time. It used regular old XM-Ls, but still managed to throw well with its triple emitter setup. Each emitter has a reflector slightly bigger than an X6 or slightly smaller than a C8.
I had big plans for the light and stripped it a few times. Then the driver retaining ring jammed in place. Took me ages to get it out (had to cut it out). Plus some other issues. So the light has sat at the back of the shelf collecting dust for yonks now.
I eventually decided to revamp it and get it working again. I located the stock driver in a box and ordered up 3 x XP-L HI (NW) from Int’l Outdoor. And decided just to try and put the thing back together, rather than significantly upgrade it.
What a PITA it turned out to be. I just couldn’t get the LEDs to stay in place with thermal paste. So I ended up drilling and screwing them down, sadly one must have moved and is ever so slightly not aligned.
The Noctigon boards and wiring also seem to stop the LEDs sitting deep enough into the reflector for my liking. Probably because the HI’s have no dome.
Up close the beam is a bit horrid with a void in it. However 20 yards and out it performs great!
Obviously there are way more powerful and/or throwy lights these days. Maybe I should have gone for a triple XHP50.2 or even Osram setup. But it is quite usable with the XPL-HI’s. According to Lux bounce tests I’m seeing similar numbers to my FT03 (XHP50.2) or MF01 Mini on High. Which I’d guess must be 2000-2500 lumens.
Although it does seem to out throw the FT03 unless the FT03 is running on Turbo, then the throw seems pretty similar. The hotspot is also wider than a single XM-L2/XP-L HI which makes it quite handy out over the fields.
I think the biggest thing is, it offers this performance without even getting warm and with 3 x 26650 is likely to have a long runtime at a high sustained output. Running the FT03 on Turbo to match the throw results in lots of heat, step down and much shorter runtimes.
By BLF standards I guess this mod is a bit ghetto and uninteresting. But for me I like to make the things I have usable. And this has certainly achieved that goal.
And showing the physical size vs a C8