I ordered another Astrolux EC06. As I don't have a light integration / measuring device to check lumens, I often do a ceiling-bounce test in a small room instead, with a lux meter.
I've not yet tried using really high-drain 21700 batteries on the EC06 yet - I just used Liitokala Lii-40A (appears to be rewrap of LR2170SA, not that high-drain battery) on them.
On my first unit, I get around 2050 Lux with ceiling-bounce when set to Turbo (first 2 seconds reading).
But on the second unit, I get only around 1550-1600 Lux with ceiling-bounce when set to Turbo mode, this means the second unit is around 20% or so less bright when set to Turbo mode.
At first, I though it may just be a battery contact issue (my guess is maybe the battery contact is not so good on the second EC06 battery carrier tube, since I just used the flat-top Lii-40A battery), but I also tried some other 21700 batteries (also flat-tops), and the first unit is always higher Lux than the second unit. I cleaned the contacts with barely any change in reading.
~~~~
I decided to test further -- maybe some LED is not working properly?
The LEDs are too bright to look directly, and it's difficult to "see" if a LED is not working, luckily I have some discarded scraps of car shade tint film, which I occasionally use to inspect the LEDs of flashlight while turning on the LED (LED's are too bright to look directly with our eyes, but shining through the car tint film, then the LEDs can be "looked at".
So I used this method.
What I noticed is: 2 out of the 6 LEDs are indeed not working properly.
When on Low brightness level (I surmise it's the regulated levels, using the 7135 chips), then all LEDs work normally = all 6 LEDs are lit up somewhat dimly.
Once on Higher brightness levels (I surmise it means both 7135 + FET (percentage) are being used), then 4 LEDs become bright, whereas 2 LEDs are still dim.
Now when doing double-click to Turbo brightness level, 4 LEDs become very bright, but 2 LEDs turn OFF (FET activated, 7135 not used) -- probably means FET is not working for the 2 LEDs.
So only the 7135 chip is working for the 2 LEDs.
~~~~
Now I have recorded a video and showed this to Banggood for an explanation, but maybe due to the language barrier, they do not seem to understand the problem that the unit is FAULTY.
(I did not explain my "guess", which is regarding the FET and 7135 chips, but I explained that on Low, all 6 LEDs work ; on High, 4 LEDs work + 2 LEDs dim brightness; on Max-Turbo brightness, only 4 LEDs work while 2 LEDs do not work.
I have a hard time getting them to respond to this issue. Any idea how to get them to understand that this EC06 unit is faulty?
