Marketing aside, I do think the flashlight looks great and the button mechanism looks well engineered.
I’m sure that the 18350 is replaceable via the top screws, would be nice if Wuben confirms
A Kickstarter campaign with this low of a pledge goal is purely for marketing purposes, once the project reaches several times its required pledge it becomes viral and millions of potencial buyer will recieve brand exposure, people who otherwise wouldn’t show any interest in a flashlight.
Most of the cases when the pledge goal is so low and gets funded so quickly it’s because of self-fund, basically they pay the KS fee in order to make the project look extremely successful and make staggering claims such as “3,000% funded in 24 hours!”. Also, KS offers the backers a guarantee where if the project doesn’t reach full funding they will issue refunds, so it would not be wise to set a real funding target.
Interesting, will34, thanks. I did see that Jellop was prominently mentioned….waayyyy at the bottom of the page. lol. I didn’t know that…schemes…like this had infiltrated Kickstarter. Marketing will be the death of us all someday…put all that energy into better skills, imho.
I’ve seen a bunch of fiascos on various crowd-funding platforms over the years…kinda loathe to support that avenue myself to be honest. Some great things have happened, though. ODM is so easy these days that if someone really has a good idea and can do the legwork, finding traditional funding isn’t terribly difficult, although that does kind of lock someone into a path, at least for awhile, where crowdfunding can enable one-off projects to happen and you may never hear from the originators again.
I decided to check the comments to see if someone asked about that battery and found this:
Seems like the back plate is similar to a watch caseback, and is most likely screw-on (ring pliers, rubber, or watch wrenches should open it effectively). I do wonder what the specs of the battery is, or if it’s a flat or button-top.
This looks really interesting. I’m thrilled by the inclusion of MAO. Glad that more manufacturers are starting to experiment with different anodizations and body colours.
Regarding titanium, I’m not sure how much sense it makes in such a small, yet bright light. Sure it is more durable than Al (and it looks really slick), but the thermal properties are way worse. Heat dissipation is always going to be an issue in this form factor, and Ti only compounds that. At 1.1k lumens, it will probably start stepping down after a few seconds.
That being said, more options are always nice and other people might prefer higher durability, especially in an edc! I’d be more interested in a copper version.
I do have a gripe with this passage:
Ti has a higher density than Al, so unless the construction is thinner, I don’t see how it could be more lightweight.
Interesting design. The H5 is also excellent, with the ability to rotate, and attachment options. I’ve had to create my own backpack mounting system. I only want 18650 lights, however, and with a red emitter. But good job!
The spacing between Medium and High mode (150 vs 250 lumens) seems too narrow and will only lead to a small visual difference.
I’d suggest either increasing High a fair bit (~400 lumens would be a good option), or adding another mode between it and Turbo.
Also, is it just me or does it kind of look like a miniature washing machine with an extended base in some pictures?
Actually I never managed to destroy a flashlight with aluminum casing. After all the titanium helps to keep the heat inside the light - which probably renders the turbo runtime close to zero.
I assume one of the two brass (?) buttons under the USB protection cover contacts a micro switch inside. There is a pretty big gap visible between cover and USB connector (and no rubber seal) so I wonder how the dust protection is expected to work.
At first glance it seems small. And it may be the shortest 18350 light. They’re only giving us two dimensions but it’s a three dimensional light. So the head itself is not really going to be any smaller than other 18350 right angle lights. And because the clip doesn’t rotate that adds to that third dimension that they’re not giving us. Who has a spare front pocket that they’re going to carry this in loose? It’s still kind of bulky for that. If you’re going to clip it in or on a pocket then the short length is not really a major advantage. The permanently mounted clip does not make it easy to clip onto clothing or other things on your body and get that light pointed forward. I edc two lights daily and I can access both of them year-round pretty much with both hands even with gloves on in the winter. I am in favor of right angle lights with a magnetic tail and that is what my secondary light is. Mine has a deep carry clip on the tail end that will rotate. So even though this is somewhat shorter than other 18350 lights I don’t think most people are going to find it more convenient to carry as an EDC on their person than other right angle lights. I’m not in favor of the LED color choices either. So how are you going to carry it? Edit. Now showing all three dimensions.
X-0 Knight is an EDC flashlight with a built-in rechargeable battery.
You can replace the battery if you wish, but we do not advise you to do so.
Your battery will last a long time as we use a high-quality WUBEN 18350 battery in the design. If you do want to replace it, please use rubber pads or other tools to open the tail cover and put the battery in correctly.
We'll be uploading a video of how to replace the battery soon. Stay tuned!
One of our departments named Wuben Lab which is dedicated to the design and production of unconventional flashlights in the future. To have a better exploration of this, we really need to get more support and recognition. And that's why we choose Kickstarter at first.
