Zebralight SC52 & Nitecore EA4 Change in Throw Over an Hour

It was set on H1.

cool test, thanks.

alkalines suck

They do suck. Next test will be the EA4 with eneloops and alkalines.

Nice job. Looks close to what flashlightreviews.ca got.

Those are what motivated me to shell out the $ for an Extech meter that can do datalogging.

Those are great but not in terms of throw like I wanted them, and they’re not customized for my lights and batteries. :slight_smile:

Maybe not very useful to anyone else but I don’t know of a source for graphs of throw over time and even if I did, making my own is more fun.

Very helpful, thanks luvlites!

I should probably add that although both curves look similar because each shows the change in output over time, Selfbuilt has said he uses lightbox readings and I’m measuring throw. Think SRK and TN31 with each method as a good example of the difference.

i am a budgee but now i am ordering the sc52

:p

noe joke.

Nice work. Thank you for sharing. That alkaline line looks just like my experience using them. Excitement at first and then a long slow never ending downward slide of disappointment as my light would get dimmer and dimmer. Me just hoping it would die already so I could feel alright about putting new ones in.

Thanks, luv :stuck_out_tongue:
I like the plots of output/lux versus time you’ve been doing. Informative.

Well said.

Look forward to it! :bigsmile:

Cool thread!

if anyone is wondering the sc52 does not work with lifepo4 haha… it tried last night and it runs for a few seconds and then flashes low voltage

this is very usefull and easily illustrates the benefits of using an eneloop :slight_smile:

I thought was interesting to see one graph of throw and the other of lumens, but they lined up fairly close. Also good to see someone run their own tests. I think the results show consistency with Zebralights.

The EA4 test will be interesting as well. Keep up the good work.

jmpaul320, interesting. I know the low flashes are based on voltage and on remaining battery capacity. I don’t know how they calculate remaining capacity though. I do know my li-ion 14500 works great, and you don’t lose low modes like many other lights do.

Just added EA4 results to the OP. Moral of the story: if you have alkaline AAs, don’t waste them in an SC52, use them in an EA4.

Will probably add a Romisen RC-G2 III XP-G R5 here, which is a decent AA mini-thrower I got from ShiningBeam. Maybe compare some 18650 lights after that.

Very helpful, thanks luvlites!

Thanks luvlites!

It’s odd that you were able to get 50 minutes of maximum brightness out of alkalines. Selfbuilt’s graph showed only ~30 minutes before output started to drop.

Actually, I guess it’s not that strange. Selfbuilt’s graph showed higher output from alkalines which would account for the time disparity. There appear to be some driver differences between the lights you guys used. I’d be curious to see what your graph looks like beyond 60 minutes as selfbuilt’s graph also didn’t show any stepdown at 52 minutes on eneloops.

I’ve done some searching online regarding the sc52. What a light! :bigsmile: As you, I think I really need to get one of these. My favorites are the small, one-battery models - and like most on here (probably…) I am intrigued by the brightest, longest-lasting examples.

Should not be surprised 1 battery vs 4 batteries. As for the SC52, of course 1 Duraecll can't do what 1 Eneloop can do.

No, that was not the point. What surprised me was how close the EA4’s performance with Duracells was to its performance with Eneloops. Four Duracells vs four Eneloops in EA4, little difference; one Duracell vs one Eneloop in SC52, huge difference. Thus my comment that in relative terms the SC52 squeezes a lot more out of its single battery.