AstroLux A01 AAA Nichia 219B Review - Winner winner, chicken dinner. An excellent, Neutral tint High CRI LED keychain light!

The UI on the d25aaa and this A01 are almost the same, too. Only difference being that the d25aaa adds a bunch of strobe variations. But this seems to have a reflector, and the d25aaa has a TIR.

I received mine today. The LED wasn’t centered correctly and the reflector had a burr. So I decided to do my first mod/repair/whatever. After watching mhanlen1s tutorial video I was able to reflow the LED and position it correctly.

Now I’m satisfied with this light :slight_smile:

Looks like a good like, its in the wish list.

Do you have a link to the mhanlen’s video ?

Thanks,
Mike

Sure: Flashlight Repair Tutorial: Reflowing an LED

Just received mine today. LED is off center. It also flickers a bit on high. I took the spring out and stretch it a bit, works fine now, no flickering.

Received mine today from Banggood, (took only 3 weeks to arrive!) it instantly became one of my favorite new stock single-AAA EDC lights. Great tint with the 219, no PWM, excellent run times on a Alkaline or NiMH, compact, great spaced modes, OP reflector, quality and finish is top notch. :slight_smile:

I have problem with mine. I got it today and everything works fine only problem is the first mode is flickering a little bit. On mid and high I can see no flickering only at low. It looks a little bit like a candle style led, a random kind of changes in brightness.

Mine arrived today. Doesn’t work. Appears to be a weak tail spring because I can get it to work if I bypass the battery tube and push the cell down hard enough for the button top to contact the driver. Should be easy to fix. Like the looks of the light and the mode separation.

A pair of these, in black!

If you take the pill out, you can shave the foam doughnut down a bit, it is pretty stiff EVA foam. I did not have any that were stronger than the spring, but I can see that may be an issue. The other thing would be if you pulled the spring out and put a small bit of foam or other squishy material under the spring to make it stronger…

Took this junky pic of the emitter on the pill (cleaned with alcohol prior to putting it back in…lol) and it is a 219B-V1….

Hi, thanks for the review! Just got my (first one, few more pending in group buy) today, and I have to say I’m not impressed at all. Tint is great, of course, and most of it feels great in my hand. But the emitter is noticeably off center, there are a few tiny imperfections in the reflector, and the machining around the lanyard hole left painfully sharp edges. I could either fix or forgive those things, especially on a $9 light.
However, the twisty switch on mine is extremely finicky. It skips modes, repeats modes, jumps to strobe inconsistently, doesn’t turn on consistently with the amount of twist, and tightening it all the way reliably turns it off . Huh? I’m no stranger to small twisty lights: among others, I own an old Fenix EO1, an ITP EOS A3, I’ve EDC’d a Fenix LD15 for many years, and never had problems like these before.
I assume most of this behavior in the AO1 is due to problems with the foam donut in the head and/or the spring in the tail. The foam isn’t visibly overlapping the contact ring around the circumference of the driver, so I don’t think it’s blocking electrical contact from the body. Foam seems glued down anyway, so I’m not sure how that’d be adjustable. I know loose tail springs can cause problems, but I don’t see how it’d explain the fact that it turns off when I tighten the head all the way. Anyone else seeing similar (mis)behavior? Any suggestions? If I need to stretch the tail spring, how do I reach down the tube and grip it?
I was hoping to gift this, but don’t want to if it’s going to be this flaky.

One other interesting note - it has a noticeably warmer tint than my Nichia 219-equipped L3 L10, and it appears only a hair less bright than the L10. Not a complaint, just a point of reference in case it’s helpful.

Re: Finnicky Switch

Andy,

Intermittent contact might be caused by anodization. Try sanding or filing the edge.

See also:

Andyman,

That switching sounds terrible… Another member had the foam donut (reverse current protection) so stiff the light would not come on. Two ways to fix it I see are to back the pill out and shave the donut down about 1/3 to 1/2 as tall to ease contact, or pull the spring in the tail and drop in a stiff chunk of foam to beef up the spring push…

Speculation, if you tighten the head all the way, and the light goes off, the foam donut is pushing the + off the driver because it is stronger than the tailspring…

A good clean and light sanding of the head would be in order too, but off all of this is too big of a deal, just get a hold of Banggood and see if you can get them to fix or replace it.

The comparisons are cool, I do not have this other lights you do, so thanks for this comparisons…

The group buy should address the tail attachment point issues, but the included split ring works…

1dash1 and ReManG, thanks for the tips!

I got a few pictures: first, the off-center emitter - worst I’ve seen.

WRT anodization at the edge, I didn’t see anything other than grease at the edge (see pic below), but I cleaned and filed it on a fine diamond file anyway (sorry, no “after” picture). After filing it looks a lot nicer, but doesn’t work any better. Ah, well, I appreciate the suggestion, and it’s a good thing to watch for in the future!

WRT the donut, I don’t have tools at work to remove the pill, but I might work on that tonight. It doesn’t really seem like a too-stiff or too-thick donut is the problem, though, since the light comes on easily, and (usually) changes modes way too easily, sometimes accidentally cycling through 2 or 3 modes with one twist. If the donut were too stiff, I can see the light not coming on at all, or only coming on with a very firm tightening. Mine still goes off with a firm tightening. That’s the only consistent thing about this light. scratch_one-s_head (<— Edit - that’s supposed to be a confused smiley, not random bold text…)

Very glad to hear the group buy ones will have an updated tail attachment point! :slight_smile: Assuming my switching issues are a rare defect, that’s my only other real gripe with the light. Sure, aluminum would be easy to sand or file, but then there’d be a bare/un-anodized spot on a brand new light. Maybe inevitable on a user light, but I prefer my anodizing to wear off gradually, as a result of pocket carry and many adventures!
Hoping I just got a dud, because this should be a really nice light!

Wow, that is off center! I did that with one I had removed the pill and I put it back in. The insulator/spacer for the LED is flat on one side, and an inverted cone on the other. The inverted cone side goes toward the reflector, it has to be flat on the MCPCB or it seems to cock over easily. I fixed I by backing it off and tapping until centered and re tightening. It took two or three attempts.

I still think the foam donut is too firm… Perhaps a few dozen squish downs with the back of a marker or something will work. The donut is just a reverse polarity protection, so it would work without it, or shaved down… Otherwise there may be something wrong with the driver…

ReManG wrote:

If you take the pill out, you can shave the foam doughnut down a bit, it is pretty stiff EVA foam. I did not have any that were stronger than the spring, but I can see that may be an issue. The other thing would be if you pulled the spring out and put a small bit of foam or other squishy material under the spring to make it stronger...

Good suggestions. I was also thinking of just pre compressing the foam a bit to break it in. I forgot to mention, I really like the tint on these lights.

Got mine in today. No problems with mine. My first neutral tint. It’s different but not sure tint is going to be that important to me.

The neutral tints will grow on you…. Use it side by side with a CW tint light of about the same power… it is one more part of the addiction here…

The tint is great. I guess I was comparing it to output of other lights. The claim is 102 lumens on high. Comparing it to my other lights seems about as bright as an 70 or 80. Will have to run down a full battery and time it. If I get the runtime of a 70 that would be great. Heard neutral is less bright. Don’t know if that means the runtime of a 102 lumen and brightness of a 70?