Review: Eagle Eye X6 (1x XM-L2, 1x 18650)

Eagle Eye X6

Reviewer's Overall Rating: ★★★½

Summary:

Battery: 1x 18650
Switch: Reverse Tailcap Clicky
Modes: 5: High, Medium, Low, Strobe, SOS
Memory: Yes (Off, ~3seconds)
LED Type: 1 x XM-L2 3C (Neutral) , Also available in 1A (Cool White)
Lens: Glass
Reflector: Aluminum (Smooth)
Tailstands: No
Price: $18.89 Shipped
Provided by: Banggood


Pros:

Very comfortable to hold for long periods of time, which you will be doing if you have this flashlight. :)

Machining is superb

  • Smooth edges
  • no 'play' in any threaded connections
  • knurling provides grip, but not overly aggressive

Annodization is flawless

Flawless reflector

Perfect, square, lubed threads

No visible/audible PWM

Surprisingly small, makes for a easily pocket-able thrower.

Great thermal management

Serious mod potential

Price

Cons:

Bezel is slightly darker than the rest of the light.

5 Mode driver

Tailcap boot sticks up a bit too far and prevents tailstanding.

Battery tube has very small ridges on the inside and wide protected cells (KP/Generic wrap NCR18650B) tend to catch every now and then and need to be twisted slightly to slide down the rest of the way (No damage to cells or wrap after several battery swaps, it is just a bit annoying).

A bit under-driven.

Function/UI:

Tailcap current (Amps):

High Medium Low
2.23 1.52 .25

(Protected & Unprotected NCR18650B 3400mAh)

14300 cd @ 30sec


Standard reverse tailcap clicky switch operation.

Click on. Half press for mode change. H-M-L-Strobe-SOS

Strobe is a fairly slow strobe.

Pictures:

The light arrived in the standard bubble mailer, crushed white box, and bubble wrapped flashlight inside. Got here without a scratch. :)

It came with a replacement GITD tailcap boot, 2 O-rings, a decent lanyard, and an extremely sturdy clip. Fairly uncommon for a light in this price range.

Here's a 360 view. I'm not a clip guy, but this is a very nice clip. The fact that it is still on for the pictures is saying something. :)

Some close ups of the fine machining.

Mini Breakdown:


Here are those beautifully lubed, square threads.

Perfectly centered XM-L2 Emitter. It's tough to see, but the glass lens is actually a bit dirty on the inside. It did wipe off easily after disassembly though.

Back of the head.

Bezel threads. Triangle cut, plentiful, lubed, O-ring seats beautifully.

Note: One BLF user received this flashlight that had heavily glued bezel threads. Several BLF members and I have received Eagle Eye X6 flashlights with zero glue in the bezel threads.

Back of the reflector. Fits right down around the XM substrate, and away from the solder joints.

The XM-L2 emitter on a 20mm star is secured with some screws.

Size Comparison:

Left to Right: Sk68 - Convoy S2+ - Eagle Eye X6 - Solarforce L2 - Convoy C8

The knurling is a bit more 'grippy' than the S2+, a bit less aggressive than my L2's knurling. A bit more Matte than the L2.

Beamshots:

As with all my beamshots, all pictures are taken in manual mode at the same settings.

The distance is 50yards to the center tree with the majority of the trunk showing.

Eagle Eye X6 : High - Medium - Low

I wanted to show a wide range of XM-L/XM-L2 lights. All lights are on their Highest mode. All stock except the noted P60.

I pulled the 3 closest to the Eagle Eye X6. The Convoy (OP Reflector) is slightly brighter with a bit more throw which is consistent with the measured 19kcd and 2.8A drive. The Tangsfire (SMO Reflector) has a much more focused beam measured at 26kcd and 3.4A.

Conclusion:

Simply put, the Eagle Eye X6 is a great light.

It is definitely among the elite few in the less than $20 flashlights that have this level of build quality. The only significant issue I have with this flashlight is the drive current. I would like to see at least 3A drive in a light like this, but it should be able to handle 3.5-4A.

Taking that into consideration and the minor cons of this flashlight like the small ridges inside the battery tube, no tailstanding, color mismatch, and 5 mode driver, I rate the Eagle Eye X6 a 4.5 out of 5.

As far as modding is concerned, I plan on very simply swapping out the driver and reflowing the XM-L2 to a copper star. The result will probably replace my Convoy C8.

I’ve updated the OP with beamshots and data.

As always feel free to ask any questions here or in a PM. :slight_smile:

Thanks unknown00101. Looks like a half decent light for the price.

Looks great. How’s mode memory on the driver? Next mode memory? Do you have any idea of the driver size for any of us “mod lites”?

Thanks for the review. Nice to see that all of these are not glued.

I have not bought one... When is the Group buy? :D

Thanks for the nice review. The smaller size than c8 is attractive.

Thanks for the concise review. I was able to read it without committing the entire morning :bigsmile:

For under $19, this looks to be a heck of a bargain!

I have this light as well and have been impressed by it. I have the F35 also and am even more impressed by that light. The blinky modes are a little annoying on the X6 but it has reliable mode memory so I'm OK with it.

I too just got the X6 and really love it. The design is exceptionally pleasing, very easy in the hand. And the clip impresses me as well, mine is also still on the light…one of only 3 that rate that.

I removed the R200 sense resistors and tried it bypassed. The small twin FET’s drove it at 5.5A from a slightly used Efest 35A. BUT, I lost the lower modes…it had 3 highs and the blinkies. So I put 2 R10 sense resistors in and it now does 4.45A from the same cell, very nice. Also put a 16mm Noctigon with XM-L2 U2 2C in using Arctic Alumina Thermal Adhesive. With a piece of Kapton cut from a battery pull I’m guaranteed there won’t be a short with this smaller star.

All in all, regardless of price, this is a very nice light and ranks high in my favorites right off the top.

A side note…got an Eagle Tac TX25C2 a week or so ago. Also a very nice light and I like it. Coming home from a week vacation where I used the ET quite a bit I found this X6 had come in. In the first day, with the above mods, I am wondering why I spent the chunk of change it took to get the ET. I’ll probably use the X6 more. Just sayin…

Thanks for sharing the review, appreciate it. FWIW, no glue on mine whatsoever.

And it’s worth mentioning that the reflector is aluminum, exquisitely finished, with a lip around the top edge that holds a very robust red O-ring that presses against the lens directly. Nice touch. The brass driver retaining ring is thick and way overkill, also a nice touch to pull heat away from the driver. Brass retaining ring in the tailcap as well. Big spring on the driver, thick diameter wire and again, nice touch. This light had some serious thought put into it and it shows everywhere. The driver compartment is, I think, for a 17mm driver, they angle cut into the area of the shelf such that every possible bit of mass was retained in the head. Thick star shelf as well. Smooth, no recess or dimple. All the little details are there and I for one greatly appreciate it.

For 19 bucks this looks like a good host for a MT-G2 build. How long did it take to get the light from Banggood to your neck of the woods?

GB requested from Neal at BG. We’ll see what he comes up with.

Mode memory is in off time (there’s probably a better word for this that I can’t think of)
So whatever mode it is turned off in is the mode it will turn on in as long as approximately 3 seconds pass. I will check on the driver measurements.

Packages from BG typically arrive here (Central US) in about 17 days (weekend/holidays included), about 30 days for Li-ion packages. I’ll double check my spreadsheets to confirm. Doubled checked and edited.

Thanks for the nice review. Wow, great light and look at that clip and lanyard too. They look high quality for such a low price. Does this light accept 17mm driver? I plan to get a moonlight mode using qlite.

That is awesome if they can do that.

The stock driver is 16.86mm (measured on the rough tabs, widest part). The ledge the stock driver sits on is 18.12mm at the widest and 16.09mm at the thinnest, so a qlite driver with it's components on both sides will sit flush on the ledge with good contact; however, the spring side would need modification in order to utilize the 21.38mm x 13.00mm x 3.99mm brass retaining ring (Outer Diameter x Inner Diameter x Thickness).

Or one of these little numbers can be used with some extra chips stacked.

The driver cavity is approximately 8.2mm deep. The shelf the star sits on is about 3mm thick (it has been machined down flat for the star to sit on), and unmachined area surrounding the star is 5.4mm thick.

The lens is some very nice glass 2mm thick with a nicely finished edge. As noted above the reflector does have a lip around the diameter of the reflector that allows the thick O-ring to sit against and the glass to sit upon the O-ring. It is indeed a truly well thought out design.

Thanks unknown00101 for the info. I might get one too.

With the resistors replaced, I’m getting 4.51A and 1370 OTF start lumens. Thats a simple change of the 2 R180 sense resistors to 2 R10, and an XM-L2 U2 2C on a Noctigon.

I love mine, I’m waiting on my XML color sinkpad’s to get here, I’ll be putting an XML color and a custom RGBW driver in my first one but I’ll definitely be watching for a GB, for the right price I’ll pick up one for sure, maybe more.

If I want to drive it at 3~3.5A range, will 2x R100 do the job? Do I replace the R180 resistors or just stack over them? Sorry, I have yet to try resistor mod before.

Stacking an R500 on one and trying it should be pretty close. I don’t know how this driver reacts to only one stacked resistor. If it acts funny you might try stacking 2 of an R500 (one on each R180) or closest you can find. I think if you come in higher than your’e looking for you could limit overall output by cell selection. Using something like a Panasonic 3400mAh cell would give good run time and not allow the major current, so it’d be a good choice to control top end output while keeping run time high.

Wight or Richard could probably elaborate more on this than I can.

Use an online parallel resistor calculator to get close then see what you can find that matches up. Take it from there.