A lot of thanks to Thorfire for giving the S70 for review!
Thorfire really appreciated my enthousiasme and mini review for the VG10 in reactions to a blog sponsored by Gearbest to promote Olight on a Dutch techsite I am active on for many years now.
I am gratefull but at the same time understand that getting a nice piece of gear for free takes away the first negative experience any normal consumer has, namely the actual paying for a product,
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Let’s start with the review of the Thorfire S70.
Not long after ordering I found a Amazon box in the mailbox. Opening it up and there was the brown box, similar to the other Thorfire boxes, but bigger.
Here we go with the content of the Happy box (there is no other name for it, the card asking “Happy” combined with the parts and flashlight shouts HAPPY in my point of view):
The heavy flashlight fits snugly and is well protected.
There are a bunch of nice things in the box besides the flashlight and manual one would expect.
A spare lens for starters, it has its own slot, also well protected.
Two colored button tops. so if you think the black rubber switch cover would looks better in orange or green, they are there to play with. We have changed it to orange for now
Space O-rings
2 holders for using 18650 cells.
And a lanyard. Or better said a carry belt, the same size and material one can find on big travelbags.
It clips on the tactical ring and on a small opening right above the button.
The lenght can be changed and it measures between 78cm and 1.43m
This means one can hang the S70 on branches in the woods, carry is on the back, side or around the wrist to have both hands available. When I get wood for the heating I use it like this and it sure is useful.
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Take a look at the manual
Thorfire gives two year warranty if their basic maintenance/troubleshooting guide does not help with possible problems. Warranty terms are legally enforced in the European Union. Not all consumers know this and get suckered in to buying extra warranty. In the USA things work a bit different,but either way, 24 months is decent to put into writing and ship with your products, it reflects confidence and Thorfire gets a big thumbs up from me on this department.
Now here is the star of the review, the actual flashlight:
Here it is next to the S50
The tails of the VG10 and S70, there is some family resemblance there in the decorative cut-outs.
The building quality is solid.
No specs on the anodisation.
The finish is in between mat and glossy, leaning slightly toward mat.
Branding is crisp with logo, Thorfire and S70 on the battery tube and a “hot” warning on the bezel.
There are no sharp edges.
The S70 has the “tactical ring” we have come to know from the VG10 and S50 (and others) to attach a lanyard or the carrying belt to and prevent rolling when laying down.
This can be removed.
Or kept loose in the small space that is reserved for it on the battery tube to give a lanyard some extra room to move.
Of course it can also simply be tightened at either the upper or lower part of its space giving two options how to position it when secured.
Turning it up side down from how it comes pre installed makes the ring curve away from the hand that is holding it and makes it more comfortable to use.
The tailcap allows tailstanding and has two openings for a lanyard, so when used here, it will not hinder tailstanding.
All threads have a very smooth action.
Anodisation on threads makes lock out on both ends of the battery tube possible.
The threads came nicely lubed.
battery tube
Reflector sizes
The reflector is orange peel and has these sizes:
It is very nice machined, the outside – nobody will see because it is hidden in the head – is free of marks and spots and I really like it that Thorfire chooses to treat parts not a lot of users will ever see with care.
The lens is not coated.
The tailcap is easy to take apart.
Note the inside out rubber domes, before the orange could be used, the nub needed to be cut off it.
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The S70 has a tail switch to turn it on or off and a side switch for modes.
A fast double click and the hidden strobe will start, and since it needs a little more time to switch between modes, if you are not thnking about it, or in the gettng used to the light period one will probably enter strobe a few times when wantng to go from low to turbo. When this has happened two times one knows it and it will most likely not happen again.
It has memory and the side switch doubles as a cell tester.
Green, full cells, orange, the cells are losing power and red when the voltage is getting low.
The feeling of the buttons is direct and solid.
I kind of hate side switches that drain cells just waiting for an on-click and lock-out is a feature I want with those flashlights. It is very nice to be able to turn the power off with the tail switch, easier then lock-out.
Side switch means the pill is not so easy to remove like in the S50.
Speaking of differences with the S50, the springs on the driver and tail are little thinner then on the S50, I did not expect that.
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The XHP70 is installed on copper.
The S70 runs on 2 x 18650 or 26650 cells.
Match them up!
My longest Panasonic fit tightly and the Keep Power 2200mAh that I used in the reviews are just a tad smaller and fit like a glove. Because of the spring in the head also cells without buttons will fit, do use a pair!
The Thorfire S70 will cut off the power when cells get drained so protection is not needed.
The S70 is a big and heavy light. But it is manageble, my wife and son have much smaller hands then me and both think it feels good to hold and operate.
The design of the battery tube is not knurdled as can be fund in a lot of flashlights, the rings make it nice to the touch, it has enough grip.
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Well, it is very impressive, man what a light!
Yesterday we were visiting and the car battery building light they got out of the garage to compare to the flashlights we brought was blown away by the S70 on 2 18650 cells.
Highly impressive.
Before we get to the output part we should be looking at how long it can preform right?
When a light gets too hot, there is no fun in operating it.
And when it cuts off after a couple of minutes how usefull can it be?
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Runtimes
Well this depends on the cells used.
I used two identical Keep Power stating 2200mAh on the wrapper but actually measuring ~2300+ mAh on my Liitokala Lii-300 charger.
Sorry, I have no data-logging-light-sensing devices so only the highest mode was checked, mainly to see what would happen at the cut off point.
I also wanted to see if cut off meant being in the dark from there, so I decided to restart the flashlight as soon as possible when it had reached the cut off in the highest mode to ontinue to run it in the lowest mode if it would allow me from there, and it did.
I was not able to keep the turbo running the entire time, but used the 3 minutes turbo at least 20 times.
So at least 60 minutes the S70 was shining as bright as it could.
After 1 hour and 14 minutes the torch turned itself off after the red lght of the sideswitch had been blinking for a while.
Thorfire specifies the runtime on turbo as 1 hour and 15 minutes.
Since 2300mAh is much less then the 5000mAh+ some 26650 cells ae capable of and these cells were able to keep it on turbo for 60 minutes I say if it safe to guess that with the correct cells the specified time is no problem for the S70 and the actual runtimes are longer then Thorfire specifies.
When it turned off, I immediately switched it back on in the lowest mode.
It worked for 32 minutes while flashing red.
When it turned off again I measured the cells at 2.8V
Pretty decent runtimes for a light as bright as this.
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Temperatures. (All in Celcius)
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Measurements with an infrared thermometer (checked with calibrated digital touch thermometer) to be accurate to the point of /-0,3 difference at 0 and/-0,8 difference at 100.
Temp of the LED by holding the head of the thermometer against the glass of the lens and moving aroung till the highest temp was read.
This proves to be a easy, the underside of the head of the thermometer against the bezel, had it pointing in the right direction. The uncoated glass was in the beam, so the LED temperatures are not acurate but give a nice idea.
While measuring, the Thorfire S70 was not moved and barely touched the material is was laying on. Measurements taken at around 20cm away from the torch.
Swiping the sensor along the to be measured parts keeping an equal distance of the parts.
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Temperature of room where this was measured 15,4
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LED temp measured
LOW 44,5
MED 84,5
HIGH 116,4
TURBO 154,5
Temp body on turbo
Head 34,3
tube 30,4
tail 30,0
These temperatures are reached in a couple of minutes and stay at this level the whole run time.
In comparison the Thorfire VG10
LED temperature
MOON 37,5
LOW 43
MED 76,6
HIGH 115,1
Temperature body on high
head 39,3
tube 35,8
tail 32,1
It is clear the cooling fins are doing their jobs very well.
The light does not become really warm no matter how long the LED is producing heat.
Most heat is dissipated from the head.
It is interesting to see that the head of the S70 stays cooler then the battery tube of the VG10.
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So a boring but clear conclusion here, as with the S50 is: the only burning sensation this beast will give somebody is the desire to shine with it.
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Of course the room was not warm, the bigger the difference between the air and the to be cooled surface the easier the heat can escape. If the environment temparatures would be higher the blood flowing through the hand holding the flashlight should start to remove heat from it. my guestmation is that around 18 room temperature it is better to hold it in your hand then just let convection do its job. Below that, the hand will actually raise the temperture slightly.
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There is a negative point to be made about the S70.
When it is placed on the head all light is blocked, so one could have it on without knowing it.
Yes, I agree, this screems for a test, is there any problem with heat in the case of it being on its head while turned on?
S70 on turbo on paper. Yes on the picture it shines as hard as it can.
No, the only problem there is are drained cells, but the paper was not in any danger of catching fire.
This is safe, I like it!
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Beamshots: we start with contra beamshots.
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Control at 100 meter:
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Contra beam at 100 meter:
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Then 25 meter:
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The camera does not do it justice, even at 100 meter is causes spots in vision afterwards.
This is one bright light. Be very cautious aiming it at others!
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Or lets start with the color tint.
It is white, but not blue.
Not warm either, so I tried to get in on camera.
First a shot with the S50 on LOW in the middle and on the left a Convoy C8 with warm white tint on MED and on the right the stock Jacobs A60 of HIGH
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Ceiling is at an angle at around 2,50 to 3,50 meters high, the flashlights tailstanding.
Clearly the tint is not warm. BUT it is not cold either.
The S70 on LOW
The camera preformed worse on these ceiling pics then with the other pics, here it makes it look the beam greenish and it seems like there is only a hotspot, the rest vanished in the pic. Bizarre, there is spill and there is no green in the tint. The cam tries to compensate for all the light it registers, also a problem on the turbo pic below.
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The S70 on TURBO
House at 100 meter (see my introducion topic for bird eye view and distances)
Control
LOW
MED
HIGH
TURBO
House at 30 meters (the right window of the top floor is exactly at 30 meters here)
Control
LOW
MED
HIGH
TURBO
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Sidenote 1
It is very annoying, on the screen of the camera it looks so much nicer, a nice beam, view like what we see ourselves. But as soon as the picture is taken the camera seems to change a lot and the results are a meager idea of what is really going on. Tried making video and retrieving stills of it, that is worse. We need to try different settings, but for this review, these will have to do.
When the nights are getting warmer, I will play longer with settings for reviews.
Sidenote 2
Hopefully the current draws are not missed, I could not measure it. The DMM did not give me anything and the torch did not turn on. This should have been easy but sorry I could not do it.
thanks