My SF11 is great—it just has a sort of “slow” eswitch that takes some getting used to.

kotobuki wrote:

Hawaiian Eyez wrote:

… I left the light in the off mode to take care of something else and came back to find the light on in a low mode. Came on by itself! Thankfully it did not come back on in turbo, and burn something up! Luckily it runs on AA’s and not our favorite 18650’s or similar….

It happened to my just arrived SF11 this morning but I thought it was my fault! will check again to day.

Thanks Hawaiian Eyez.

I checked SF11 for all day: set OFF with a pack of fully charged battery, faced up; its still OFF for all the time. Looked like it was my real mistake before!

kotobuki wrote:

kotobuki wrote:

Hawaiian Eyez wrote:

… I left the light in the off mode to take care of something else and came back to find the light on in a low mode. Came on by itself! Thankfully it did not come back on in turbo, and burn something up! Luckily it runs on AA’s and not our favorite 18650’s or similar….

It happened to my just arrived SF11 this morning but I thought it was my fault! will check again to day.

Thanks Hawaiian Eyez.

I checked SF11 for all day: set OFF with a pack of fully charged battery, faced up; its still OFF for all the time. Looked like it was my real mistake before!

I have gotten mine to work a few times, without it acting up. I would still be cautious about leaving batteries in, if you’ve experienced the same issues, some of the rest of us have.

According to the manual, a half twist of the tailcap will perform a lockout. Do those of you with a working SF11 get that? Mine has power pretty much as soon as the locating pins of the tailcap are inserted.

Mine has also worked normally a few times, then it goes back to being unresponsive and having a mind of its own. Thankfully Sofirn are working with me to resolve the issue, will update when the replacement comes.

Sounds like a loose or dirty connection somewhere.

Dusty wrote:

…..

According to the manual, a half twist of the tailcap will perform a lockout. Do those of you with a working SF11 get that? Mine has power pretty much as soon as the locating pins of the tailcap are inserted.

You absolutely right, it still works until I nearly removed all tail cap out!!!!

kotobuki wrote:

Dusty wrote:

…..

According to the manual, a half twist of the tailcap will perform a lockout. Do those of you with a working SF11 get that? Mine has power pretty much as soon as the locating pins of the tailcap are inserted.

You absolutely right, it still works until I nearly removed all tail cap out!!!!

Well, it might just be a mistake in the manual. I think sometimes they just update between different models, and sometimes miss things.

I wanted to post here, and thank Tracy for getting involved in the issue I had with my SF11. I received a new one today, and have been putting it through the ringer for the last couple of hours. It is working great. This one came from a different Amazon distribution center, so hopefully for Sofirn, it was just a small batch that were having problems.

I also want to thank Tracy for the help on the SF11 Issues. She actually PMed me before I had a chance to send them a message or go through Amazon. My replacement light arrived last week and is working as it should. Very happy with the light now, should make a great emergency AA light.

Hy Tracy

Sent a PM, also experiencing odd behavior.

Is there any way to identify which batch — flaky, or reliable — that a light came from?
I mean, besides sitting and watching to see if it turns itself on …

Looks like I dodged a bullet on the SF11. The aliexpress store listing has 14500 in the title, in the url , and in the description.

I thought “COOL! A light that will use 4 NiMh AAs or 4 Lithium 14500’s!” and placed an order. Then I looked more closely at this thread and the description page, and the seller verified that it won’t use 3.7v 14500 batteries.

So, I’ll be getting a refund for now. I realize 14500 is, technically, the size of a AA, but that seems pretty shady and misleading to so prominently display that in the description since the commonly accepted meaning of 14500 is the lithium rechargeables. But maybe I’m wrong.

Does the tailcap lockout work on your lights?

Is that a way to tell the old flaky batch from the revised batch?

I applaud Sofirn making improvements — but I want something clearly visible showing which batch a flashlight comes from, even if it’s only a painted “v1.1” version number, or a paint dot, or something distinctive.

Sofirn, consider getting some glow-in-the-dark paint to put dots on revised lights. That would be a find-in-the-dark feature worth having, too.

manithree wrote:

So, I’ll be getting a refund for now. I realize 14500 is, technically, the size of a AA, but that seems pretty shady and misleading to so prominently display that in the description since the commonly accepted meaning of 14500 is the lithium rechargeables. But maybe I’m wrong.

I seem to remember reading somewhere it could use one 14500 but not four of them.

hank wrote:

Does the tailcap lockout work on your lights?

I bought mine at the start of November from the Sofirn store on Aliexpress and don’t have any of the problems.

No half-turn lock-out. There was no listing of it on the store page as a feature so I’m not complaining. The printed manual still mentions it.

hank wrote:

Does the tailcap lockout work on your lights?

Is that a way to tell the old flaky batch from the revised batch?

No lockout. That’s about my only real gripe with this light. I have one of the bad ones, purchased in May. Tracy had a replacement sent within a couple of days. I’ve had both apart, and there is no difference in the driver. Same model/ revision number. I think they pulled them from Amazon, when they started having issues. It isn’t an issue that will just appear one day, either. It will show up as soon as the light gets heated up. (Or at least thats what everyone, including myself, experienced) Never did figure out exactly what was causing it.

One thought for Tracy/Sofirn — check your driver circuit for susceptibility to “electronic smog” like a cell phone operating nearby.

I have seen other electronics from China that would turn on or off if a cell phone or walkie-talkie radio operated nearby, for example.

I also noticed I could trigger a neighbor’s car alarm by changing modes on a flashlight as I was walking near it (a few years ago, I no longer have that light— not one of yours)

Quote:

A simple method of determining the location of electrical interference is by using a portable AM radio tuned to a quiet frequency at the lower end of the dial. You should hear static or a buzzing sound as you get close to the source of the interference. The closer you get, the more intense the static will be.
— https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/interference-radio-tv-and-telephone...

Will Sofirn start selling on Amazon Australia?

manithree wrote:

I thought “COOL! A light that will use 4 NiMh AAs or 4 Lithium 14500’s!” and placed an order. Then I looked more closely at this thread and the description page, and the seller verified that it won’t use 3.7v 14500 batteries.

So, I’ll be getting a refund for now. I realize 14500 is, technically, the size of a AA, but that seems pretty shady and misleading to so prominently display that in the description since the commonly accepted meaning of 14500 is the lithium rechargeables. But maybe I’m wrong.

Eww. I don’t even trust 2 Li cells in series, so why would you want 4 in series??

All the headaches with matching them, balancing them, etc., just seems like too much of a risk to put the “fire” in “UltraFire”…

I got the Thorfire TK4As, and they’re damned nice for the price. Didn’t find out until after that there was a Sofirn equivalent.

Get it, run eneloops in it, you won’t be disappointed.

Would a new version of the SF11 be coming out soon?

I’m getting to like that form-factor, and it’s just a nice simple but elegant design. Very clean.

Improving on the TK4A would make the SF11 a winner. Keep the same UI as the TK4A, but make doubleclick turbo/100% instead of strobe, so this way you’d have instant access to both its lowest and highest settings.

The reflector of the TK4A seems to have some very fine leftover machining marks, making the beam slightly ringy. Smooth it out, and you’d have a perfect beam!

And it definitely needs 2 screws to hold down the emitter.

And 4000K-4500K would be perfect!

Tracy, do you only provide these deals with codes by Amazon? I get get anything shipped to Sweden from Amazon. Can you offer discount codes on AliExpress or similar?

Hi Tracy
I would like to buy a sp10b from amazon. Do you have a discount code for this ??
Thank You

PM me if you can.

BT100 wrote:

I would like to buy a sp10b from amazon. Do you have a discount code for this ??

See post #1 here. Got all colors, too!