NOTE: I have done some new (22/2/2013) readings in a room with less of an 'throw bias' this includes most (but not all) of the lights below, and a few more as well. You can see this here: https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/16343.
A third version has also been completed (20/7/2013) with more lights added and a with the light and lux meter repositioned to effectively eliminate the throw bias, which was still present to some extent in V2. You can see these results here: https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/20136.
I have been slowly adding to this table on CPF for a while now, but didn't feel it was quite 'budget-oriented' enough originally. Anyway it seems I've been adding lights from brands which appear more and more over here too so it feels right to post it here too.
Light Name
Mode
Ceiling Bounce Lux
Estimated Lumens OTF
LD20 Q5
Low
0.9
10.8
Med
4
48
High
8
96
Turbo
14.3
171.6
Fenix TK20
Low
4
48
High
14.7
176.4
Jetbeam BA20
Low
1.6
19.2
High
20.6
247.2
Eagletac T100C2w (Q3 5a) @3.9v
Low
4.5
54
High
13.9
166.8
OEM Nitecore EZAA R2
Low
0.2
2.4
High
7.8
93.6
iTP A3 Std ed
High
3.4
40.8
Nailbender 1amp XP-G R3
Low
1.2
14.4
Med
7.7
92.4
High
23.5
282
Custom 1amp XR-E Q4
Low
3
36
High
17.1
205.2
Custom 2.5amp XM-L T5 3C
Low
2.8
33.6
Med
16.5
198
High (stable)
51.7
620.4
Ultrafire 3 mode drop-in IMR @4.2v
Low
4
48
Med
22.8
273.6
High 1 sec
80.1
961.2
High stable
66.5
798
Ultrafire 3 mode eX-cell @4.1v
High 1 sec
64
768
High stable
62.5
750
eX-cell @4.0v
58
696
Olight M3x U2 mod
Low
5.4
64.8
High (stable)
71.5
858
Skyray 3x T6 '3800' heatsinked
Low
12.1
145.2
Med
73.5
882
High 1 sec
148.5
1782
High (stable)
142
1704
Kaidomain U2 drop-in
High 1.4amp
38
456
IMR 1.8amp
45
540
Nitecore EZCR2w RCR2
Low
1.3
15.6
High
11
132
Zebralight H501w
Low
0.2
2.4
Med
0.9
10.8
High
4.8
57.6
Zebralight H51
L1
0.2
2.4
M1
2.4
28.8
H2
8.5
102
H1
12.8
153.6
Quark Mini AA R4 4B 14500 @4.15v
Low
0.3
3.6
Med
4.1
49.2
High 1 sec
22
264
High (stable)
20
240
N30 30w HID
MAX
231
2772
Romisen RC-2R4 R5 1.4amp mod
High
27.4
328.8
Nitecore EX10 SP R2 RCR123 @4.15v
Low
0.3
3.6
Med
4.6
55.2
High
14
168
DX Incan P60 module @4.1v
High
7.2
86.4
Jetbeam BC40
Low
10.6
127.2
High
79
948
Klarus P2a
Low
1.5
18
High
20.5
246
Fenix LD01 R4
Med
2.5
30
Low
0.2
2.4
High
6.5
78
Fenix E01
High
0.8
9.6
Nitecore D11.2 neutral R5
Max
12.3
147.6
Nitecore D10 90+ CRI +.2 circuit
Max
7.6
91.2
Nitecore EX10 neutral R5 +.2 circuit
Max
18.3
219.6
Olight S65
Low
1.7
20.4
Med
17.7
212.4
High:Start-Up
62.8
753.6
High:Regulated
55.4
664.8
DRY Triple XM-L T6
Trustfire 2400 'Flames' 4.2v, 4.2A
Low
11.9
142.8
Med
58.1
697.2
High
137.8
1653.6
Turbo 1 sec
200
2400
Turbo Stable
173
2076
Trustfire 2400 'Flames' 4.0v, 3.7A
Turbo 1 sec
200
2400
Turbo Stable
184
2208
Xtar 2600 (sanyo 2600) 4.1v, 4.6A
Turbo 1 sec
202
2424
Turbo Stable
170
2040
All are done with the lense of each light and the lux-meter at the same height/position pointed at the same angle towards a white ceiling. Once I'd worked out the multiplier (12 exactly) based on my LD20 which has very accurately measured med/high modes I went through a number of my other lights for comparisons.
All P60 drop-ins are wrapped very tightly in copper tape and my custom ones, including the nailbender xp-g which I modded down from 1.4 to 1.0amp, are thermally potted also for best heat dissipation, ultra-clear lenses are also used on my P60 hosts.
Stable refers to the the output not having dropped more than .1 on the lux scale (1.2 lumens) in the last 3-4 seconds (or roughly this anyway), and does not necessarily mean the light will stay flat at that output over a minute or more. In fact this is certainly not the case on some modules e.g. the ultrafire 3 mode as it runs unregulated, which is why I have included cell voltage prior to measurement for these lights.
I was particularly impressed with my TK20 (my first decent light) and my modded nailbender R3 neutral XP-G, both of which I had subjectively thought were overperforming for some time, it was nice to have that objectively confirmed. :)
The test may be slightly biased against lights with very wide angle spill beams, e.g. H501/H51/M3x/N30 HID, but I don't think the effect is too great. I was very careful to test every light from exactly the same position etc, but when raising one up or down to avoid any of the beam touching the white wall instead of the ceiling I didn't notice any real difference in lux reading.
If BC40 is measuring 948 lumen, then it should be about 4 amp to the led. Can you confirm this with the batteries amp pull? It should be getting from the batteries 2amp or more. Otherwise, there is something wrong with your setup. I am getting 967 OTF with my xm-l U2 4,3amp M31 olight mod.
I believe that 858 lumen for M3x U2 mod is quite high too. i put one of the best cutter's( cherry picked) U2 leds and i can get about 830 OTF max.
Also, compare you S65 with selfbuilt's (and ti-force) measurements, your stable OTF value is selfbuilt's value for the startup(startup for him is the period in the first 3minutes where he takes the readings).
I hope that you don't need to revise all your numbers downwards!But i can definitely see something wrong here in these cases!
Thanks for the input, tailcap current for the BC40 is around 1.6A at 8.4v (probably 8.2v under light load) so with an estimated 90% buck conversion efficiency I'm thinking 3.5A or so to the LED? I think I may have got a particularly high performance LED by luck, as it seems to subjectively perform very impressively also.
You make a good point, I'm always looking to improve the calculations but on average they seem about right to me, if I revise some down then I'd have to revise others you see so it's hard to work out where exactly to set-it. Someone mentioned in the CPF thread that I should be using a logarithmic scale not a direct one (I simply multiply by 12) but I thought lumen measurement was a direct objective scale and no-one followed up when I asked for clarification.
If you or anyone else have any specific suggestions for improvement I will consider them and maybe change the multiplier. It's all done on an excel spreadsheet anyway, so easy enough to do for me.
Personally i am trying to follow the method selfbuilt is using, it is very difficult to produce accurate numbers.
As for the BC40, i can't believe that is producing 948 lumen, but i can believe that is is over 800 and this is still an impressive number.
Personally i am using flashlights from others that have been measured with accuracy(catapult,ife2,predator and some more), and i still doubt for some of my measurements, i am feeling that i still don't do something right.
Thanks for posting this! It's nice to have a reference and compare some of the popular lights to others. Of course the numbers aren't exact but they're probably close enough for reference.
Well I originally used my LD20 Q5 as a base and it fits almost perfectly. The DRY etc at the higher end also fit well with what others have measured, as do many other lights, e.g the BA20 and P2A. The problem lights seem to be mid-range ones and only a couple, which doesn't make much sense. In all honesty I think the BC40 is an overperformer, remember there is a 14% possible variance in output even within one output bin. If the BC40 they used to rate ANSI was a poor performing T6 and gave 830 OTF then a high performing T6 could conceivably perform at 950 lumens OTF. That would be an extreme case (normally ANSI has to be taken as the median result from a random sample of three production lights) so it's more likely the readings are also slightly off.
However, adjusting the BC40 down to 830 OTF would throw off the results for most of the other lights quite a lot in my opinion. I am more inclined to believe I just got lucky with my BC40, it is incredible the output of it in a ceiling bounce test.
I disassembled a manafont drop-in and rewired it to an original genuine Lumapower MRV with a big solid heatsink, so great heat dissipation. Then ran with an AW IMR cell for around 3.5-3.7A direct drive on high mode. It did not beat the BC40 in a ceiling bounce test. Of course the ultrafire drop-ins may not use genuine T6 bins, as probably neither do most cheap drop-ins, but it still shows how well the BC40 performs.
I think you're covered by saying numbers are estimated ...
Everyone knows what that means .
I was surprised at the H501 as it seemed low .
Also the general problem with all numbers is the inverse square law that says to see a doubling in light output you need a quadrupling of light output .. So to the human eye or brain it takes 4x to get 2x .
A 600 lumen light only being twice as bright as a 150 lumen light.
No one on the planet able to differentiate between a 600 lumen light and a 675 lumen light ,,when a 12% increase is in fact a 2~3% increase
Yeah, that's also true and worth remembering. Although many psychophysical sources suggest it is nearer 3x objective light increase = 2x subjective light increase. There is of course some individual variance too as with most things.
Also the Spot/Spill characteristics of the beam massively interfere with any overall judgement of brightness. This shouldnt be reflected in an overall measurement of light output and wouldn't be in a proper sphere, but is a little in my own measurements. I think the H501 may be a little harshly rated due to it's all flood beam, having a more focused hotspot seems to slightly aid the readings as less is lost sideways and therefore a higher proportion gets back to the lightmeter in only 1 'bounce'.
Actually I 've heard it's more like 5x so I think it's interesting you're going the other way ..hmm.
I agree that very floody lights appear to have much less output ..
EDIT: I like the H501 so well ..I probably feel the need to defend it's lower output .even the 100lumens Zebra rates it at doesn't begin to describe how good a light it is //Sorry it's in my top ten favs.
Putting any effort into sharing your estimated lumen figures is always a bold move. You can say they are estimated all day long and it wont matter. I dont know why it is but lumen figures will always be trouble. Among flashlight enthusiasts it is almost like talking about religion or politics.
I have always heard it takes 3X the output to perceive a doubling of brightness. That is also what my eyeballs are telling be. But perceiving a doubling in brightness would be a very subjective task.
