Like you and TheFreeman are pointing out.. It seems to be very difficult to get the 'correct/perfect LED', and you even have to be lucky! Even if you have the perfect light, you may not have the perfect LED.
That's even harder for companies who make tons of flashlights (not small companies who only make a few hundred).
There are just so many variables with flashlights, that I think you did a great job on finding what you were after, getting the best EDC you could get, and replace the LED with the best you have.
$110 bucks for a light that I then have to spend a few hours modding so that it doesn’t suck? From a company that pushes proprietary expensive batteries? Still a hard pass for me.
A Convoy S21A with a Nichia B35AM requires no mods, and is less than 1/4th the price. The Olight doesn’t have a bike strobe mode, so it can’t even backup my bike light like the S21A can with just a quick change of mode group.
If you do find a subjective opinion that is universal, let me know.
I really dig the Arkfield. Can it be improved? Of course. What do I like about it? Form factor (familiar shape ;-) ) , dial + button is a great UI for me. Imagine if the Arkfield had Anduril. Dial for mode and click to set. Example, dial it to blinky mode and then click to select which blinky.
There are others that I like and some I don't. The proximity sensor was their feature to prevent burning pockets; that recall was not cheap (material + salvaging(?)/recycling + shipping + staff time).
No it was not cheap. They continued to produce and sell the lights when they knew it was a problem. And on the second larger warrior they even made the switch more pronounced and easier to press. Therefore inviting more inadvertent pocket activations from pressing rather than just metal issues. The so-called tactical lights with one press to turbo really should be carried in a holster unless it’s going to be locked out in the pocket. A proximity sensor does make sense for some lights but cool white low cri doesn’t make sense for any as far as I’m concerned, and especially if it’s the only light you’re going to carry.
I love that they are rechargeable, but dont have a rubber usb flap, so I can really trust the waterproofing.
And they all seem to be built to survive some real abuse.
I really dont like the reality of the proprietary charger though. Its really useful and satisfying, but would only be truely useful if it was the standard instead of USB C.
If it breaks (which mine has) or you misplace it, you can no longer charge your light. Or if you are not home and need to charge.
Youre not likely taking the cable with you everywhere.
When my S2RII was my only light, I would never take my cable out of the house to avoid any risk of breaking or losing it. It stayed in its safe home. And still stopped working for no reason.
I also cant do LED swaps (yet?), so I need my lights to come with the LED I want. (my god the LED in that S2RII is disgusting!)
And since discovering budgetlight brands, I can no longer justify the cost of an Olight.
The Oport option works with USB-C cable! I bought one because of that and it charges well all the Olight lights I have, being compatible with most of the “recent” ones!
Inductive charging is super convenient. I once had charging pads at my office and a few places around the house… for the phones. Until I figured out how inefficient it was. It not only takes a bunch of additional time to charge things, but it generates a bunch of heat. I noticed that the temperatures on my phones was 10 to 12 degrees C higher when using inductive charging. Not sure about the Olight system, but I can’t see it being much better. I don’t need the battery and electronics to be heated up unnecessarily for hours while charging.
I guess I will just “struggle” with plugging in a USB cable to charge my lights. Even better, I will take the cells out and charge them in a purpose built charger. While replacing them with charged cells, just ready and waiting. Voila… almost no down time.
I just don’t like proprietary anything. But maybe least of all, batteries and/or charging systems.
BTW, the Warrior 3S is too darn big for me to consider it an EDC light…
But I really liked the step by step on modding it. Pretty useful for any light.
So I take it you didn’t watch the video? I made some pretty impassioned arguments. Whether you agree with me or not, no one can deny I worked hard on the video. “Marking it as do not recommend” seems a petty response for disagreeing with my argument.
I just can’t get over Olight charging $27 for a spare battery. That’s more than a Convoy S21a with an included battery, just for a single customized 21700. If they worked with standard batteries, and only required their proprietary ones for charging, that would be one thing. But their trend of only being able to use their own stupidly overpriced batteries is just a deal breaker for me.
Cheule and Charles are on different planets in terms of video quality. Cheule clearly develops his ideas and opinions, scripts out his points, edits the videos, seeks C&C on his content, and adds to the discussions happening in the community. You cannot say he threw together any video slap-dash, even the “quickies”.
Practically nobody talks about reflowing Olights and so here is a video showing you how to do it and why you may want to do it. It’s a resource we didn’t have before. That’s nice, whether it applies to you or not.
Thank you for understanding that I am only trying to contribute to this hobby. I actually don’t mind telling everyone that I found Quadrupel’s comments hurtful and unproductive. Comments like his, and the “yeah, what you said” comment from “Man of Light” is why I don’t hang out here on BLF more. I find many BLF commenters acerbic and myopic.
Non of your lights came with perfect emitter? What about Emisars and Convoys? Why you call tactical light as EDC ? Why not Baton pro? Maybe sponsor send you a wrong light and you didn’t noticed it?
I will totally have a discussion with you—if you aren’t simply trolling. And right now, it feels like you are trying to be inflammatory.
In order to hopefully start a real, substantive discussion, I’ll begin by saying that a lot of emitters I’ve gotten from Simon have been above BBL, usually emitters like SST-20, SFT40. Hank, usually does better, like with his SST-20 FA3 binning that is slightly under BBL and SFT40s that aren’t horribly green at mid ramp—the 10 I got from Simon were very green.
But again, that’s even a crapshoot. I’ve bought XP-L 5A4 from Hank (which usually all look amazing) that looked very yellow/green, and had to immediately replace with nicer binning from my own stockpile. That happened with the D1 I just bought last month.
I also noticed that the Nichia 219B sw45k that Hank and Simon are currently using is higher output, but less rosy than the bin that Rey is using in his Triple Dawns. And I’m talking about new stock triple dawns, so this shouldn’t be an issue of “was this made by Nichia in 2018 or 2020.”
Many commenters have mentioned that even with how easy the Warrior 3S is to open up and swap, that it’s too difficult for them. The Baton series has a press fit bezel that can be quite tricky to open without damaging.
I agree with your points in the video about Olight. I love my Warrior Pro and Javelot Turbo.
I have many other Sofirns and Lumitops but I prefer my Fenix PD36R for EDC for the simple UI (and color/tint over Olight).
Now you make me want a 3S. Would you do the swap for me?
.