Disclaimer: I bought the light with my own money. No one had any influence on the review.
All measurements were done on hobby-equipment, so please be aware of potential mistakes and deviations.
Intro
I bought a christmas package and it contained this light. So I decided to do a review. My expectations weren’t too high for “just another SFT70 light”.
Specs by Wurkkos
Click here to get to the light on Wurkkos site (no affiliate link)
What you get in the box and build quality
The light comes in a typical white wurkkos box with a print of the light and some information about it spread on nearly all sides.
A plastic tray protects the lights for its journey, the underside holds a simple lanyard, packed together with two spare o-rings, a multilingual manual and a short USB-C-to-C-cable. The battery is already inserted in the light, insulated by a little plastic disc.
The anodization is slightly matte and together with the deep texture of the light that provides a very good amount of grip. The bezel is a bit lighter colored than the rest of the light and gives a nice contrast.
The threads are well lubed and buttery smooth.
The LED sits in a mid-sized, deep reflector and is nicely centered. The glass is AR-coated.
Overall, the build quality is very good and I would call it amazing for the price.
The button is rubber covered and contains the battery/charging indicator. It has an audible click and a good tactile feedback.
The indicator is red for charging, green for full. It also displays the remaining capacity with the levels solid green, green blinking, solid red, red blinking
LVP is not mentioned in the manual, but it is there.
The light is capable of reverse charging and charges my phone without any problems. The cutout for the charging port is deep and narrow, so most of my high power cables didn’t fit. Normal cables did work without any problems.
Size
Armytek Wizard C2 Pro max LR, Sofirn SC13 Copper, Wurkkos TS28, Wurkkos TS26s, Convoy S21B
My scale states 106g without and 174g with battery and I measured 36mm ⌀ at the head, 28mm⌀ at the tail and a length of 130mm.
Carrying Options
Lanyard: a basic lanyard is included. Nothing fancy, but the quality is good. It can be attached to the tailcap, there is only one hole there, so you have the choice between a good tailstand / usable magnet or the lanyard.
Clip: The clip is a one of those that clip to the body. It comes premounted and is hard to remove, so it won’t come loose on its own. It provides plenty of room for webbing or a belt and is nearly deep carry. The contact area on the body is a bit small, though, and might work through your pants. It can be a bit hard to clip somewhere, as the opening of the clip is a bit small for my preference.
Magnet: There is a magnet in the tail. It holds the light even horizontally without slipping, but just barely. I would prefer it to be a little stronger.
UI
The UI has a ramping mode and a stepped mode.
The ramping is good, comparable to anduril it ramps constant to the visual change of the brightness.
The stepped mode could change levels a bit faster for my liking, but the levels are well spaced and it works fine.
The UI is simple and similar for ramping and stepped:
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One click for on/off - except if you activated Turbo while the flashlight was on, in this case it reverts back to the mode the light was in before.
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Hold from on for brightness change
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Hold from off for moon
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Double click from off or on for turbo.
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3 clicks from any stage for strobe
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Four clicks from off for lock, but two and more clicks for unlock and turn on.
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Four clicks from on to change from ramping to stepped and back
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Double click from turbo brings you to moon.
Beam profile and measurements
The beam is not too throwy but with a good amount of reach. Wouldn’t use it indoors, but it is usable for nearly every outdoor scenario.
Don’t go white wall hunting, as the spot has the slightest donut hole, petals in the corona and the spill ends in a purple ring. If you don’t go white wall hunting, you are still going to see some of this, but it never had any impact on my usage of the light.
Turbo performance looks amazing. As I started the measurement and looked at the readings, I immediately doubted the numbers. but i double and triple checked it - and wurkkos really hits the 3200 Lumen @30S and over 3600 @ turn on.
Sustaining slightly over 1000 Lumen for around 2 hours is really good, too. The stepdowns at the end of Turbo are fine for me, they give you a good indication you should change your battery.
High starts at the point to which turbo steps down - if you ask me, this is the perfect level for high! But after a bit over one and a half hours, the lights steps down to around 500lm and nearing the 3 hour mark, to the medium level. I would have preferred it to have a shorter runtime and a longer time at the 1000-lumen mark. This is a design choice wurkkos made, as the light is clearly able to sustain 1000 lumen for longer.
To be fair though, Wurkkos is not the olny one doing this and they state exactly that behaviour on their marketing, so you know what you get.
Mid on the other side has a stepdown which is not specified. It’s up to you, if you like that or not, but Wurkkos should have specified that stepdown.
If you look closely, all modes follow the same stepdown pattern, even low.
Low runs and runs and runs - around 66 hours, till it dies.
I didn’t test eco, but I have no doubt that it will run for a long time…
I testet all modes for their output:
| Eco | low | medium | high | Turbo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wurkkos | 3 | 45 | 250 | 950 | 3200 |
| My measurements | 4 | 53 | 285 | 1100 | 3700 / 3200 |
| turn on / 30s |
CCT ranges from 5800K on low to 6800K on turbo
CRI ranges from 67 on low to 71 on turbo
DUV ranges from 0,005 on low to -0,002 on turbo
Flicker is similar over all modes and in the green Range.
I couldn’t visually detect PWM, neither with my eyes nor with my camera.
On turn on, the light throws 610m, more than the 506m Wurkkos states. After 30s, there are still 550m remaining. Impressive!
The battery measured good 5037mAh on my Vapcell S4+. After the light shut down, I measured 2,9V, after charging it full in the light, 4,2V.
Summary
The TS28 is a surprising little light. It is still pocket sized, throws quite good and output and performance are very impressive. I wish Wurkkos would ditch the stepdown at high and mid as Turbo shows that that would easily possible - but it’s a design choice and at least mostly stated in the specs.
So, if you like the form factor of the TS26S but want more throw without sacrificing the capability as a sufficient walking light, this might be for you. You give up on CRI and indoor usability, though - but in my opinion, thats not what this light was made for! The TS28 is an outdoor allrounder with a character quite similar to the Acebeam L35 v2.
Wurkkos always was known for budget lights, but with their newer lineup, they come close premium territory. The build quality is excellent, the electronics of the lights seem very good and Output and sustain are on a very high level.