Hello i seem to always have liked light throwers and my first interest was lasers , and now i have a wide knowledge and collection of them 1400mw blue, 200mw green…500mw violet and 200mw Red… they are great fun…
but now i have gone towards an additional hobby… flashlights.
so a few questions i have are
is lumens pretty much the measurement of how bright a flashlight will be? like a 100mw green laser is brighter than a 50mw one… 3000 lumens is better than 2500…ect
throw vs flood,
seems simple enough… throw is pretty much where a flashlight is more like a laser… it will light up stuff far away much better but not the whole area right in front of you
flood will light up everything point blank but not something far away
any other important facts on those?
what are some important quality control factors with these lights.? like for lasers… you can get cheap high powered ones that are overdriven 500% more than they should thus will be very bright for an hour and be fried soon after
any other fun facts for beginners…
also i just bought a BTU Shocker 3 XCREE XMLU2 3500 Lumen flashlight and should have it soon… should be a good first super light…
The Shocker is a great light, you might be disappointed in every other light you buy now. Everything you assumed above is correct. The more amps the driver puts to the led the brighter, big reflector equals more throw, small reflector equals more flood. Small led equals more throw, large led equals more flood.
Regarding driver power output: A higher power driver gives more light, but may create excessive heat depending on the size of the light. Also runtimes at max will be lower.
2.8 amps - In a small 1x18650 light like the S2 or Roche F12, the light will get hot fast on maximum power. If you’re running the light on max, hold it in your hand rather than standing on a table. Your hand will help wick off excess heat and will help you tell when it’s getting too hot. If the head of the light gets too hot to touch, turn the light to a lower power setting or turn it off. The upside is if you want a pocket-rocket to wow your friends, this may be for you.
2.1 amps - A more reasonable driver for the non-flashaholic. You’re less likely to start a fire and runtimes will be longer. Less wow factor though.
1.5 amps - no heat issues at all for an 18650 light of any size and you’ll get long runtimes. Won’t be as bright as many other lights though.
Specialty lights - at Mountain Electronics you can order custom-made lights with extremely high output… 1 or 2 cell lights operating at 4.5 amps or higher in very small sizes. As a new flashlight enthusiast I recommend steering clear of these until you educate yourself on the proper use and care of such lights. An overpowered small light won’t be able to shed heat well and if used for anything more than very short bursts at max can be a fire hazard. Such lights may require special high-discharge batteries, and it gets even riskier in multicell lights with no undervoltage protection. There is a risk that if the light is run until the batteries run dry, one battery may empty slightly faster than the other and then be reverse charged … causing an immediate rapid discharge of highly toxic smoke and flame. Basically your flashlight could turn into a pipe bomb and explode in your hand.
Regarding tint: White LEDs used in all LED flashlights are composed of a blue LED with a yellow phosphor layer on top. When the blue light hits the phosphor the phosphor emits red and green light. The light mixes and the output appears white. By varying the amount of phosphor, LED manufacturers can change the tint of the light. Less phosphor gives a bluish white tint. More phosphor can give a brownish, yellow or orange tint. Since the phosphor is never as efficient as unconverted light coming directly from the blue LED, lights with warmer tints will tend to be slightly less bright compared to cool tints, all other things being equal.
6000-6500 kelvin color temperature cool white - a very cool bluish-white light. Can be quite harsh and not very pleasing to look at. Good for looking at things in doors but may be harsh looking and give poor depth perception and color rendition outdoors. However, these do tend to be slightly brighter so if you’re looking for the maximum output and wow factor this may be for you.
5000k neutral white - slightly brownish or yellowish. Much less harsh than 6000k. One of the most preferred tints. Provides a good balance of brightness without being harsh.
4500k neutral white - slightly orange or brown white. Quite pleasing to the eye. One of the LEDs reknowned for having one of the best tints, the Nichia 219, has this tint.
4000k neutral white - orange white. Same as above but even warmer. Very pleasant to use outdoors with good depth perception. Doesn’t look harsh.
3000k warm white - very orange. Indoors, things may look quite orange and cooler colors may be hard to make out.
2700-2900k warm white - this is the color temp of a typical incandescent lightbulb.
Brightness
Lumens - a measure of the total amount of light coming out of the light. More lumens means more light. However, our eyes see light in a non-linear scale. You need around a 20% increase in lumens to even notice a difference. And an increase of double the lumens may only appear to be 20% brighter. Lumens includes the total output of both the spot and the spill.
Lux - a measure of how well a light shines on things in the distance. This is typically measured at the center of the spot.
Relationship between lux and lumens - bigger LEDs produce more lumens, but tend to be harder to focus and often produce less lux. Getting high lux often requires a small LED and/or a large reflector or aspheric lens to focus the light. Lights with very small reflectors and large LEDs tend to be short-range floodlights.
CRI - color rendering index - separate from tint is the quality of light. The typical measure of this is CRI, which goes on a scale up to 100. Lights with high CRI tend to render colors better than lights with lower CRI at the same tint. Many enthusiasts prefer high CRI lights, but emitters with high CRI tend to either be very warm or produce much less output than other emitters.
100 CRI - My understanding is that incandescent lights, candles and the sun all have 100 CRI.
The best CRI LEDs are around 90-92 CRI. Others billed as high CRI tend to be 85 CRI or higher.
Cool white non-high CRI XMLs may be around 65-70 CRI.
I find that looking at beamshots helps answer any questions regarding lights.
More lumens doesn’t necessarily mean brighter since there are different tests and standards used to measure those. Also like you said there’s throw which helps send light farther by use of a bigger reflector or an aspherics head.
As far as quality control there’s only getting a good brand, ensuring that it’s water proof up to your standards and maybe having a good reputation of surviving a drop form certain height. There are lights that are driven harder, this is called a turbo mode on some cases, but it doesn’t typically last long since the light will go into a lower mode after a predetermined time to protect it from heat.
oh lots of good info here… its good to hear that everyone seems to enjoy the Shocker, …seems i found a good one… cant wait till the mail comes… for smaller lights with heating … i do have a 1400mw blue laser that has the same issue… its in a c-6 body and will overheat of on too long so at least i could treat it similar for small ones … im guessing mine is around 6000K? Its the XMLU2 version
When it comes to throw nothing can beat high quality aspherical flashlight.
In another words same size aspheric will always out throw same size reflector light.
Also if you want to see further in the night aspheric is best choice.
My pocketable aspheric(250KCD) throws visually more than Lightforce 170 striker reflector which has 350 kcd claimed on their website :) So it is just to funny how some guys are pumping lux/cd on their flashlights.
similar to how with lasers you can have all the milliwatts you want if you have one with way better divergence it will shoot much better and farther with a thinner beam… even at less power …
Welcome aboard sunbeam. You don't have to be concerned about "noob" status here. Thank goodness this isn't one of those forums where the veterans enjoy brow beating new comers.
You seem to have much of the basics down. Important quality control factors are the things you can't mod/fix yourself. For me they are:
Reflector shape and finish
Quality of materials and machining of the host
Anodized finish
AR coating on lenses
Pretty much every budget light is going to have a pretty sorry driver and various assembly-line issues (mostly to do with electrical resistance and with emitter focus). Also, they generally have substandard emitters. So getting skills and knowledge in these areas will enable you to turn budget lights into great high performance lights.
