Wurkkos TS30S + monster LED SBT90.2 = $60 4750lm 1km SUPER-Thrower. Comparison w/ TS30S Pro & other lights incl. the :-) insane 13000 lm Nightwatch Valkyrie. (Summary & measurements on P. 1)

LED Flashlights – General Info 21700 Flashlights
29

Thank you for the nice comment. I have done A:B comparison of Wurkkos 5000 mAh battery versus Samsung 40T 4000 mAh battery using photography. The Samsung did result in higher brightness at least on Turbo start-up as seen in the 2 shots below. (Although it may not be visually clear, the RAW software does indicate which pic is brighter, just no absolute value.) This makes sense because the very high 15 amp current draw in Turbo mode should be easily met by Samsung’s approx. 25-35 Amp rating.

OTOH, a couple things to considered:
1. The higher brightness would benefit only in Turbo mode. If you use this light the way I do - leave it on for longer than 5 minutes at a time, this higher brightness would likely result in faster step-down to lower mode, where current draw is not as high and difference would expect to be much less. OTOH, if you use it mostly in occasional short on/off period and want max brightness, then yes IMHO you should use Samsung (only $5 at 18650BatteryStore.com).
2. The Wurkkos has higher capacity (5000 vs 4000 mAh of Samsung), a benefit in a current hungry LED like this one.


30

Thanks for your reply.

I should have mentioned as well, that one of the reasons I was asking is because Wurkkos.com actually has a good deal (for me at least) on some 21700 Molicel P42A’s.

Im trying to decide whether or not to grab one/two of those along with the light, Instead of the included cell. Or as well as the included cell lol.

31

Hi there,

I reckon that you have not purchased a dedicated luxmeter, but no problem. Do you have a phone with ambient light photo sensor? Quite a number have nowadays. Just DL any of those luxmeter apps and use it, it’d tell ya if your phone does not have one, then read the lux figures from a ceiling bounce, try to keep things between runs standard, for eg the temperature of the flashlight. (use a small stream of running water to cool it down faster between the runs). The cell should be ok if the runs are short like less than 5 seconds and you have a > 1 minute rest time after that for the sag to recover, no biggie. If you really want it to be 100% scientific and you have the time to spare, charge up the light again for a minute or 2, let the cell and light rest for 10 mins and start off from the same voltage accurate to 0.001 volts.

This is more convenient and “accurate” than just reading off the histogram or something, and you’d also have absolute figures before vs after mod and calculate things like percentages gain. In fact then you’d also be able to know how much are you sagging at 3 seconds, 10 seconds, 20 seconds, 30 seconds, 1 min etc, and things to know if that initial gain is worth it or not etc. Depends on how you use the light as well, as you’ve mentioned.

You might also try to do a spring bypass, the luxmeter with ceiling bounce is still a very good method to gauge these before/after mod thingys, no need for any lumen pipe or box just that those are more optimal.
Also, for your use, you are just after that percentage % gain increase number on the same light after mod, so ceiling bounce is more than sufficient.

Some lights benefit from this bypass, others don’t…i always do lux readout from a ceiling bounce before and after, really depends on a few factors.

32

I can see the Samsung 40T hotspot being brighter visually already…… do try to get a lightmeter reading as per my earlier post, it’d be telling.

1lumen did report 20A and 22A input between the Wurkkos 5000mAh and 40T, 5 amps more than zeroair, difficult to say which is more accurate. But ultimately getting a lux reading when comparing A vs B be it different cell or different mods is key and preferred, you see light output but you don’t detect electrical amps flowing in the light and that energy needs to be translated into output. Ceiling bounce with marked out spots for the meter and tailstanded light is better and easier, you can also do hotspot lux readings but that tend to vary a bit more than ceiling bounce depending on how you position the meter on the hotspot.

33

Thanks - I like the info of your detailed posts. You got it - I’m using the RAW program’s histogram to check relative brightness. I still like it because I am lazy to have to do one more measurement, but I just downloaded Light Meter and Lux Meter and will give your ceiling bounce method a try. This will have to do until the Opple Pro is available. I appreciate your careful method; yeah I waited 1 hour between battery tests, just had breakfast in between :slight_smile: .

Good catch on the 1lumen article’s battery discussion. Did he measure 20A from the 5000 mAh battery? I thought capacity comes at the expense of drain, and 5000 mAh 21700 batteries generally have 10-15 Amp max discharge?

34

Some battery “puzzle.” I have two Wurkkos 5000 mAh batteries:
The one that comes with my TS21 has 5000 mAh capacity and a triangular top plate like Sofirn 5000 mAh, rated at 10 A max discharge. Test/review of Sofirn 21700 5000mAh (Black)
The one that comes with TS30S also has 5000 mAh capacity, but a round top plate similar to Sofirn’s 4000 mAh battery. Test/review of Shockli 21700 4000mAh (Black) 2018

I guess they are re-wrapped Lishen or Shockli, but interesting that they might be different batteries?

35

Not too sure about the 20A reading on the Wurkkos 5000mAh, that’s why i earlier said it’s difficult to say which is more accurate.

But for the SBT 90.2, decent gains can be had by going from 15A to 20A. Subtract a bit for driver inefficiencies, a high drain cell and bypass is preferable.
BTW if you don’t have access to soldering, just use some rolled up aluminum foil, insert one end into the “hole” of the spring at the top part and route the other end to touch the bottom gap of the spring, tuck it in with a screwdriver, snip off any excess and you are done. No safety issue with the TS30S’ tail spring design. Just be a bit more careful if doing this way for series type battery carriers.
With rolled up aluminum foil, it’s very easy to do A-B comparisons since it doesn’t take more than 2-3 minutes to install/uninstall it. (i suck at soldering and take 30 mins for each spring, imagine doing that for multiple 3-4 cells soda can lights).

36

Yeah, you never know what you are getting. But these should be decent cells from Sofirn basically, generally they know what they are doing.

37

With this double spring design, Is a bypass really achieving anything with this light?

38

Not sure, it really depends. On 1 particular light, i did not get any improvement even though it has a single spring. Sometimes you can get some differences, sometimes not. You’ll never know. So just try it out with a simple wrapped up foil and measure it with the light sensor.

39

@2100
Ah, okay. Thanks.
I think I had a small misunderstanding about bypasses.

40

Heh heh……always measure the output of your lights, that is the key takeaway.

For eg, once i forgot to clean the contacts of the Q8 style of soda can lights, ie both the aluminum tube carrier contact ring and also outer metal ring of the driver disc, and this resulted in like 30% drop in optical output.
This is esp so if one is a rather heavy user and always frequently takes out the cell for charging on a dedicated charger instead of using the USB-C (various reasons eg the light does not support QC/PD and only regular 5V 2A).

So in a way, say if the light’s electrical contacts are dirty, you are not really gonna see that small 3-5% improvement coz that is relatively small in comparison. On some lights with lousier springs you might see 10% or so. There are other factors like driver, driver to emitter wires…but usually those we just presume to be ok and eat the losses esp on lights that you cannot really screw out the driver easily. “Eat the losses” is also because seriously speaking, that +5% or even +10-15% isn’t gonna matter in real world (unless if it’s an instant A-B comparison on an identical target), just a feel-good numbers game to us flashaholics. lol.
Take for eg the above –30% drop in output, i did not detect it at all in real life usage. lol

Enjoy the hobby - that’s the most impt! lol :person_with_crown:

41

I did some prelim “test” using ceiling bounce and like it a lot - thanks. FWIW the numbers vary a little bit but Samsung battery has about 10% higher lumen. For example Samsung 40T ~ 420 lm Wurkkos battery about ~380 lm. I have a few questions since you appear to have had a lot of experience:

1. I put my cell phone next to flashlight (more or less underneath hotspot). Does it matter much where you put phone?
2. Large room vs small room like a bathroom (boy my wife is gonna tell her siblings and they are going to laugh about this) - does it matter?
3. Floody light vs light with throw - any change or comment in the way you measure?
4. Do you try to put light closer to ceiling? Mine is about 5 ft from ceiling.
5. My numbers - are they about the same range as what you are getting?
Thanks again.

42

Code for TS30S on Amazon is 35lzu2w9 makes it $62 and it just went up to $96 for regular price for there. Plus it comes with the murder bezel and afaik wurkkos and Banggood no longer are including it. Code stops this week. (New member here btw, made a profile just to share). Cheers
*edit to say nice review too!

43

Wow bro…10% is pretty decent in terms of bypassing. Surprised that even with double springs it could get this.

Of coz, just gotta keep in mind that this would cause the kickdown to occur a little faster, but i think with a SBT 90.2 (5000+ lumens) in a 230 gram host still ought to be pretty ok / practical

Answer 1. Just test it out yourself, put it 3 inches away, 6 inches, 9 inches. It probably would vary just a little in most cases, not a big difference.
I know for my case here it wouldn’t matter much. But of course keep it at the same place for the same flashlight before/after mod.

2. Doesn’t really matter significantly…but do measure at just 1 location so that at least this is a constant.

3. There is a little variation unless if it really is a throwy light (eg your TS30S) vs a very floody light (eg X80-GT2), else not a big deal. The light sensor reads less if you hit it from the side, but it’s gonna be from quite an angle wrt the flashlight’s hotspot. Also think in terms of flash photography, if you angle it 45 deg, then of course the light is gonna be reflected away from the photographer, so it’s gonna be the same for an extremely floody light (Acebeam X80-GT2).
For these, really gotta put them into contraptions like pvc lumen tubes etc.

4. 5 feet is good, not much issue if it were 3 or 5 feet.

5. Yes, in range.

Regardless, it’s just something that you do it and be happy with it . Coz in real life, like what i have posted above before, things like whether or not our eyes are adapted to the dark and also how our pupils react to the hotspot/spill in different environments (target reflectiveness) would wash out any of these 10, 20% differences. That’s why experienced flashaholics would tell you all these small differences dont make a difference in reality. In fact we know that if we wanna upgrade, take for eg my 25k lumens OTF JKK76, it’s gonna be at least a MS12 mini, minimum. That’s if you really want to be a happy flashaholic. :smiley:
Or put it this way, i actually have 2pcs of JKK76 (1 is 6500k and the other 3000k), and also i can switch on 1pc and then the other in say setting 3, turbo etc. I’d say the above upgrade example of JKK76 -> MS12 mini is true, just on the lumens output aspect. Other than the turbo setting on the 2nd pc, all other settings don’t really make much of significant difference and that is only coz if i were in the know that i am using/controlling the 2nd pc.

44

Comparison of another great thrower Nitecore MH12S with Wurkkos TS30S. Nitecore has same smooth reflector type as Wurkkos and hence has a good, useful bright spill (brighter than the two TIR lights - Sofirn IF22a and Olight M2R Pro). It has very respectable 349 m throw and has one thing that Wurkkos TS30S can’t match: the small size. As mentioned neither flashlight is “better” than the other as they are different classes of light. Having said that, it’s interesting to see how the Wurkkos just obliterates MH12S when it comes to throw and brightness.

The Wurkkos sometimes feels like a car’s headlight beam the way it lights up the road (!). I have to admit I don’t feel like taking the Nitecore out with me as much as I used to. If you crave throw and brightness & don’t mind the larger size , the answer is clear.

Pictures taken in RAW format, fixed/same exposure and white balance.


45

@2100, thanks for the detailed and very helpful answer. Yeah learning something new to fool around with is lots of fun :innocent: and I’m experimenting with different ways as well. I have tried both living room and one of the bathrooms that has no windows (favored because I could test during the day, all day lol). Preliminary testing shows a fairly consistent 5-10% increased lumen when switched from Wurkkos 5000 mAh to Samsung 40T 4000 mAh (with ~25 A rating).

One thing I’ve noticed is it seems ceiling bounce “favors” spill over hotspot, meaning it doesn’t reflect hotspot’s brightness as much? My Convoy M21F has more spill but hotspot is not nearly as bright as M21E, but ceiling bounce shows equal number or slightly higher for M21F (test was done in the small bathroom with a mirror btw). I am sure this is nothing new for the veterans but for others who are trying this the first time like me, that observation emphasizes that the numbers are not for comparison between different lights. It’s more for mods/change done to the same light and for checking before/after result (as you’ve already pointed out).

46

@Shimshamtymamm thanks for the code, got me to finally pull the trigger on the TS30S! Been on the fence for quite a while, but this was enough to seal the deal for me.

47

Oh wow that’s a great deal and Amazon no less - just curious how you found out about the code, did you email Wurkkos and ask for one? The LED on this light alone is $30; surprised how Wurkkos could make a living with such big discount but it’s our gain :+1: .

The “murder bezel” LOL. You’re right my AliExpress version does NOT have the murder bezel and darn it now I want one! :smiling_imp: :confounded:

BTW if anyone is new to this hobby and just bought this light, temperature calibration and increasing max thermal limit to 50-55 C are ABSOLUTE must. Easy enough to do with Anduril 1, just ask this forum for help if necessary.

48

No problem man! I love saving money on lights too so I get it. Funny thing, I actually wanted the MDK bezel mainly for display/uniqueness. Was just about to pull the trigger on the wurkkos site just because I wanted to get one before gone and found this. Score.