Zebralight H2 vs H1

I think Zebralights are well thought out and seem to be well made. I have the H51 and H51f.

Still I think the H2 setting may be an exaggeration. I realize that increases in output with a floody light aren't as noticeable as a more focused light since less of the output is right in front of you. I also realize how we humans interpret increases in output (and it's not linear).

When I go from 100 lumens to 200 lumens (H1 to H2) I can barely see the difference even with a fresh battery. It's most noticeable indoors in a small hallway with white walls.

Yet, I have an Ultrafire that is rather average with one AA and when you put in one 14500 the increase is very noticeable. I doubt that it's increasing more than 100% so I find it hard to believe that the 100-200 lumen setting on my H51's is real. The output is more focused however.

What do some of you other H51 owners think?

I have the H51wf with the H2 set on 82 lumen. The difference between H1 at 164 lumen and H2 at 82 lumen is almost imperceptible. But when I am away from my recharger I like the extra battery life I get with the 82 lumen H2 setting.

The difference doesn't look that great because even though it is objectively a 100% increase in the amount of light being produced, the eyes don't work linearly; none of our senses do. In order for you to see a doubling in perceived brightness between two lights, you need to triple the actual light intensity, a 200% increase is what is necessary. In other words, a 300 lumen light will look twice as bright as a 100 lumen light, and also because of the non-linearity in terms of how our perceptual systems work a 200 lumen light will only look 1.3x as bright as a 100 lumen light.

B0wz3r said:

The difference doesn't look that great because even though it is objectively a 100% increase in the amount of light being produced, the eyes don't work linearly; none of our senses do. In order for you to see a doubling in perceived brightness between two lights, you need to triple the actual light intensity, a 200% increase is what is necessary. In other words, a 300 lumen light will look twice as bright as a 100 lumen light, and also because of the non-linearity in terms of how our perceptual systems work a 200 lumen light will only look 1.3x as bright as a 100 lumen light.

Click to expand...

Yes, I get all that but mine doesn't look 1.3 times as bright but my Ultrafire with a 14500 vs AA does look 1.3 times as bright.

I never use the 200 lumen setting on the Zebralight because it is pointless (for me).

It's not a problem because 100 lumens is more than enough for my uses.

gcbryan said:

Yes, I get all that but mine doesn't look 1.3 times as bright but my Ultrafire with a 14500 vs AA does look 1.3 times as bright.

Click to expand...

Everyone is a little different. You need to have someone help you actually figure out how much brighter it really does look. The best way to do this is with a procedure called magnitude estimation. Have someone pick a light and setting that's a certain intensity, and call it "100" (any reasonable number will do). Then have them show you other settings and you assign the brightness of each of those with reference to the baseline "100" brightness. Do this several times for each setting to get an average, and you'll be able to calculate exactly how much brighter it does look to you. This is standard procedure in research in perceptual psychology.

gcbryan said:

Yes, I get all that but mine doesn't look 1.3 times as bright but my Ultrafire with a 14500 vs AA does look 1.3 times as bright.

Click to expand...

It is quite possible that putting a 14500 (3.7v) into a light designed for AAs (1.2 - 1.5v) is too high a voltage for the LE(driver) so it is going into direct drive and supplying full voltage with no control over the current. IIRC putting a 10440 into an ITP A3 EOS increases the lumens from approx 80 to over 200 - certainly a very noticeable increase.

An alternative explanation is that your ultrafire is optimised to run on a 14500 and is severly under-driven by a normal AA.

With my H51 the difference between H1 and H2 is less noticeable inside, and (slightly) more noticeable outside.

I think there are/were several things going on. First the multiple between the other brightness settings is more like 3x until you get to high and the it's 2x.

Secondly if the batteries are used a bit then the high setting takes the hit first so it probably isn't really 200 at that point.

There's also the environment. With the H51, where the beam is a bit more focused, it's a bit more noticeable. With the H51f, where the beam is more diffused, the additional light is more spread out and therefore less noticeable.

It would be nice if H2 was 300 (but probably not doable on AA). That way the increase would be 3x like the other settings.

I have noticed that when the batteries are getting lower then there is no more high mode and that's when I change the batteries (if convenient).

When you say a fresh battery, what kind? An alkaline cell will sag quite badly under high draw. I agree that the difference between H1 and H2 isn't that big but it is a difference.

For example I was quite disappointed with my preon revo until I installed an eneloop. I would guess I was getting about 30 lumens with an alkaline cell instead of the rated 82.

yeah it depends A LOT on what batt yer using.

A fresh NIZN is ~1.6v and H2 is more noticeable
its more like the H31 which I also have.
the H51 gets about as much as possible from a non lion AA

I think 300 lumens OTF from an H51 is doable, but it would require use of a 14500, and the price would be drastically reduced efficiencies with nimh's and other AA chemistries. One of the reasons ZL has such great performance out of their lights is because their drivers are optimized for a narrow voltage range. The 170 lumens my H51w puts out on H1 is more than enough for most of my needs.