NoNotAgain
Flashlight Enthusiast
Portinga Titanium Firefly light review
I first learned of the Firefly light via the Candle Power Forums. CPF member "jashhash" is Joshua Portinga, known here is the designer and brains behind this light.
There were to be three body metals offered, aluminum, stainless steel, and titanium. Besides the ability to customize by adding tritium vials, the Firefly was offered with a high CRI 90+ (color rendering index) LED.
A Kickstarter campaign was launched to fund the manufacturing costs associated with the light, but unfortunately the minimum sales numbers for each material type weren't met and the campaign was cancelled.
Per postings by Joshua, the titanium version light had a large enough number of people wanting to back/purchase the light and the Firefly 2.0 was launched.
Fast forward four months, and there were difficulties in getting suppliers to produce parts that were agreed upon, most namely, the driver. This delayed the project by another month.
Finally news I had been waiting for, that lights were shipping. The problem was it appeared to be via a slow boat from China. It quite possibly was on a slow boat as more than three weeks passed before the first light was delivered.
My USPS man dropped off one rather mangled box coming from China. Between China Post and USPS, the box was majorly distressed. The good thing is/was that there was an inner box with ample foam to protect the valuable cargo inside. The inner box with the foam liner saved the light from damage.
Crushed outer box
Crushed inner box
The second light was delivered couple of days later and was in worse shape than the first box. This time the inside box was pristine. This delivery was the Cree LED version of the Firefly with Ice Blue Tritium.
Crushed outer box
This is the first of two Titanium Firefly lights that I ordered. This one features a high CRI index Nichia 219B emitter and green tritium vials.
.
Picture of firefly on box
Overall firefly view
Pics of both lights
Pics with tritium lit.
My first impressions of the Firefly light are mixed. The machining of the titanium looks very good. There are few marks from the lathe collet, and a few small scratches. (they polished out with the use of some gray Scotch Brite) probably incurred during assembly. The LED is well centered. Looking at the tritium vials, they appeared to be cocked in the bore and weren't straight. They appeared skewed on different angles. The screws used to retain the machined titanium pocket clip were too long and encroach on access to the rear click switch removal area.
Crooked tritium
Long screws
The Firefly is capable of using three different power sources, AA alkaline batteries, a AA nickel metal hydride battery and a 14500 lithium ion battery.
I'm not testing the output of the alkaline powered light as I've had too many items damaged by leaking batteries, so if you're going to use alkaline batteries, good luck.
I installed a freshly charged Panasonic Eneloop NiMH for power and pushed the titanium tail button, and viola, there was light. Half pushes of the button yielded three brighter settings. Additional half pushes cycle you through power modes. A full button push turns the light off.
The second power source supported is the 14500-lithium ion battery. I use Efest 14500's as they were the highest milliamp rated 14500's I could find. The 14500 battery is supposed to provide the highest lumens of the three battery types supported by this light. Without breaking out the light meter, a quick eyeball comparison, the Firefly light does appear brighter using the lithium batteries verses the NiMH Eneloop.
I have plans to test the lumen difference between the Nichia and Cree emitter at a later date.
The reflector supplied in my light has extremely smooth texture without any ripples or orange peel. The lens was crystal clear and without fingerprints. Mode changes were noticeable from the firefly, to low, then medium and finally high.
Getting back to the tritium. To access the tritium vials, you remove the head, which contains the lens and reflector. Once the head is removed, you access the o-ring used to retain the tritium vials or stainless steel pins from falling out. This is what I found.
Light with head removed
After removal, I noticed what appeared to be dust or sand. Close examination, the debris turned out to be solder and solder flux that had splattered.
Head removed, debris
Close up of heatsink and mcpcb
The mcpcb was coated with this material as well as the copper heat sink. There's not a lot of room inside the light once the LED is installed, so careful removal of the debris is going to be required without touching the LED dome. Until I do some poking at the solder splatter I don't know how adherent it is. Either way, it needs to be removed.
I emailed Joshua with my findings and he confirmed that what I found was the residue from using solder paste instead of solder wire due to the tight access. A few industrial thin cotton swabs and isopropyl alcohol and the interior cleaned up fine. The solder splatter wasn't attached to the heat sink very well, so the cleaning was needed to keep the solder from dropping off and possibly causing a short.
Internally, the Nichia and Cree powered lights are two different lights. The Nichia is just a bare LED soldered to the mcpcb, while the Cree has a small plastic reflector sitting over the LED. The Cree XM-L2 LED has a plastic cup type devise over the LED. The mcpcb was clean on this light. Also, the hole in the reflector is smaller on the Cree version light.
Nichia on left, Cree on right.
I'm a big fan of titanium, which is why I purchased this light. The high CRI Nichia 219B LED was an afterthought for me. I like the design of the Firefly light. It looks manly. The attention to detail during machining is apparent. This makes for a very attractive light. The knurling allows for a good grip and the light is light enough in weight for use as an EDC in a pocket or clipped to a belt or waistband.
I've had a few email exchanges with Joshua about the Firefly light. He's most proud of the machined type 5 titanium belt/pocket clip. The entire light was well thought out, but this is a semi-custom titanium light that is using foreign labor to keep the price down.
Firefly machined clip
I enquired about the aluminum version of the Firefly and lessons learned with producing the titanium version. Joshua's response was that there probably wouldn't be another Firefly light as his wife's green card was approved and he's moving back to the USA. The light is too complex to turn production over to a job shop, so the 300 titanium Firefly lights are all there will probably ever be.
It's too bad that these 300 lights will probably be the end of the Firefly light. There's room in the market place for both the aluminum and titanium lights of this design.
I first learned of the Firefly light via the Candle Power Forums. CPF member "jashhash" is Joshua Portinga, known here is the designer and brains behind this light.
There were to be three body metals offered, aluminum, stainless steel, and titanium. Besides the ability to customize by adding tritium vials, the Firefly was offered with a high CRI 90+ (color rendering index) LED.
A Kickstarter campaign was launched to fund the manufacturing costs associated with the light, but unfortunately the minimum sales numbers for each material type weren't met and the campaign was cancelled.
Per postings by Joshua, the titanium version light had a large enough number of people wanting to back/purchase the light and the Firefly 2.0 was launched.
Fast forward four months, and there were difficulties in getting suppliers to produce parts that were agreed upon, most namely, the driver. This delayed the project by another month.
Finally news I had been waiting for, that lights were shipping. The problem was it appeared to be via a slow boat from China. It quite possibly was on a slow boat as more than three weeks passed before the first light was delivered.
My USPS man dropped off one rather mangled box coming from China. Between China Post and USPS, the box was majorly distressed. The good thing is/was that there was an inner box with ample foam to protect the valuable cargo inside. The inner box with the foam liner saved the light from damage.
Crushed outer box
Crushed inner box
The second light was delivered couple of days later and was in worse shape than the first box. This time the inside box was pristine. This delivery was the Cree LED version of the Firefly with Ice Blue Tritium.
Crushed outer box
This is the first of two Titanium Firefly lights that I ordered. This one features a high CRI index Nichia 219B emitter and green tritium vials.
.
Picture of firefly on box
Overall firefly view
Pics of both lights
Pics with tritium lit.
My first impressions of the Firefly light are mixed. The machining of the titanium looks very good. There are few marks from the lathe collet, and a few small scratches. (they polished out with the use of some gray Scotch Brite) probably incurred during assembly. The LED is well centered. Looking at the tritium vials, they appeared to be cocked in the bore and weren't straight. They appeared skewed on different angles. The screws used to retain the machined titanium pocket clip were too long and encroach on access to the rear click switch removal area.
Crooked tritium
Long screws
The Firefly is capable of using three different power sources, AA alkaline batteries, a AA nickel metal hydride battery and a 14500 lithium ion battery.
I'm not testing the output of the alkaline powered light as I've had too many items damaged by leaking batteries, so if you're going to use alkaline batteries, good luck.
I installed a freshly charged Panasonic Eneloop NiMH for power and pushed the titanium tail button, and viola, there was light. Half pushes of the button yielded three brighter settings. Additional half pushes cycle you through power modes. A full button push turns the light off.
The second power source supported is the 14500-lithium ion battery. I use Efest 14500's as they were the highest milliamp rated 14500's I could find. The 14500 battery is supposed to provide the highest lumens of the three battery types supported by this light. Without breaking out the light meter, a quick eyeball comparison, the Firefly light does appear brighter using the lithium batteries verses the NiMH Eneloop.
I have plans to test the lumen difference between the Nichia and Cree emitter at a later date.
The reflector supplied in my light has extremely smooth texture without any ripples or orange peel. The lens was crystal clear and without fingerprints. Mode changes were noticeable from the firefly, to low, then medium and finally high.
Getting back to the tritium. To access the tritium vials, you remove the head, which contains the lens and reflector. Once the head is removed, you access the o-ring used to retain the tritium vials or stainless steel pins from falling out. This is what I found.
Light with head removed
After removal, I noticed what appeared to be dust or sand. Close examination, the debris turned out to be solder and solder flux that had splattered.
Head removed, debris
Close up of heatsink and mcpcb
The mcpcb was coated with this material as well as the copper heat sink. There's not a lot of room inside the light once the LED is installed, so careful removal of the debris is going to be required without touching the LED dome. Until I do some poking at the solder splatter I don't know how adherent it is. Either way, it needs to be removed.
I emailed Joshua with my findings and he confirmed that what I found was the residue from using solder paste instead of solder wire due to the tight access. A few industrial thin cotton swabs and isopropyl alcohol and the interior cleaned up fine. The solder splatter wasn't attached to the heat sink very well, so the cleaning was needed to keep the solder from dropping off and possibly causing a short.
Internally, the Nichia and Cree powered lights are two different lights. The Nichia is just a bare LED soldered to the mcpcb, while the Cree has a small plastic reflector sitting over the LED. The Cree XM-L2 LED has a plastic cup type devise over the LED. The mcpcb was clean on this light. Also, the hole in the reflector is smaller on the Cree version light.
Nichia on left, Cree on right.
I'm a big fan of titanium, which is why I purchased this light. The high CRI Nichia 219B LED was an afterthought for me. I like the design of the Firefly light. It looks manly. The attention to detail during machining is apparent. This makes for a very attractive light. The knurling allows for a good grip and the light is light enough in weight for use as an EDC in a pocket or clipped to a belt or waistband.
I've had a few email exchanges with Joshua about the Firefly light. He's most proud of the machined type 5 titanium belt/pocket clip. The entire light was well thought out, but this is a semi-custom titanium light that is using foreign labor to keep the price down.
Firefly machined clip
I enquired about the aluminum version of the Firefly and lessons learned with producing the titanium version. Joshua's response was that there probably wouldn't be another Firefly light as his wife's green card was approved and he's moving back to the USA. The light is too complex to turn production over to a job shop, so the 300 titanium Firefly lights are all there will probably ever be.
It's too bad that these 300 lights will probably be the end of the Firefly light. There's room in the market place for both the aluminum and titanium lights of this design.
