mhanlen
Enlightened
Xtar B20 Pilot XM-L U3 Flashlight Review
Also, if you'd like to skip the text review here is a full video review of the light!
Also, if you'd like to skip the text review here is a full video review of the light!
I want to thank Ken at Xtar for the opportunity to review this light. I'm still fairly new to this (and CPF forums in general), so bear with me. I don't own a lot of the high tech stuff that some of the awesome reviewers have, so I'll just try to take a lot of interesting pictures and test the light thoroughly- and hopefully you can decide if this light deserves your hard earned money. Anyway Xtar seems to be releasing quite a few new lights, and their new 18650 light had me interested because of it's claimed output, nice runtimes, that and it being relatively compact. And as far as I know, since this light is so super brand new (released late last month), I think this is the only review of it right now. Since I go backpack camping several times a year I like bringing along a nice variable output light to use at night while doing chores around the campsite- because there's no source of artificial light in the national forest. It also needs to be tough, relatively compact, resistant to the elements, and reliable. And according to the initial specifications it seems to fit the bill.
First off, let me list the manufacturer specs. Starting with output and run times.
First off, let me list the manufacturer specs. Starting with output and run times.
| Mode | Turbo | High | Mid | Low | Signal |
| Lumens | 1000 | 600 | 250 | 30 | 250 |
| Run times using the supplied 3100 mah xtar 18650 | 3.1 hours | 3.3 hours | 7.5 hours | 70 hours | ---- |
Additional specs.
| Beam Throw | 210 Meters |
| Max Intensity | 11100cd |
| Waterproof rating | IPX8 |
| LED Type | Cree XM-L U3 with 50000 Hour lifespan |
| Main Flashlight Body Material | 6N01 Aluminum Alloy, Type III Anodized |
| Working Voltage | 2.7-4.2v |
| Battery Type | Single 18650/186700 Protected and Unprotected |
| Switch | Clicky rear mounted tactical with momentary on. |
| Dimensions | 34.5mm Head Diameter, 24.5 body and tailcap diameter, 140mm overall length |
| Weight | 113g without battery |
| Mode Memory | Yes. After 2-3 seconds. |
| Mode Arrangement | High-Turbo-Medium-Low with Hidden Strobe |
| Available Packaging (detailed below) | Full Set (reviewed), Simple Set. |
| Lens | Ultra-clear tempered glass lens with anti-reflective coating |
| Carry Options | Lanyard, clip |
In the spec table directly above you'll see that the light comes in two types of packaging. Xtar sent me the "full set" version of the packaging, which includes: A flashlight, stainless steel clip, a holster, lanyard, extra-o-ring, flashlight manual, warranty card, 18650 3100 mah battery, MP1S charger, US wall outlet adapter, USB mini cord, car 12v power adapter, and a charger manual. Inadvertently the holster was left out of my packaging, so I will be unable to review that- Ken assured me that all retail sets include this holster. And there's also the simple set, which is the flashlight, clip, lanyard, holster, extra o-ring, flashlight manual and warranty card. Basically the simple set doesn't include the battery, charger and cords, and the case. Which is a pretty sweet case.
Moving on.
The light was shipped via DHL on a Monday and I got it on a Thursday. Yep, in less than a week. I am going to assume that it was to get it to me extra quick for review. After opening the DHL plastic envelope, the set was further protected with bubble wrap inside. I have purchased other things from Xtar in the past, and it seems that the extra xtar packaging with special tape is typical of stuff that comes from them.
The case.
And inside the case.
Ok here are a few more details of the stuff that comes in the box.
Light and documentation. The documentation was resting on top the the stuff you see in the photo above. It actually stores very nicely below the fitted foam that all the stuff is nestled in.
One great thing about this set, in fact it's probably my favorite thing about the full/deluxe/whatever-you-want-to-call-it set, is that Xtar provides a high quality cell to run your light off of. I'm pretty sure I've read that the battery is just a rebranded Panasonic 3100 mah cell- but that's a good thing. It helps you get very nice runtimes out of it, which you'll see later in the review.
This is the extra o-ring and manual that comes in the set. They both come packaged in that little baggy. From a personal preference, when I carry lights, I like to use a clip and very rarely do I use the lanyard. I do like the lanyard to have a quick detach mechanism like this one does. It's the details folks!
I've never owned a light that came with an case to house all it's accessories. I'm sold now. Can all lights come with this please? I work in sound and video, and in my head all equipment should be stored in cases to protect it. It's about time this sensibility became the norm in the flashlight world! The full package obviously includes every single thing you'd need for this light (and more), if you're just getting into lithium ion lights. While this is my first Xtar light, it's not the first Xtar product I own. Prior to this set I had purchased (and still own) the WPII Mark 2 charger and a set of their 2600 mah blue label batteries. With those in mind and the general communities consensus that Xtar makes a very fine charger and battery, I had high hopes.
Look another table. Here's the Xtar specs for the SP1S charger unit.
| Operation Temperature | 0~40c |
| Input Voltage/ Current | DC 5v/500mA |
| Output Voltage/ Max. Current | DC 4.2v (+/-.05v) 500mA |
| Weight | 33g |
| Official Supported Battery Sizes | 14650/17670/18650/18700/14500/10440/16340/18350/15270 |
Now in order to get some of those batteries to fit you'll need some of those xtar spacers to get them to work. Since I already own an Xtar charger I have several laying around. They're those little screw in things that come with the WP2. Here is a quick list of the amount of spacers you'll need to get the following batteries to work.
| Battery Size | # of spacers |
| 14650/17670/18650/18700 | 0 |
| 14500 | 2 |
| 10440 | 3 |
| 16340/18350 | 4 |
| 15270 | 5 |
And as an added bonus this charger also accepts some 26650s as I have personally tested. No modification necessary for the battery I charged with it.
Other manufacturer specs about the MP1S that are noteworthy. These are taken from the manual, and maybe slightly paraphrased.
- When the input voltage is removed (the charger is unplugged but you leave the battery in the charger), the charger will be in a low current status automatically and lowers the discharge voltage to below 4uA
- The charger is designed to charge the above listed 3.7v li-ion batteries. The MP1S has been designed with a TC.CC.CV charging algorithm which monitors the battery charging in real time and controls the charging safely and automatically.
- The charging management will monitor the IC (integrated circuits) temperature and if the charger gets too hot, it will lower the charging current to ensure continued safe charging.
- When charging has been completed, the charger will monitor the batteries voltage and will restart charging if the battery falls to 4.0v.
There are definitely better qualified individuals here that can dissect the finer points of chargers better than myself. And if you don't want to take my word for it there are actually a few much better reviews of this charger on the net, which indicate it's pretty decent. But I will contribute the following observations. Charge time isn't fast, but that's to be expected with a 500mA charger. You could always buy something like the WP2 if that's a problem. Considering the run times of the flashlight, you probably won't need to charge it that often. It's well made, and simple. Not much to break on the charger. The spring design means you won't have to worry about a slider breaking- something I have had a problem with on cheaper chargers. My particular model charges my 18650 batteries to 4.19v, and the batteries never get anymore than slightly warm (just slightly above room temperature). I love the USB cord design, that allows you to use it with the car adapter and the 120v standard wall outlet. I wish more battery chargers had this feature. The charger has a mini-USB port, whereas the outlets have the standard USB plug. It makes it super versatile, because if you ever lost the cord or needed a longer one they're very very easy to source. You probably have several laying around the house. Oh and did I mention it can unofficially charge 26650s? I can't verify more than the current 26650 I own, but it charges that one to 4.19vs too. I mean technically the charger is NOT designed for 26650s, I'm just saying that I have a 26650 and it charged it to the proper voltage.
On to THE LIGHT!!!
How big is it? That's probably a very important factor in purchasing it right? Here are a few shots that give an idea of scale.
Next to a Convoy S6/Xiaozhi.
For my tastes it's slightly too big for blue jeans style EDC. Some people think even the S6 is too big for EDC, so it's a fair point. If you wear cargo pants and jackets or use a holster then it might be an EDC for you. I walked around with it in some shorts (with cargo pockets) and I barely noticed it. I used the clip. Which brings up something I've been thinking on. This would make a great general purpose light for bike commuters. It has a ton more run time than some of those 4x18650 bike lights- and it can be removed easily at the end of the ride. The slight downside is that it doesn't put out as many lumens as some of the scorchers do, but in my opinion a well made light like this- given the run times is a much better choice. It is plenty plenty bright for a bike light. It combines the right amount of spill and throw to light up what's directly in front of you and what's further down the road/trail. Also that bike light holder was not supplied by xtar. It's a $2 eBay special.
Check it out.
Also, who cares about rain when it's waterproof (down to 2 meters)? Seriously, let it get soaked.
So you want to pocket it? The clip is super grippy. You may need to do a little bending right out of the box because it's really tight.
Of course, the clip is easily removable if that's your bag.
Another size comparison, this time with the EA4W. A light that figures heavily into beamshot comparisons later down. Both lights look really nice together.
Here it is compared to my EDC set. A Wave, an Endura 4, and a warm white tinted convoy s6.
Ergonomics.
The light fits nicely in my hand, and has depressions around the diameter to rest your thumb.
If you examine the macros, you'll see the attention to quality control is pretty excellent. I detected absolutely no areas of the finish that were spotty. Everything is nice and satin-y. Not too shiny and not too matte. It's smooth but, not slick.
The business end. Oh yeah!
The bezel is stainless steel and the reflector is butter smooth and highly polished. No plastic here. Also I believe it's stainless because I was able to stick a magnet to it. It should take a beating quite a bit better than the aluminum cheapy bezels often found on flashlights.
Here's what it looks like when I remove the reflector, bezel, and optics. The tempered glass lens is coated and actually very thick. My camera wasn't able to pick up the purple-ish sheen, but trust me- it's there. Xtar's site claims 98.5% transmittance, compared to the 89%-92% of regular glass. There's also the standard o-ring to lock out moisture. Again, all high quality components.
This is not a very scientific way to measure things, but it's more of a basic reference. And to break up some photographic monotony.
This is the lens.
This is the plastic spacer that sits between the reflector and the emitter board. Astounding!
Since the pill seems to be glued in, I wasn't able to remove it. Normally I'd do it in the name of science, but I really don't want to try and scratch up such a nice light. It doesn't look easy to take apart in there anyway. Other than the EA4W it's the only light I haven't completely disassembled.
Here's what it looks inside. Look Xtar even has a logo there.
And now the tail cap. Ok, I have to admit... I've gotten so used to reverse clickies that I thought the light wasn't working properly when I first started playing with it. The light is a regular clicky with momentary on. Just like a good old Mag-lite. The UI is laid out the following way: High, Turbo, Medium, Low. To scroll though modes you have to basically turn it on and off quickly to go to the next mode. After it's been off for 2 or 3 seconds it remembers the last mode you had it on. Pretty straightforward.
The rubber cover is nice and thick. It's not cheap and has a very tacky feel. The switch operation isn't mushy or too touchy. It's just right.
Lanyard hole! Not quite as thinned walled as some, so it looks like it'll hold up. Time will tell of course.
Here is the switch assembly taken apart. Notice the gold plated spring? I don't know, but the whole assembly screams quality. There doesn't appear to be a weak part.
Further disassembled.
Oh and it can accommodate both protected and unprotected batteries. Picture one is what an unprotected looks like in it. Picture two is the protected battery that comes with the deluxe set. Also take a look at the well-lubed anodized threads. That's the factory lube on it folks! Let's get excited about lube!
The tail cap and the main tube make electrical contact via the un-anodized bottom of the main tube. Since there's not an electrical switch there's no need to unscrew it to lock it out.
Ok, so I was most attracted to this light due to it's long run times. Would I be able to take it camping and not have to bring any extra batteries?
For my first runtime test I turned on the light to Turbo mode and let it run. Again, because of the way the UI is laid out, turbo is second. Since I do not have an integrating sphere or a lux meter, I decided to take a series of photographs to detect the drop in output over time- if any. I actually attempted run time outputs several times before figuring out what makes the most sense- working with the equipment I have. A Sony dsc-w330 point and shoot, with no adjustable controls- and a borrowed and beat up 6.0 megapixel DSLR with only a 50mm lens. For my beamshots and runtime tests I used the DSLR so I could control shutter, iso, and f-stop. A 50mm prime does not offer a whole lot of flexibility, so forgive the lack of perspective in the shots. When possible I used my point and shot to give an idea on how my tests were set up.
Ok, blah blah.
Runtime tests were conducted this way. I placed the b20 on a ledge in a dark stairwell in the house. I set up the DSLR on a tripod and set the iso to 400, f-stop to 1.8, and my shutter to 1/100. The lens of the camera is about 8 foot 10 inches to the white wall, the the light is tail-standing about an inch from the wall. I have no real reason for determining this distance, except maybe because I liked the framing. I determined my camera settings by approximating what my naked eye saw.
The way I determined how many pictures to take on Turbo and High mode, was to look at xtar's estimated runtime for each mode, and basically take a picture every thirty minutes until it surpassed or came within the estimated manufacturer specs. The only deviation from the 30 minute formula was: I took my second picture 10 minutes in to try and detect any initial output drop. You'll see this on turbo mode. So it goes like this: 0mins, 10 mins, 30 mins, an hour, and so on.
Here is Turbo mode. Notice it has a pretty even drop in brightness. There seems to be a fairly quick initial brightness drop-off in the first 10 minutes. Again though, even though it seems to be a sort of large drop, it wasn't detectable by my eyes. In the chart I have indicated the starting voltage and amperage, and then did a second reading at the end of the test. I apologize for the focus issue- I had done several other tests before this one- which I had not posted and the camera was in focus for those tests. Maybe it was bumped? I didn't realize until I was making the chart in photoshop. I would have redone it, but charge time and test time runs an extra 7 hours- time I don't have. Even though the focus is off in this one, there's a very discernible difference between the different mode charts. And it's easy to tell that the out of focus one starts off much brighter.
TURBO.
Alright and now High mode. There's quite a big difference in behavior between the two charts. The High chart maintains a much more even brightness up until the final frame, and then it drops off fairly suddenly. It's even darker than the final frame in the Turbo mode. That and the final voltage and amperage is much lower than the turbo mode. It seems to be anyway that it you need the maximum brightness for a sustained period of time, maybe stick with turbo mode because of the more even power curve?
HIGH
How about medium mode? Since the length of time nearly doubled with this test, I took pictures every hour. Camera settings are all identical to the other run time charts- making it easy to compare relative outputs between modes during the hour marks
Finally, here is the runtime test on low.
Several things to note. I had to adjust the camera settings for the low mode on the light because the previous 1/100 shutter speed I used on the other runtime tests wasn't going to be able to show off the light well. Second, there's a much greater time between pictures to help reduce the amount of data- and makes it much easier to digest at a glance. Also, those were the only regular intervals that I could be home to take the picture. The final picture, taken at about 43 hours, should be considered a "moonlight" type mode. In order to show the light was still on, I repeated and enhanced the final photo to illustrate that the light was still on. This picture was taken about 330 in the morning, and at that point it was flickering slightly, probably because the light was attempting to hit a low voltage shutoff battery protection. When I awoke again at around 7am the light had shut off. So there is a little less than 4 hours margin of error on the total runtime. I was unable to get it to turn back on.
For me though the amount of useful light probably runs out around the 30-33 hour mark. Of course if you're using it for more than 30 hours straight, then maybe you're in an emergency situation and then you still have about 10ish hours of low intensity to moonlight mode anyway (after the 30 hours). One other thing to note is that the battery protection did not kick in. Because I would get a brief flash of light when I attempted to turn the light on, I assume the lights low voltage feature cuts the light off somewhere in the 2.6ish voltage range. Ok here it is.... The initial review has also been updated.
More notes about runtime tests.
Ok, so you'll notice that at the 3 and a half hour mark on turbo and high there's still a good amount of light? Both modes seem to maintain a very steady curve in drop off- to my naked eye. I did not detect any hard mode switching. Both modes basically just keep running and running. In fact, I did a test to see how long it would run on high mode. I started at 310pm and let it run until 1120pm. Yes, 8 hours and 10 minutes. At that point the light was barely above a moonlight mode. I got sick of waiting and shut it off. When beginning I started out with a 4.19v battery running at 1.25 amps. The ending? 2.6v at .01 amps.
Oh and a final brightness comparison. It was done during a seperate test, and not related to the ones above- but I thought I'd include it anyway. Basically, I decided to do a beamshot comparison after the xtar had been on Turbo for 4 hours. I found the "Low" setting on the EA4W to be most comparable in brightness.
Ok, before we get to the beamshots lets do a tint comparison.
The Xtar is quite a bit cooler than the EA4W (neutral white tint). I know sometimes side by side tint comparisons can be misleading, but I'm throwing it in anyway. If I'm going to describe it... it's quite a bit cooler than a NW tint, but it's not super blue like some of the cheaper budget lights (like the CW Sky Ray King). On the other hand it's not anywhere near 3AA LED Mag-lite green either. The center spot is actually quite warmer than the surrounding spill.
Ok now the wall beam profiles with tailcap measurements.
The photos are labeled so I believe they speak for themselves. These shots were with me holding the flashlight away from the wall about 2 feet-ish.
High
Turbo
Medium
Low.
Alrighty. Here are some outdoor beamshots. I used the Flexcandles Asgard Neutral white, and the EA4W. The Asgard is definitely the thrower. It has a much tighter hotspot than the Pilot and the EA4W. The EA4W is a nice balance between the Pilot and the Asgard. While not a floody light per se, the Pilot has a smaller reflector than the other two, so that needs to be taken into consideration.
Without further ado. Here is a shot that I did with my point and shoot camera that lays out basic distances. That light pole is about 40-50 feet high- by visual estimation. And it should be noted it sits about 20 feet further away than the vines in the images below. I'd really like to have a nice DSLR, with a few lenses so I could shoot these on the same camera- but for now, this is what I'll make do with. So bear with me.
And I know it says so in the photos, but all beam shots used a 50mm lens- so while it seems like it's a touch too close for the actual distances- that's how far it is away.
Barrier. 68 feet.
Vines. 210 feet.
Base of the light pole. 230ish.
Ok the EA4 on High and Turbo. I wish I had some lights a little closer in style to the Pilot, but since the EA4W is such a popular light, it can be used as a sort of metric. As I accumulate lights, I'll try to do more apt beam comparisons. Although this gives you a good idea of what the Pilot "is" and "isn't." I've seen the EA4W rated anywhere from 720-890 lumens.
The Pilot.
High.
Turbo.
Medium.
Low.
The Asgard on High/Turbo (whatever the highest factory setting the light comes with is)... supposedly it's about 900ish lumens. Very focused. It's much more of a thrower than either one of these other lights.
Ok how about those vines in the daylight photo? This is just with the Pilot.
It's pretty far away. Here's the Pilot. Remember even though I shot the daytime shot and the nighttime shot with two different cameras, the tripod is in the exact same place- like it is for all of the outdoor shots.
High.
Turbo.
Medium.
Low.
So now we are down to the the final comparison. The "extreme light tower throw." This one will make the light bleed. The camera is set to the exact same settings as it has been on all the other nighttime shots.
Low. The B20 Pilot. To be honest, I could actually make out the light pole with my eyes- even on low mode, although you can't tell that here. But in the name of science couldn't alter the settings or apply photoshop tweaks.
Medium.
Turbo. The Pilot definitely shows more of the pole than the Asgard and and EA4W on turbo. See it's floodier!
High.
The Asgard kills both lights in the hotspot intensity contest. It's logic though, because the head and reflector on that light is huge compared to the other two.
The EA4W.
Final thoughts.
Xtar refers to this as a general purpose sport light. I think flexibility is it's greatest asset. It is portable enough for a large pocket and tiny enough to fit in any backpack. It performs beautifully as a bike light, and it's resistant to the elements. Need a: glovebox, backpack, or camping light, then you've found it.
Thanks for looking everyone.
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Thanks mhanlen
