Colinsdad
Newly Enlightened
- Joined
- Jul 13, 2010
- Messages
- 66
First of all, a huge Thank You to Dora and the staff at GearBest for not only entertaining my queries on these lights, but, for sending me some samples for testing! I wanted to know how these VERY low cost lights perform against some well-established brands we know quite well. Now, before we get to the good stuff, let me throw some caveats out there about my testing protocols.
I do not possess the wonderful accoutrements that Selfbuilt and HJK have for reading PWM, runtimes and the like, so I keep things simple: I do have a simple light meter that measures in Lux, have a backyard and neighbors that are used to seeing me playing around with lights, so, I can provide some decent beamshots for comparisons sake. Now that's out of the way, onto the good stuff.
The first test is the Big Boys: The 5XML-U2 SkyRay against the Nitecore TM11. Both lights were run with freshly charged 18650s, Ultrafire 5000 MaHs to be exact. Why not AWs or IMRs? Simple. Because neither light runs with flattops, and because I only have 2 IMR 18650s in my inventory. Mind you, at 32$, I frankly wasn't expecting much. But, as you will see from the beamshots, the SkyRay certainly holds it's own against the TM11.
Here's a pic of the two lights, side by side:
Here's a pic of the light disassembled:
The SkyRay on High- at 48" I measured 815 lux, which roughly translates into 3700 lumens
Here's the TM11 on high, I measured 670 lux, which roughly translates into 2900 lumens (btw, on turbo, it's 912 lux, or 4200 lumens)
For some reason, I can't get the code to work for low level shots, but, the TM11 is much lower than the SkyRay. Now, onto the little guys.
Here's the Eiger Ultra X on the left and the Singfire to the right with a 10440 for scale:
The Singfire is pretty small and inexpensive at 7.97$:
Ready for 10440:
Here it is on High....it's one mode. Now, you can't tell, but this light has a very warm emitter and throws a decent beam- I managed 44 lux or 205 lumens :
Here's the overacheiving Peak(85 lux or 395 lumens) with a fully compressed QTC:
All in all, for the VERY reasonable price point, both of these lights deserve a closer look for those on a budget. Mods, if you'd like to move this to Reviews, feel free to do so.
Chris
I do not possess the wonderful accoutrements that Selfbuilt and HJK have for reading PWM, runtimes and the like, so I keep things simple: I do have a simple light meter that measures in Lux, have a backyard and neighbors that are used to seeing me playing around with lights, so, I can provide some decent beamshots for comparisons sake. Now that's out of the way, onto the good stuff.
The first test is the Big Boys: The 5XML-U2 SkyRay against the Nitecore TM11. Both lights were run with freshly charged 18650s, Ultrafire 5000 MaHs to be exact. Why not AWs or IMRs? Simple. Because neither light runs with flattops, and because I only have 2 IMR 18650s in my inventory. Mind you, at 32$, I frankly wasn't expecting much. But, as you will see from the beamshots, the SkyRay certainly holds it's own against the TM11.
Here's a pic of the two lights, side by side:
Here's a pic of the light disassembled:
The SkyRay on High- at 48" I measured 815 lux, which roughly translates into 3700 lumens
Here's the TM11 on high, I measured 670 lux, which roughly translates into 2900 lumens (btw, on turbo, it's 912 lux, or 4200 lumens)
For some reason, I can't get the code to work for low level shots, but, the TM11 is much lower than the SkyRay. Now, onto the little guys.
Here's the Eiger Ultra X on the left and the Singfire to the right with a 10440 for scale:
The Singfire is pretty small and inexpensive at 7.97$:
Ready for 10440:
Here it is on High....it's one mode. Now, you can't tell, but this light has a very warm emitter and throws a decent beam- I managed 44 lux or 205 lumens :
Here's the overacheiving Peak(85 lux or 395 lumens) with a fully compressed QTC:
All in all, for the VERY reasonable price point, both of these lights deserve a closer look for those on a budget. Mods, if you'd like to move this to Reviews, feel free to do so.
Chris
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