Olight S10R Baton II reliability or lack thereof

Anybody else having problems with this model? I'm on my 2nd one and now this one is failing just like the first one. It just randomly decides to not work correctly at some point in its lifetime. The first one crapped out in a week and the replacement is only about a month old now and acting up. I can't switch modes and when turning on the flashlight it just flickers. Tried different batteries but rechargeable and non rechargeable. Then it will just start mysteriously working again in a day or two. I sent an email into Olight direct this time to see what they do. This is my first Olight purchase and will likely be my last, definitely not EDC material.

Same here. On my third. First two just stopped working. I will say their customer service has been great, very quick turn around on warranty.

They're sending me a new tailcap. I guess they know something I don't but it sure acts like there's something wrong with the electronics. We'll see.

Now I'm just going on 4+ months with mine and can't be happier.
No issues,,,,,,, yet (?)

Lateck,

I gifted one to a co worker and it quit. Only used for a month.

The tailcap's center charging pin is pushed outwards by a small spring. While charging, or even while in your pocket, gunk and lint can collect between the tailcap and this center pin. I own two S10R-II's, and both need regular maintenance on the tailcap to function properly. To clean the contact area, all you need is:

• point-tip tweezers (not too sharp)
• isopropyl alcohol
• cotton swabs (the kind you clean your ears with)

Use the tweezers to unscrew the retaining ring out of the tailcap. After that, it should be possible to remove the little round plate with the tailcap springs on it. When that is removed, you can push out the center pin. Clean that, and the area it sat in with a cotton swab dipped in alcohol.
Wait for it to dry, place the pin and plate back in the tailcap, and then screw the retaining ring in with the tweezers. This should resolve the contact issues in the tailcap.
While this works for me every time, the S10R-II is not reliable enough for my taste, and I now EDC a Zebralight SC600-III instead.
From what I heard, newer rechargeable Olights have the spring in the charger instead of the tailcap, so they shouldn't have this issue.

oKtosiTe said:

The tailcap's center charging pin is pushed outwards by a small spring. While charging, or even while in your pocket, gunk and lint can collect between the tailcap and this center pin. I own two S10R-II's, and both need regular maintenance on the tailcap to function properly. To clean the contact area, all you need is:

• point-tip tweezers (not too sharp)
• isopropyl alcohol
• cotton swabs (the kind you clean your ears with)

Use the tweezers to unscrew the retaining ring out of the tailcap. After that, it should be possible to remove the little round plate with the tailcap springs on it. When that is removed, you can push out the center pin. Clean that, and the area it sat in with a cotton swab dipped in alcohol.
Wait for it to dry, place the pin and plate back in the tailcap, and then screw the retaining ring in with the tweezers. This should resolve the contact issues in the tailcap.
While this works for me every time, the S10R-II is not reliable enough for my taste, and I now EDC a Zebralight SC600-III instead.
From what I heard, newer rechargeable Olights have the spring in the charger instead of the tailcap, so they shouldn't have this issue.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the information. I will try this.

NickelPlate said:

Thanks for the information. I will try this.

Click to expand...

Good luck, getting the retaining ring back in place can be a bit finicky, but it gets easier with practice.

I disassembled the tail and cleaned all contacts thoroughly and all is good with mine. It does need regular maintenance as do most lights though. FWIW mine took a 7 foot drop to the concrete floor and still works fine.

oKtosiTe said:

Good luck, getting the retaining ring back in place can be a bit finicky, but it gets easier with practice.

Click to expand...

That worked BTW. Thanks for the tip! It's a pain but at least the light is working again. I guess that's the price to pay for having the convenience of just dropping this thing in the charge cradle at the end of the day.

Hehe, too high a price IMHO. I'm actually considering voiding my warranty and soldering shut the charging pin hole and just turning it into a regular flashlight.

I have used mine everyday, and have had issues with it just shutting off randomly. Then it went through the washer and dryer and one of my vendors dropped it off a ladder onto concrete, ever since that happened its worked great no issues at all, go figure.

I've had nothing but great luck with all of my Olight brand lights. Currently have the S1, S2, S2 copper, S10RII, S15R, S30RII, and a little i3s, and all of them have performed their edc tasks without a hiccup. I hope I continue to have good luck with them because I think that Olight puts out some very nice high quality lights.

I've had no issues whatsoever with my S10R Baton II. Received it last Christmas. Charged it to full, and have used it anywhere from several seconds to several minutes each day and have not had to charge it yet. I also have not had any reliability issues thus far. Keep in mind I don't keep it on the higher two settings for very long. I use it as my EDC flashlight and have not had to clean the inside at all. Though I do like to wipe the lens every so often. I also have not dropped it any significant distance.

Either way, I love it so far and my cousin recently bought the S10R Baton III. He will put it through much harsher paces than myself, so I will respond if he has any good or bad results.

Warden64 said:

Charged it to full, and have used it anywhere from several seconds to several minutes each day and have not had to charge it yet. I also have not had any reliability issues thus far.

Click to expand...

I think that's where the difference lies. I recharged the light on a daily basis. That allowed a small amount of gunk/lint/dust to enter the tailcap charging "hole" every day, therefore accumulating much faster. Every time you place the light on the charger, the center pin in the tailcap gets pushed inwards, creating a small crevice around the pin where gunk can enter. When the center pin loses contact, the light won't turn on..

This is why I'm not fond of built in charging - more points of entry for foreign objects

GarageBoy said:

This is why I'm not fond of built in charging - more points of entry for foreign objects

Click to expand...

In truth later models moved the moving parts from the light to the charger, hopefully making this less of an issue.

I had one as well, and it failed in less than a month, so it was returned. I've had an S1 baton which has had no issues in over a year.

The S1r baton looks cool, but does anyone know if Olights proprietary charging lights like the S1r baton, the headlamp, etc have had issues similar to the s10r baton II?

I've both the S10R Baton II and S30R Baton II. After several months the S10R started giving trouble charging when placed on its base (I know that each has a slightly different base and can't be interchanged between the lights). The LED on the S10's charging base would turn yellow almost immediately upon placing the light on it, even though I knew the battery was weak. I've been using either my Nitecore 4-bay or XTAR VC2 Plus 2-bay charger to charge my Olight RCR123As or 18650s.
I tried charging the S10R last week on its base and again it turned yellow immediately. I tried turning the light on and it would only flicker, and it wouldn't turn on at all with regular CR123s.
I tried unscrewing the retaining ring in the base cap but couldn't get it to budge so I just put the battery back in and then sent a message to Olight on their "contact us" page to explain my situation.
For the heck of it I just tried turning on the light and what do you know, it seems to be working again! I'll monitor its performance but thanks for the tips!

oKtosiTe said:

The tailcap's center charging pin is pushed outwards by a small spring. While charging, or even while in your pocket, gunk and lint can collect between the tailcap and this center pin. I own two S10R-II's, and both need regular maintenance on the tailcap to function properly. To clean the contact area, all you need is:

• point-tip tweezers (not too sharp)
• isopropyl alcohol
• cotton swabs (the kind you clean your ears with)

Use the tweezers to unscrew the retaining ring out of the tailcap. After that, it should be possible to remove the little round plate with the tailcap springs on it. When that is removed, you can push out the center pin. Clean that, and the area it sat in with a cotton swab dipped in alcohol.
Wait for it to dry, place the pin and plate back in the tailcap, and then screw the retaining ring in with the tweezers. This should resolve the contact issues in the tailcap.
While this works for me every time, the S10R-II is not reliable enough for my taste, and I now EDC a Zebralight SC600-III instead.
From what I heard, newer rechargeable Olights have the spring in the charger instead of the tailcap, so they shouldn't have this issue.

Click to expand...

Funny I just disassembled my s10rii's tailcap exactly as described above BEFORE seeing this post.

I have the s10ii for several years and it suddenly stopped working about two years ago and just put it in a bin. Earlier I saw the baton and figured I try to assess and check if it will still work seeing that the body, led, and battery are all intact and still in pristine condition.

Lo and behold, after being able to disassemble the tail cap, clean, and reassemble it, it just worked again after all this years.

Initially I thought the led is fried or the chip inside. But when I removed the tail cap, I figured I could tap and directly connect the negative side of the battery directly to the main body so I can eliminate body/led/chip problem and isolate it to the tail cap. When I tapped it using "jumper cables", basically metal tweezers, the torch turned on. That's when I figured it's a tailcap problem.

I believe olight figured this is a design problem and have corrected it with newer tailcap design and battery orientation. The batin series I believe is discontinued already.

Anyway, just happy with my resurrected s10r!

Sent from my INE-LX2r using Tapatalk