Changes in a fast pace market - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Rick Law
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 30, 2015, 01:11:55 am
content: No doubt some of us on this site may play around with flashlights. With 12 recovered laptop cells sitting on the shelf, six months ago, I decided to get some 18650 flashlight to play with. I show this not because I am unhappy about the product; true they were advertised as "CREE" but are really Latticbright LEDs, but that was expected. This is more about how theylook the same but are not. I am not referring to the LEDs but instead I am referring tothe body and the way parts are designed and fitted.These three flashlights looked the same on the sellers' web page to me, so, wanting the same for interchange-ability, I ordered them. Well, they are not the same. Again, this isnot a rant about being unhappy with the product. I am amazed at the variations. I suppose with so many manufacturers copying/imitating/faking-as others, this is to be expected.[picture 1]A closer look at them, they are very different. They are different size too!The MXDL…… (main tube) 20.5mm diameter 78.3mm lengthThe KYWD-EYE…… (main tube) 21.1mm diameter 77.9mm legthThe UltraFire…… (main tube) 22.5mm diameter 80mm lengthNope, the difference is not just wide tolerance. The design of the tube is also different.[picture 2]Note also the the metal ring secured tail-cap switch for the black UltraFire verses the plastic friction secured tail-cap switch on the other two.Another significant difference is how the zooming-head is fitted to the body. The UltraFire's O-Ring is not on the body but instead it is on the pill. The UltraFire is on the right-most in the picture below.[picture 3]Now look at the zoom head and the pill. The red one (which is also an UltraFire branded) has a shallower pill with fewer threads. The O-Ring on this pill and the paper insulation on the driver are added by me so those are not manufacturer's differences. The MXDL (in the middle) has a pill with more threads. The black UltraFire (on the right) has the zoom-head's securing O-Ring on the pill instead of the body.Left-to-Right, the red UltaFire came with a smooth top-ring. The black MXDL came with a "window-breaker" ring with 5 protrusions. The Black UltraFire with the longer zoom-head has a "window-breaker" ring with 3 bigger protrusions. (In one seller page, it was said to be the emergency car-window breaker, so I called it a "window-breaker" ring).I have the MXDL top ring installed in the red-UltraFire since my wife wanted it. So in picture 1 the MXDL has the smooth top ring.I ordered a few of those because I got the black MXDL first. My daughter wanted one, and then my wife wanted one. With three similar ones, I ordered the forth as parts donor for future needs. I wanted exactly the same thing (except color). They look the same but are not.Well, it is not just this particular kind of lights. For the next power outage, I got some larger flashlights in case I need to fix things in the dark…[picture 4]You can see that the silver one is actually quite a bit shorter than the black one. Tail-cap for the silver one is significantly shorter than the tail-cap for the black one. The silver one has the zoom-head O-Ring on the body instead of the pill. The black one has the zoom-head O-Ring on the wider part of the pill. The top ring is also different. These are the "minor differences" that the seller didn't even think of mentioning. I needed to add a few O-Rings to silver one for it to take the longer protected batteries.[picture 5]None of my flashlights are using the original LED or driver anymore. I had them all standardized on Nanjg 105c driver with home-grown firmware. They are all on "XML2-U2". The smaller flashlights has a timer that limits full-blast to 60 seconds since they don't have the metal to deal with the heat.No, this not a rant. I am not unhappy with them. In fact, I am quite happy with them. I am just amazed at how different they are when I thought I was buying something exactly alike but for color. Amazed at how a little more aluminum is stripped off (or an O-Ring skipped) to save a few tenths of a penny each revision cycle…