Tag: mini thrower

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Wurkkos TS12 Review (Budget Pocket Thrower!)

Today I am taking a look at the Wurkkos TS12, a small pocket thrower with onboard USB-C charging. It’s using a new YLX N3535B round LED and is powered by a 14500 battery all for a bargain price. Thanks to Wurkkos for sending this to me to review any discounts or coupons I have will be in the description.

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Get your own Wurkkos TS12 for a discount at https://wurkkos.com/products/wurkkos-ts12-mini-edc-flashlight,-1050lm-432meters-powerful-rechargeable-light-with-bezel?DIST=REJCFVQ%3D&VariantsId=11017

 

Packaging & Accessories

Wurkkos packaging on recent models has been a lot nicer and this is no exception, it’s a full color slip with technical specs on the back over a white box with magnetic closures, a sticker on the end of the box let’s you know what the specs of your model are. The light ships with a few accessories, a generic lanyard, 2 spare orings for the tail cap, and USB-A to USB-C charging cable. You can get it with a 900mAh 14500 for an additional $2 which is worth doing in my opinion.

 

Construction & Design

The TS12 is made from 6061 aluminum and anodized in black. The light is a mini thrower and has a form factor similar to the Lumintop GTmini, but with a bit more of a tactical feel. The tailcap is flat and magnetic so it tailstands without a problem. In the hand the deeper groves provide decent grip for a light with no knurling on it. There is only a spring in the tail cap, threads are standard ACME cut and the head and body tube are all one piece. 

The button has a silicone cover, with an LED in it’s center that’s used for a charge status indicator. The USB charging port on the rear is small, not all your USB-C cables will fit due to width restrictions. The front bezel is aluminum I believe and anodized in a gunmetal finish and glued in place. The front lens is thick glass, and below it is a deep smooth reflector with a small round LED in the center. 

 

UI

The light has two UI modes, a stepped that it ships in by default and a ramping option that you can switch to. Stepped mode is a very traditional flashlight interface, simple click to turn on, long press to go up through the 3 main modes, double press to go to turbo, and triple press to go to the blinking modes. Once in the blinking modes, you can double press to move between strobe, SOS, and Beacon modes. The light also has moon mode which you can access from off by long pressing. 

 

To switch to ramping mode when on click 4 times to switch between mode groups, the light will flashlight to confirm. 

 

Ramping mode works like you think with double click to turbo, and triple click to strobe although when ramping if you hit peak output the light will reset down to low instead of stopping. Not idea IMHO.

 

Retention

For retention, there is a small lanyard hole in the tailcap for the included generic lanyard. The light looks like it’s designed for a clip to attach at the rear however one is not included. I like it’s slightly longer length than the GTNano I have since the body tube is a little longer. 

 

Size & Weight

I measured the length at 90.9mm, body diameter at 20mm, and head diameter at 33mm. Weight with the battery came in at 2.61oz. The light is IPX8 water rated and drop rated for 1M. 

 

LED & Beam

The Wurkkos TS12 is using a new LED the YLX N3535B  which is round instead of square. There isn’t much information available for this LED that I can find, but from testing, I can tell you my example is 5536k and 57Ra on my Opple Meter. Its tint is more yellow in DUV than we see from most other LED’s. To my eye, it looks yellow-green but that doesn’t show up on the meter much. In a thrower, we typically don’t care as much about high CRI so this isn’t as big of deal. It’s something I would notice though if using it on something reflective like snow. The beam has a small hot center, and a few diffused rings in it. The spill has a small area around the hot spot where it’s reasonably intense and then a huge drop-off for everything past that. I don’t notice much of a difference here with the LED being round vs. square and having optics. There is fast PWM in the light.

 

Outputs

My measured outputs (On my TexasAce LumenTube) were generally pretty close to what was claimed by Wurkkos for the TS12.The exception was Turbo at the standard FL1 reading of 30 seconds was 844 lumens instead of the 1050 lumens claimed. I saw 1050 lumens but only on the very initial startup output. 

 

Heat & Runtime

Turbo stepdown on the TS12 is pretty significant and occurs pretty quickly. It goes from a peak near 1050 lumens to around 300 lumens in 90 seconds. I do wish it could sustain more lumens for longer. Peak heat was around the 15-minute mark at 46C which is warm but won’t burn you. Around the 35-minute mark on out to an hour, the light began to sea saw in output, too slowly to see with the eye but enough to see in the graph before running on low. While the light stayed on (but in a very low output) for another 90 minutes, when starting in turbo the effective useful runtime is about an hour. Starting in High, you got a lot of more of this sea saw output much sooner and a little bump in effective runtime. In medium, it did about 3:20:00 of total runtime and no sea saw output. 

 

Recharging

A couple of notes on charging with the TS12. I found the USB-C port to be a bit narrow, the ID of a USB-C port is 8.1mm wide while the width of the surrounding aluminum for this recessed port is only 11mm so you can’t use a particularly wide cable or an adapter to get there in my experience. The included battery rated at 900mAh and I tested it at 881mAh on my Vapcell S4 Plus charger. This isn’t a light where a high drain battery is required. Charging itself was without issue, and it charged fine with PD charging. I record the light charging in exactly 90 minutes at a maximum charge rate of 0.84A. Full the battery measured at 4.12v which is a little low. LVP kicked in at 2.980v.

 

Conclusion

Pocket throwers have a more limited niche use in a lot of situations. It’s made it hard to justify on price sometimes, but the Wurkkos TS12 delivers a solid mini thrower, with solid performance for a budget price. It’s an easy light to recommend in the pocket thrower class without a lot of strong negatives.

 

Get your own Wurkkos TS12 for a discount at https://wurkkos.com/products/wurkkos-ts12-mini-edc-flashlight,-1050lm-432meters-powerful-rechargeable-light-with-bezel?DIST=REJCFVQ%3D&VariantsId=11017

 

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Thrunite Catapult Mini V2 Review (1100 Lumens, 515 Meters of throw, 18350)

Today I’m taking a look at the new Thrunite Catapult Mini V2. Now if you have watched my channel for a while you will know I really liked the original Catapult Mini and it’s probably my go to small thrower flashlight so I was excited when Thrunite said they had an updated model coming out. It’s using an SFT40 LED that’s brighter than the original light and a different optic setup, so lets see if it’s an improvement or not. Thanks to Thrunite for sending this to me to look at and review.

 

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Get the Thrunite Catapult Mini V2 at Amazon with the links below.

Desert Tan https://amzn.to/3oD2ee6 use code LXDG4Y7L to save 15%

Black https://amzn.to/3N1xbln Click the coupon on the page to save 15%

 

Packaging & Accessories

Standard Thrunite packaging here, the signature brown cardboard box with just the logo on the front and the line drawing on the side, opposite that is the indicator for the body color and LED tint. Inside the light is nicely protected with black foam. Accessories are the light itself, USB-A to C Charging cable, proprietary 18350 1100mAh battery, and a bag of extra o’rings, button, recharging port, and branded lanyard.

 

Construction & Design

V2 shares some similar design characteristics with V1 in roughly the same shapes but with a little different style. The light is made from 6061 aluminum and is available in two colors currently, a standard black and a Desert Tan that I have here. The V2 is slightly longer by about 4.5mm in length. The V2 to me feels more like most of the recent Thrunite Designs with a lanyard attachment point on the flat tail, allowing the light to tail stand. The grip on the body is a combination of very fine-milled lines, and then 5 milled flats around the side. The head has the standard Thrunite flat metal button with an LED Battery indicator in the middle and a standard USB Port cover opposite that. That head grows in size with a cone and a more traditional flat screw-off bezel that’s not glued in place. The V2 is using a traditional smooth deep reflector where as the V1 used a TIR-style optic and this has a pretty big difference in the beam pattern as we will see later. 

 

Retention

Retention options here are limited, as the light doesn’t have a clip, nor comes with a holster. It does come with a lanyard that attaches to the tail if you wish. The light does tailstand but that’s less useful with a thrower like this in my opinion. I do like the size of the light in my hand, and find it pretty comfortable to use. The tail is nonmagnetic.

 

Size & Weight

I measured the length at 85.81mm, the diameter of the head at 40.4mm, diameter of the body at 26mm. Weight with the battery installed came to 4.06oz. The light is drop rated to 1.5M, and waterproof to 2M (IPX8). Here is a photo comparing it to the Catapult Mini V1 and the Lumintop GT Nano all small form factor throwers. 

 

LED & Beam

The Catapult Mini V2 is using a SFT40 LED that I measured on my Opple meter at 5835k and 65 CRI, so more on the cool white spectrum and low CRI. DUV had no undesirable tints to it. This LED is combined with a traditional smooth reflector where as the V1 used a unique TIR style optic. The result is the beam patterns are quite different. Where the V1 was all throw, and basically no spill, the V2 has a very bright hot center (with a bit of a donut at closer ranges), and a bit of spill. This makes the V2 somewhat better as more of a general-purpose light rather than only a thrower. 

 

V2

 

V1

 

Outputs

Outputs here on the Catapult Mini V2 were generally higher then claimed when measured on my TexasAce lumen tube at the 30 second mark. This isn’t something I mind at all, a nice little benefit.

One other thing to note here on outputs is the candela rating or throw, the V1 was rated at 89,600 candela and 598 meters of throw. The V2 is rated at 66,150 candela and 515 meters of throw, so slightly less throw than the outgoing model, but you are giving that up for a bit more spill to make the light a little more useful as well as a brighter output in all modes.

 

Heat & Runtime

I will let the graphs do the majority of the talking here on this section. Turbo runtime lasts 90 seconds in my testing, stepping down to 400 lumens. This corresponds to the thermals that I measured on the outside of the light at 34C. It was able to run at this level for 1:20:00, with peak heat increasing to about 39C on the outside of the light. Skipping turbo and just going with high nets you another 6 minutes of total runtime, and running on just medium gives you 3:30:00 of total runtime.

 

User Interface

The Catapult Mini V2 is using Thrunight’s standard UI that they use with basically all of their lights. It has 3 modes during normal operations and shortcuts to Firefly and Turbo. To get to Firefly from off, just long press for about 1 second. For Turbo double press in any mode, and for strobe triple press. For the main modes once on just long press to cycle between them. The light does have memory and will remember only the main modes. There are 2 lockout methods with the light, first is electronic lockout which you can do by long pressing the button for 4 seconds when off, and the same to unlock it. The LED will breathe fading in and out when it’s locked out with this method. Or my personal favorite is just to mechanically lock it out by slightly unscrewing the body from the head to break contact. 

 

Recharging & Power

The Catapult Mini V2 comes with a Thrunite branded semi-proprietary 1100mAh 18350 battery. I tested this battery at 1181mAh in my Vapcell S4 Plus charger. What makes the battery proprietary is the plastic ring around the positive contact on the battery and the fact that there is both positive and negative contacts on the positive end. However, the Catapult Mini V2 only uses positive contact meaning a button top 18350 that’s long enough works here too.

Using the onboard USB-C charging port I was able to charge the light from LVP at 2.903V to full at 4.191V in 3 hours 3 minutes. Now this is a pretty slow charging speed of about 0.5A and only about 1/2C. So it’s super conservative given the battery capacity. I had no issues here charging with a USB-C PD charger either. 

 

Conclusion

I think it’s debatable if the Catapult Mini V2 is really an upgrade here, while it is brighter, and the beam is more useful as a general-purpose flashlight, it’s slightly not as good as the original at being a thrower, which was what is so impressive about the original. That said the V2 is more useful daily because of the spill and the throw is nearly as far. The SFT40 has a slightly cool white tint with no negative tints which is nice to see. 

 

I do like the design of the V2 light slightly better with the improved grip and lanyard attachment points. The rest is pretty similar and unchanged. While I am a little disappointed a proprietary battery shipped with the light, i’m glad it’s not required to function and that normal small button, button top works here or a standard battery with a magnet if needed.

I can definitely recommend picking up a Catapult mini, now which version I think comes down to how you plan to use it, and the V2 for me probably gets the slight edge over V1 just because it is more useful in more scenarios with the increase in spill. That said let me know what you guys think is the better light to go with and why in the comments below. If I have any discounts those will be in the description of the video along with links to my socials. 

 

Get the Thrunite Catapult Mini V2 at Amazon with the links below.

Desert Tan https://amzn.to/3oD2ee6 use code LXDG4Y7L to save 15%

Black https://amzn.to/3N1xbln Click the coupon on the page to save 15%

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Thrunite Catapult Mini Review (680 Lumens, 89,000 Candela, 18350)

Today I have a shortened review of the new Thrunite Catapult Mini, a handheld thrower running an Osram LED and a 18350 battery. While not super bright in number off lumens, the light really throws well for its very small size. Thanks to Thrunite for sending this to me to take a quick look at and review.

 

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Get the Thrunite Catapult Mini on Amazon (Save 20% by clicking the coupon on the page)

Gray https://amzn.to/3ma0JAD

Black https://amzn.to/3yEHWAA

ThruNite Store: https://amzn.to/37zrsOj

 

Accessories

Packaging is the standard Thrunite box. Here is a photo of all the accessories the light comes with. It’s nice to see them include the spare button and port covers still, that’s not something every manufacture is still doing in 2021. 

 

Short overview of construction

The Catapult mini is available in 2 colors black and gray, and I have gray here. It’s made from 6061 T6 aluminum and nicely anodized. Despite it’s small size, they didn’t skimp out on machining quality. The light separates into 3 pieces easily, and it does stand on it’s flat, non magnetic tail. The body tube has the squares milled into it like we saw on the Thrunite TT20 but deeper, and it’s non reversible. 

The body head section uses the standard Thrunite button with LED indicator in the center, and USB-C charging port opposite with a silicone cover. The head itself is the largest part of the light, with a small flat bezel. The bezel does unscrew easily to remove the lens and optic, which should make this light fairly easy to mod if you wish. 

The Lens itself is covered by glass, with a plastic TIR style optic below. This optic reminds me of some of them I have seen on some of my larger Acebeams as well, it helps diffuse the beam a bit but still create that nice hot center and throw. 

 

Comparison with other lights

LED & Beam

The light is using an Osram KW.CSLNM1.TG in Cool white, but to my eyes it’s definitely more neutral than cold. The beam is extremely focused, it has the slightest amount of spill that fades very smoothly without artifacts. It’s a great beam profile for a mini thrower. No PWM was observed on any of the 5 modes.

 

Outputs are listed officially at 

  • Turbo – 680 Lumens
  • High – 235 Lumens
  • Medium – 96 Lumens
  • Low – 21 Lumens
  • Firefly – 0.5 Lumens
  • Strobe – 680 Lumens
  • 89,600 Candela

Night Shots

Heat and Runtime

Turbo on this light lasted for 1 minute before step down, maximum temp was reached at 1:30 at 35C so it gets warm pretty quickly but not in the danger zone. From there the light steps down to about 35% relative output where it will run for 2 hours before running in firefly mode for another 30 minutes or so. Total runtime was 2:30:00. Nothing here surprising. 

 

UI & Recharge

The UI here is standard Thrunite, 3 main modes with firefly at the bottom, and turbo at the top with memory for the main modes. Long press from off to access firefly, double click to access turbo, triple click to access strobe. 

Recharging is accomplished with the onboard USB-C port. It is incompatible with C to C charging or PD charging and requires an A to C charging cable that’s supplied. This is disappointing in 2021. Charging is on the conservative time, it took 2 hours even to charge the included 1100mAh 18350 battery from LVP at 3.035V to full at 4.145v. Total charge rate was about 0.6A. While charging you can use all modes on the light.

One quick note about the battery, it has the positive and negative terminal on the one end of the battery like you see with many brands these days. However in this case you don’t actually need it to use or charge the battery in the light. That’s great news. I tested with a flat top unprotected Keeppower battery and had no issues.

Conclusion

Pocket thrower flashlights seem to be the popular type this year. I found the Thrunite Catapult Mini to be a good performer, especially for it’s size. While not the brightest in terms of lumens it really does throw impressively. I seem to say this a lot but non flashlight people will be impressed with how far you can reach with such a small light. I remember using a 6D Cell Maglight as a kid because it could go so far, it was huge and weighed a ton. This little light outperforms it in all ways, at a pretty affordable price. 

 

I do wish Thrunite would go back to offering more Neutral and even Warm LED tints when they launch new products. They were one of the only manufactures doing this but have seemed to get away from it recently. That said I would call the tint here pretty neutral, so about perfect despite the box saying cool white. 

 

I like the Thrunite Catapult Mini and can recommend it. Everyone needs a pocket thrower, and this is a good choice thats a lot of fun, and comes in a color other then black, if you want that. Thrunite has good customer support too should you ever need it, and best yet it’s on sale for around the $40 price point at the time of filming this video. So if your interested please check the link in the description to see where you can purchase it at. 

 

Get the Thrunite Catapult Mini on Amazon (Save 20% by clicking the coupon on the page)

Gray https://amzn.to/3ma0JAD

Black https://amzn.to/3yEHWAA

ThruNite Store: https://amzn.to/37zrsOj