Tag: nitecore flashlight

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Nitecore MH12S Review (1800 Lumens, USB-C PD, 21700)

Today I have the Nitecore MH12S, this is a new model in a long light of MH series lights from Nitecore. It’s marketed as multitask hybrid series light. It produces 1800 lumens, contains a 21700 battery that’s included and is USB-C PD rechargeable. Nitecore did provide this light to me to review.

 

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Packaging & Accessories

The MH12 comes in a typical Nitecore retail package in the trademark black and yellow color scheme. Something that’s a little different is it doesn’t have the typical runtime chart on the back, only a long list of features, and on the side a list of use cases and accessories. Accessories included with the light itself is a 5000 Nitecore (non proprietary) button top 21700 battery, a 18650/CR123 Battery magazine, tactical holster, USB-A to C charging cable, lanyard, 2 spare o’rings, and a pocket clip, along with your normal paperwork. 

Construction

The MH12s is made from aluminum and anodized black. Machining & fit and finish are good, with no obvious problems detected. At the tail cap there is a quiet tall mechanical switch that protrudes and it takes some effort to actuate. The lanyard attachment point is on the rear tail cap and decent sized hole. Inside there is stiff springs at either end, and threads are anodized, fine and well lubricated. 

 

The body tube has minimal knurling but does have some on each end, you have 3 areas in the middle for the clip or tactical finger loop (not included) should you want. The body tube is glued to the head. There is a minimal anti roll ring at the front, it’ has limited effectiveness with anything but a flat surface.

The button (eswitch) on the head is aluminum as well, with a hole in the middle for power indication status, the button is relatively small and hard to find at night by feel alone, especially with gloves. There is minimal fins for heat dissipation. Opposite the button there is the USB-C charging port, the silicon cover here is well integrated and stays put without trouble. 

Up at the front there is a minimal bezel that does allow light to escape when standing on its head, it protects the anti reflective coated glass lens, and smooth bezel underneath. 

 

Size and Weight

I measured the overall length at 141mm, max diameter on the head at 29.5mm, minimum diameter on the body at 25.5mm. Weight with the included battery was 149.2g. The light is IP68 water rated and submersible to 2M along with the standard 1M of impact resistance.

It’s a long long light but within 5mm of the Thrunite TT20 and Olight M2R Pro, but narrower then both. 

 

Retention

The MH12S has quite a few retention options. It comes with a pocket clip, lanyard and a tactical hostler but is also compatible with a tactical ring that Nitecore offers separately. The pocket clip can attach facing either direction on any of the 3 ribs in the middle of the light. It’s not a deep carry clip as a good ¾ of an inch sticks op out of your pocket when put in the lowest position. My clip was slightly out of spec and doesn’t make contact with the body of the light. A little modification with some pliers should improve this situation but is a little disappointing to see on a brand new light. 

You also get a plastic belt holster that the light can be pushed into. You can put it in heads up or heads down, and it’s a tight fit. If done correctly at allows you to mount to access both the side buttons and top button from the holster. The lanyard attachment point should you choose to use that is on the tailcap. 

LED & Runtime

The light features a Luminis SST-40 W LED in cool white at 6500k. The good news here is that it’s not as blue as some older Nitecore lights which I appreciate. On ultralow and low power modes I get a slight green tinge but this disappears at higher power levels. The beam itself is small defined hotspot in the center and a large spill of less light. True to it’s name this is a nice all around beam, good for walking the dog, hiking, or more tactical uses if you wish. 

There are a handful of battery options here, the light comes with Nitecore 5000mAh 21700 battery, which will be most users primary cell, but with the battery magazine (Spacer) the light comes with it will also run 18650 and 2x CR123A batteries or RCR123. A battery capable of 8A discharge or more is needed to be able to access Turbo’s 1800 lumens or you will be limited to High’s 1050 instead. No PWM was present in this light, and I did verify this with my oscilloscope. 

 

Official outputs are listed as the following. 

  • Turbo – 1800 Lumens
  • High – 1050 Lumens
  • Mid – 300 Lumens
  • Low -50 Lumens
  • Ultra Low – 1 Lumen
  • Strobe/Beacon/SOS – 1800 Lumens

 

Heat & Runtime

I did my runtime and heat tests with the included 5000mAh Nitecore battery in uncooled conditions (More realistic). Turbo had a pretty quick step down from the 1800 lumens within the first minute and a half but it was a gradual step down and continued this trend from the 0:43:00 mark to 2:46:00 it was quite stable at 40% relative output, before it did it’s LVP warning and stepping down to 5% relative output and shutting off at 3:23:00. Max heat I saw during this time was 46C at 0:10:00.

I also ran a runtime test under the same conditions but only going to high mode, and here the light was able to sustain a much higher output for longer in comparison to turbo. Around 80% relative output or better for 3:26:00, with at total runtime of right at 4:00:00. So if you don’t need turbo this is the best mode to use for sustained output and runtime. 

 

UI

The light has 2 modes, first the daily mode which is the lights default and how I tested and then a tactical function. When in daily mode the light does have a memory function for all modes except SOS and Beacon. When in tactical it will only memorize turbo or strobe. 

 

For daily mode the light turns on with the tail switch, and then you use the e switch up front to change modes, and it cycles through all 5 non blinking modes. There are no shortcuts to jump to turbo or turn on ultralow when off. If you press and hold the mode button when on the light will go to strobe instead of cycling through modes. It’s a little different from many lights but is easy enough to understand but might be hard to remember if switching to many other lights.

 

Recharging

The MH12S has onboard USB-C charging, thats capable of being charged via USB-C to C and USB-C PD, another nice change to see. USB-C to C is finally going mainstream on flashlights. I charged the included 5000mAh Nitecore battery (non proprietary) from LVP at 2.947V to full at 4.198V in 3.5 hours. Max charging rate I saw was 1.9A at the 1:30 mark. The charging curve here looks a little funny with a lot of drops to near zero as detected by my meter, this also caused it to cut a little short the graph. I don’t think this is a problem for charging the cell just a bit different. The light will also charge 18560’s with the adapter if you want to. 

Pro

  • Simple interface but lacks shortcuts to moon or turbo.
  • Good all around beam
  • Not as cool white as past Nitecore Lights.
  • Wide selection of compatible batteries (21700, 18650, CR123A, RCR123A).

 

Cons

  • Seems long
  • Pocket clip did not make contact with the body without modification and it’s deep carry
  • Only one LED and tint option
  • UI has no practical shortcuts, requires cycling through brighter modes to go lower. 

 

Conclusion

The Nitecore MH12S is a solid general use light. I like that NItecore has taken a step away from ultra blue emitters but do wish they would offer a more neutral or warm tint option, in the MH series of lights since I believe these better represent the multifunction roll the lights were designed for. 

This isn’t a light I will probably EDC in my pockets due to the clip design and relatively long nature of the light, I do like it’s slim nature though. I think this is a better jacket pocket light or utilize the holster it comes with. The UI here isn’t my favorite but I can live with it. Overall I like the beam profile here of the light, and with the 21700 it has a great runtime, and it’s super great to see USB-C being implemented with full support and PD support. 

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Nitecore HC35 Review (2700 Lumens, Quad LED, 21700 Battery, Headlamp)

Nitecore has a new large format headlamp on the market, with 4 LED, and a diffused lens. It runs a 21700 battery, and has onboard microUSB for recharging. While designed as a headlamp I am going to come at this one from the angle of a worklight too. Thanks to Nitecore Store for sending this to me to look at and review. I will have a link to them in the description below. 

 

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Packaging and Accessories

Packaging is a large yellow retail hanging box, with photos of the lights and lots of stats throughout. Inside the light and accessories site in a plastic shell.

Accessories include the HC35 with the Nitecore button top 21700 4000mAH battery (NL2140HP), pocket clip, Nitecore branded headband, spare o-rings, micro USB cable, manual, warranty, 18650 adapter. Somewhat strangely no extra USB port cover was included and I actually broke mine during testing. (My fault, not Nitecore’s)

 

Construction

The light is made from anodized aluminum, and machining here is pretty good. Starting at the tail cap, it’s flat, magnetic and labeled accordingly. The tailcap has shallow diamond knurling on it that doesn’t add a ton of texture but enough. 

The body tube features the same knurling and is not reversible. The clip only attaches at the head of the light. 

The light is attached to the headband on one side via a spring steel clip, similar to how a clip on clip works. It’s easy to take on and off and allows for the light to be attached without taking off the pocket clip (Nice) which makes charging easier but it doesn’t take a ton to make the heavy light come loose from an accidental smack or bump. For hiking or house work it’s ok, but I want to see something more secure ideally especially if you were caving/climbing with the light. That said when using this more as a work light rather then a headlamp it’s a handy feature to be able to remove it easily. I used it to change some brakes on a car recently and it was nice to pull off and use as an area flood light. For heavier duty situations a zip tie or even rubber band on the other end of the light would make it more secure.

The head features a fairly large lens, with the 4 LED’s under it. It has a optic sitting on top of the LED with a textured diffuser on top to really even out that beam pattern. Everything is surrounded by a silver aluminum bezel. On top there is a textured rubber button, with a pround silver bezel to help locate it. This does allow the light head stand. This button is a little hard to push if you have on larger gloves. On the back there are 3 deeply milled groves for heat dissipation. Lastly the microUSB port is on the light covered with a gray silicone rubber cover. The head has minimal labeling of just the serial number, model number and various regulatory symbols.

Size and Weight

I measured the length at 128mm, minimum diameter on the body was 26mm, maximum diameter at the head was 30mm. Weight with the battery, came in at 172.3g. The headstrap alone weighs in at 41g. This is fairly heavy. It’s a big headlamp, especially when you put it next it’s 18650 counterparts kind of like the Olight Perun I recently reviewed. 

Comfort when used as a headlamp is ok for a couple of hours. Past that the weight kind of starts to get to you in the forehead. Nitecore could add a bit more padding on the back of the bracket to help with this. I do like that the headbands webbing has ventilation holes. 

Retention

For me this isn’t a light I want to EDC in my front pockets, it’s just too big for that. The pocket clip can mount on either end of the light. When mounted nearest the head about 25mm of the light sticks up, when mounted at the tail, the clip extends past the tail and renders the magnet less useful. The balance point of the light is nearer the head so to keep from having to move the clip each time you mount the light to the strap, it really should go at the tail. 

LED | Beam Shots | Heat

The light is using 4x Cree XP-G3 S3 LED. Tint is pretty cool white. The S3 varient has less green tint, but at lower powers it’s still noticeable. The optics and diffuser here do a very good job of making the 4 leds one uniform floody beam. Perfect for this type of application. I didn’t detect any PWM via eye or my scope. 

Official modes and spacing are listed at 

  • 1 Lumen – Ultra Low
  • 40 Lumens – Low
  • 270 Lumens – Mid
  • 800 Lumens – High
  • 2700 Lumens Turbo, Strobe, Beacon, SOS

 

Runtime

This is really a light designed for longer outputs. Turbo starts decreasing at the 30 second mark and it declines pretty rapidly down to high at 800 lumens. This is disappointing that it’s so short, I would have hoped to get a couple minutes out of turbo output here given the size of the light and relative conservative heat values. From here it mostly maintains this while sagging a little for about 140 minutes, then over the next 20 minutes or so you see 2 large stepdowns and the light runs in low and ultra low for the remainder of time about 475 minutes, till it LVP kicks in at 2.947v. Heat was fairly well controlled, at 1 minute I saw 95F, at 5 minutes 97.8F, and at 10 minutes 101F. 

 

UI

UI here is different different, with fewer shortcuts. It’s a quick press to turn on, and then quick single presses to go up in brightness, and all solid modes are available, ultra low through turbo. Long press to turn off. You have short cuts to low when the light is off, a short press gives you 1 lumen. To directly access turbo from off press the button for more then 1 second. When the light is on there is no way to access turbo directly. 

 

To access the blinking modes double press the button when the light is off, then short presses changes the mode. Long press to exit blinking modes. 

 

Recharging

Charge time from LVP at 2.947V to Full at 4.12V on the included Nitecore 4000mAh 21700 battery was 2 hours and 41 minutes at a maximum of 2.1A via MicroUSB. Charge curve here looked normal, and I have no complaints. It’s nice here that with the included cell adapter the light will also charge an 18650 battery. During charging the blue LED on top will flash, and when charged it goes solid. This LED is also used as a voltage indicator when the light is in use. 

I do wish the light came with an extra port cover (my first time needing one due to my mistake). Also being a new design and a large capacity battery the light would see a benefit from USB-C.

 

Pro’s

  • Blinking modes are not part of the normal operating modes.
  • Very even diffused light but quite cool tint.
  • Direct access to low from off
  • Nice it can run off of 21700, 18650 and 2x CR123 with the included adapters. 
  • No proprietary cables or batteries needed, but it’s still MicroUSB 🙁

 

Con’s

  • Cree XP-G3 emitters isn’t what I would expect to find on something in this price range and I am not a fan of the tint.
  • Turbos 2700 lumen output has a very short duration, only 30 seconds.
  • Long press to turn off keeps tricking my brain. 
  • Wish it had an additional clip to secure the light in the headband for added security
  • Anodizing doesn’t seem to be the most durable, especially around the clip.

 

Conclusion

The Nitecore HC35 is a big bright light. I tend to think of it more as a worklight then a headlamp but it does both jobs fairly well. It’s a bit heavier than I want to use as a headlamp longer term, but what you pay for in weight you get in runtime. With the strong magnet and very floody beam it works good as a work light to stick onto a metal object or tail stand on it’s flat base. 

 

UI here is easy but different from a lot of other lights so I can see people fumbling a little around on this one initially. It’s different having turbo as part of your main mode. I do wish turbo could sustain itself for longer, 30 seconds just isn’t very long. Overall this is an interesting combination of headlamp and worklight. Let me know what you think of the HC35 in the comments. 

 

Full Image Gallery https://imgur.com/a/HWZh9yX

To purchase the Nitecore HC35 Headlamp, visit Nitecore Store at http://bit.ly/2HGp8rP