this post was submitted on 09 Aug 2024
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flashlight

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Portable illumination

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This tiny little light is truly a joy! For under thirty bucks, you get a prettty solid light with fairly nice specs. Sporting an 800 mAh 16340 battery, it's nice and compact while also managing to include on-board charging through the included USB-C cable. The two-way pocket clip is only about half the length of the light. Initially I was a bit concerned by the relatively short length of the clip, but the retention is very strong, it actually requires some tugging to make it loose enough to be usable.

The light rocks the Anduril 2 UI, and that combined with the 16340 battery makes it a somewhat unusual piece- I'm not sure I've seen any other Anduril lights using the same battery type. You could say "Cornflake, this light is a few years old now, what makes this light relevant?" I simply think it's nice to have more options in the small light on Anduril category. It's not as pretty as my Emisar D3AA which has the newest and most impressive version of Anduril 2, but I was in the market for another little light and this fit the bill. I have not handled the Wurkkos TS10 V2 yet, but I've seen some disappointing posts about parasitic drain that is unusually fast. I have not encountered that issue on this light or the D3AA though, it seems capable of holding a charge on standby pretty well. ALSO, the Sofirn SC21 Pro uses a buck driver (according to the manual), which is a lovely thing to see in the little light market!

The Samsung LH351D emitter is rated for a CCT of 5000K, and I'm pretty sure the CRI is at 90. Unfortunately, it's got a nasty green tint to it, I believe Cheule has nicknamed this LED "dog farts," and it does live up to the moniker. For a small light it has a rather deep and heavily-pocked orange peel reflector, making for a nice spot + spill beam and I fail to notice any artifacts in.

The moonlight mode is perfectly adequate on this light, but I did have to fix the floor setting on stepped mode to include it in the stepped-ramp cycle. That's a simple UI change in the 10H from on menu. My biggest gripe with it however is the resolution of the smooth ramping. Perhaps I've been spoiled with the D3AA, but the first few lumens on the Sofirn SC21 Pro have some VERY noticeable granularity to it, even when used at .5x ramp speed. This means that finding the "perfect" brightness just above moonlight is really hard to do as it appears to skip some intermediary brightnesses in the ultra-lows. Everything above those first several lumens seems to ramp better.

Is this a good EDC light in 2024? I think so. For a cheap price you're getting a pretty capable light in an attractively small form factor. If you love Anduril 2 then it's hard to pass up on the novelty of having it in this cute little form factor :)

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

lol I meant to post this from this account, if you want to see more flashlight content I'll be sharing it on Cornflake_Dog from now on

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Any idea if it has flash pads? And I've been put off by its size. It's quite large for a 16340 light, longer than the SC13 which uses an 18350. The Wurkkos HD10 (14500) also looks interesting. Maybe you can adjust the Anduril settings (or even reflash the code) to fix those low levels in your SC21 pro.

I have an SP10 Pro which is nice but it only works on 14500 despite being advertised as working with AA as well :(. Maybe I'll try a D3AA.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

It does have flashing pads!

It is pretty long for a 16340, I liken that to the deep reflector. I think I've seen some folks mod it with a TIR for more throw though! I'm not sure where to get a flashing kit though, I've never flashed anything.

D3AA is really hard to beat, especially when you can get a good 14500 like the Vapcell H10. Brilliant light with much better resolution in the stepless dimming. Also, you can use voltage check to get 3 digits of info instead of the usual two. Just checked after a charge and my D3AA flashed out 4.12 V

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Thanks, yeah, Hank's lights generally seem better thought out than Sofirn's, except for the lumenitis which disrupts other parts of the design. I do like having a charger built into the light, or at least the battery. I prefer stepped to smooth brightness ramping, though that's just me. I wonder why the SC21 Pro uses a 16340 instead of an 18350 given that it's not trying to be tiny anyway. Anyway it's good to keep seeing new Anduril lights. I wonder if Hank will make a light with these new UPDI parts (t1616 etc).

I think right now, I find both of these lights interesting, but not different enough from what I already have to make me want to click "buy". My main EDC is still a Skilhunt E3A.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

The standard SC21 is what I carry when off work. I like how it perfectly fits the small pocket watch/zippo pocket on jeans.

I went with the warmer color temp (27k I think?) to see how I liked it compared to the cold white light that my work Streamlight has. I definitely like how gentle and cozy it is, very similar to incandescent flashlights which is great for what I use it for.

Yeah this little guy is obviously going to be outperformed by bigger lights but the light you use is the one you have with you. It makes it easy to keep it on me.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I bet it's a lovely light in warm white! I totally agree, the light you carry is the one you use and this form factor is much easier to keep on your person than larger lights.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure the original non-pro version also has stepless ramping, correct? After getting a few lights that have it, it's really hard to use anything else haha

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Yep it does! I prefer the step options because I don't mess with brightness very much. If I bump it and it changes it's easier to reset imo

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Deep OP reflector

Short two-way pocket clip. It's surprisingly tight!

Diffuse spot with spill around it

Light comes apart in two pieces, you can see the included 16340 li-ion battery rated at 800 mAh