RovyVon A23 Flashlight Review

The RovyVon A23 is a pocket-sized flashlight with an e-switch and RovyVon’s recognizable design. Read on for testing!

---

Official Specs and Features

Here’s a link to the RovyVon A23 Flashlight product page.

Versions

The A23 is an anodized aluminum version.  There’s also the A24 (titanium), and the A29 (brass).  These are available in Cree XP-L HD and Nichia 219c.  It’s also possible to purchase with or without tritium already installed.

Price

The A23 goes for $46.95.  The other two more special metals are more expensive.  I hope to be running a group buy on the brass version soon!

---

Short Review

This is a great little light.  There’s no knurling and I thought that would make the light harder to handle, but it doesn’t.  Also, I like the clip a whole bunch – it’s a clip style I’ve tried to promote to makers.  Output is good, and I like the TIR, too.  Of course, I like that brass is an option.

Long Review

The Big Table

RovyVon A23 Flashlight
Emitter:	Nichia 219c (4500K)
Price in USD at publication time:	$46.95
Cell:	Internal
Turbo Runtime	High Runtime
LVP?	Yes
Switch Type:	E-Switch
Quiescent Current (A):	?
On-Board Charging?	Yes
Chargetime
Power off Charge Port with no Cell?	While charging, all modes
Claimed Lumens (lm)	600
Measured Lumens (at 30s)	546 (91% of claim)^
Claimed Throw (m)	109
Candela (Calculated) in cd (at 30s)	317lux @ 4.582m = 6655cd
Throw (Calculated) (m)	163.2 (149.7% of claim)^
All my RovyVon reviews!

^ Measurement disclaimer:  Testing flashlights is my hobby. I use hobbyist-level equipment for testing, including some I made myself. Try not to get buried in the details of manufacturer specifications versus measurements recorded here; A certain amount of difference (say, 10 or 15%) is perfectly reasonable.

What’s Included

• RovyVon A23 Flashlight
• Lanyard
• Split ring
• Paracord
• Charge cable (USB to micro-USB)
• Manual

Package and Manual

The manual is an A4-sized paper with a couple of languages.

Build Quality and Disassembly

The most striking thing about the body of this light is that there is no knurling.

I thought that would impact grip, but it really hasn’t for me.

With the built-in cell, it’s unlikely you’ll need to unscrew the head much.  The threads are small, anodized, and fine.  Without any grip, it is hard to screw and unscrew the head.

The head has two springy contacts with hit two pads on the body.

The guts in the body come out with little effort, once the head is removed.

The guts hold much of the electronic components.  Also, this might not be the best look at them, but have a look at the tailcap loop below – there are two tritium slots here.  One on each side.

The battery connects via a little jst style connector.  If you need to disconnect this, I recommend using plastic tweezers!

Here’s a shot of the battery.  More on this later.

The PCB in the body comes out of the plastic housing in the body easily too.  The red/black wires connect across here.

When I disconnected the wires, I accidentally pulled these wires out of their connector.  I recommend you not doing this.  It’s both dangerous (since touching these together would short the cell) and very difficult to fix.

When I pushed the guts back into the body, I sheared off the button cover from the body.  Be careful there too.

I did get it back together successfully.

Size and Comps

Length: 76mm
Diameter: 21.5mm
Weight: 49.8g

This light might not land in the “keychain” category for you, but it hits a nice sweet spot for me.

Here’s the test light with the venerable Convoy S2+.  Mine’s a custom “baked” edition Nichia 219b triple.  A very nice 18650 light.

And here’s the light beside my custom engraved TorchLAB BOSS 35, an 18350 light.  I reviewed the aluminum version of that light in both 35 and 70 formats.

Retention and Carry

The pocket is the main way to carry the light.  I really like this clip.  It’s deep-carry in an unusual way.  The mouth is plenty big, particularly with a very smooth body.  The clip screws down onto the body from the top.

The also-included lanyard could attach on the clip or through the loop in the tailcap.  Same with the paracord.

Power and Runtime

The A23 is powered by a built-in lipo battery.  The battery is a 2.22Wh 600mAh battery, connected through a little jst-style connector.

It’s technically replaceable – in fact, RovyVon has listed on their site the option to purchase a spare battery.  I’ll be honest and say I don’t really recommend you expecting to change the battery often, or per-cycle or anything like that.  Once the battery dies, then sure by all means.  But in your day-to-day use of this light, don’t plan to change the battery.  UPDATE:  The replaceable battery is actually a complete swap of the guts.  Not just the battery – so you don’t have to worry with the jst connector at all.

Here’s a runtime on Turbo.  The stepdown is fairly dramatic but the light holds 150ish lumens for quite some time.

High also has a dramatic stepdown, from a ~400 lumen 30 second reading.

In both cases, the light exhibited LVP at around 2.9V.  The manual says the light shuts off at around 2.4V.  Yes, that’s low for a LiIon but this is a lipo.  Anyway, runtimes don’t seem to take it that low.  Also, the charge port indicator is red when the battery is below 2.6V.

Charging

Since the light has a built-in battery, of course, it has onboard charging as well.  The micro-USB port in the tail, opposite the screwed-in clip.  It has a silicone press-in cover.  The cover is secure.

Here’s the included cable.  It’s nice and short.

Charging proceeds at over 1A.  It’s also very consistent.  A full charge takes under 45 minutes.  There’s a charge indicator under where the port cover connects to the light.  Red means charging is active.  Blue means charging is complete.

Modes and Currents

Mode	Mode Claimed Output (lm)	Claimed Runtime	Measured Lumens	Tailcap Amps
Turbo	700	80m	575	–
High	450	130m	424	–
Medium	120	150m	94	–
Low	30	9.5h	25	–
Moonlight	0.5	72h	0	–

The modes are handled by the body side of the light, so my normal current testing doesn’t work.  That’s why this section is blank.

Pulse Width Modulation

Unfortunately, PWM is present on the middle three modes.  Or as u/parametrek pointed out on Reddit, what we see on the High mode is “SMPS ripple.”

Here you can see a “baseline” – a chart with almost no light hitting the sensor.

Then there’s the Ultrafire WF-602C flashlight, which has some of the worst PWM I’ve seen. It’s so bad that I used a post about it to explain PWM! Here are multiple timescales (10ms, 5ms, 2ms, 1ms, 0.5ms, 0.2ms) to make comparing this “worst” PWM light to the test light easier. That post also explains why I didn’t test the WF-602C at the usual 50us scale.

User Interface and Operation

The button is a side switch, just below the head.  It’s a metal-cover e-switch.  The metal button has a metal surround, which both gives a place to find with your finger, and helps prevent accidental presses.

It’s a very quiet clicky button.

Here’s a user interface table!

State	Action	Result
Off	Click	No action
Off	Hold	Momentary Turbo
Off	Double Click	On (mode memory)
On	Click	Mode advance (excluding moonlight)
On	Hold	Off
Off	Click 4x	Moonlight
On >3m	Click	Off
Off	Click 3x	SOS
SOS	Click	Strobe
Strobe	Click	Beacon

LED and Beam

The emitter in my copy is a Nichia 219c.  That’s under a clear TIR, and the beam provided has a very pointed hotspot, flowing smoothly into spill.

These beamshots always have the following settings:  f8, ISO100, 0.3s shutter, and manual 5000K exposure. These photos are taken at floor level, and the beam hits the ceiling around 9 feet away.

Tint vs BLF-348 (KillzoneFlashlights.com 219b version) (affiliate link)

I compare everything to the Killzone 219b BLF-348 because it’s inexpensive and has the best tint!

Conclusion

What I like

• Carries very well!
• Metal cover for the e-switch
• Cool location for trit slots
• On-board charging is good

What I don’t like

• Click 4x from off for moonlight is not ideal.
• Probably not the best to say it has a “replaceable” battery.  It’s not really field-replaceable.

---

Notes

• This light was provided by RovyVon for review. I was not paid to write this review.
• This content originally appeared at zeroair.org.  Please visit there for the best experience!
• For flashlight-related patches, stickers, and gear, head over to PhotonPhreaks.com!
• Use my amazon.com referral link if you’re willing to help support making more reviews like this one!
• Please support me on Patreon! I deeply appreciate your support!