Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient Flashlight Review
Here we have the Olight Seeker 3 Pro in “Forest Gradient.” Still 4200 lumens and some great features like a rotary dial! Read on for more!
Official Specs and Features
Here’s a link to the Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient product page.
Versions
There are a bunch of versions of the Seeker in general. But of the Olight Seeker 3 Pro specifically, there are at least four. Black, Orange (seen here), Brown, and Blue are all available, as well as this new Forest Gradient.
Price
This special edition Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient flashlight is selling for $112.46 right now. Here’s my Shareasale link for the Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient flashlight.
Short Review
While I have an orange version of this light that I love, I put this Forest Gradient version through the paces. It measures up just like the orange; they’re great lights. There’s also the rotary interface, allowing a much finer tuning of the output to your needs. I personally don’t use that as much as I just use the clicky, and that clicky works very well too. The nylon pouch is even an outstanding part of this item, too. The battery is proprietary, as is the charging. Emitter swaps (from the cool white Osram P9) should be fairly straightforward.
Long Review
The Big Table
| Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient Flashlight | |
|---|---|
| Emitter: | Osram P9 (4) (6000-7000K) |
| Price in USD at publication time: | $112.46 |
| Cell: | 1×21700 |
| Turbo Runtime Graph | High Runtime Graph |
| LVP? | Yes |
| Switch Type: | E-Switch |
| Quiescent Current (mA): | ? |
| On-Board Charging? | Yes |
| Charge Port Type: | Proprietary Magnetic |
| Charge Graph | |
| Power off Charge Port | with cell: all modes without cell: no modes |
| Claimed Lumens (lm) | 4200 |
| Measured Lumens (at 30s) | 4005 (95.4% of claim)^ |
| Candela per Lumen | 4.4 |
| Claimed Throw (m) | 250 |
| Candela (Calculated) in cd (at 30s) | 623lux @ 5.658m = 19944cd |
| Throw (Calculated) (m) | 282.4 (113% of claim)^ |
| Claimed CCT | 6000-7000 |
| Measured CCT Range (K) | 6200-6500 Kelvin |
| Item provided for review by: | Olight |
| All my Olight reviews! | |
^ Measurement disclaimer: I am an amateur flashlight reviewer. I don’t have $10,000 or even $1,000 worth of testing equipment. I test output and such in PVC tubes!! Please consider claims within 10% of what I measure to be perfectly reasonable (accurate, even).
What’s Included
- Olight Seeker 3 Pro Flashlight
- Olight 5000mAh 21700 cell (customized, proprietary)
- Nylon pouch in black
- MCC charge base (USB to proprietary magnetic)
- Manual
Package and Manual
Build Quality and Disassembly
The Olight Seeker 3 Pro is a solid, well-built flashlight. Like the other versions I’ve had of this same light, this is a very nice flashlight. It just feels right in the hand.
Along the sides of the Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient are softish grip areas. These do provide a nice bit of grip, that’s for sure. They also are dust magnets…
Cooling finds on the head are minimal depth, but according to the test, they do the job just fine.
With the tailcap removed, you can see the square-cut, anodized threads. These threads are fairly short, and also exceptionally smooth.
Both head and tail have springs, but those too are customized.
On the tailcap is reeding, which is shallow but provides enough grip.
Size and Comps
Length (mm / in) 132mm/5.20in
Head Diameter (mm / in) 35mm/1.38in
Body Diameter (mm / in) 28mm/1.10in
Weight (g / oz) 200g/7.06oz (Including Battery)
If the flashlight will headstand, I’ll show it here (usually the third photo). If the flashlight will tailstand, I’ll show that here, too (usually the fourth photo).
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
First, let’s talk about what this light does have for carry. There’s this very nice nylon pouch.
The Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient is intended to go bezel-up, but not intended to be used while in the pouch.
You can see below that the latch is covered by some nylon. This is an interesting design and I can’t really explain it, but it does work very well.
There’s a lanyard hole in the tailcap, but no lanyard is included.
The grip section is worth mentioning as far as retention goes, too, since it does provide an extra level of grip.
Also not included on this revision in the long lineage of Seekers is a pocket clip.
Power and Runtime
The Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient is powered by a proprietary 21700 cell. It’s proprietary in that both positive and negative terminals are exposed on the positive end of the cell. It will not be charged in a bay-type charger. Also, traditional 21700 cells will not work in the light, and can’t be charged by the light.
Unlike some other Olights that use the same cell, the cell for the Olight Seeker 3 Pro is inserted with the positive terminal toward the tail. This “breaks from tradition” so pay attention here!
On the body are a few markings, including the cell orientation. Note that cell orientation is opposite to normal.
The photo below shows the wrong way to install the cell!
Low voltage protection is observed, too, with output stopping when the cell is around 3V.
Charging
The Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient has on-board charging via a USB to magnetic connector.
This is the standard MCC charger.
Modes and Currents
| Mode | Mode Claimed Output (lm) | Claimed Runtime | Measured Lumens | Tailcap Amps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turbo | 4,200~1,200~600 | 2.5+127+35 mins | 4107 (initial) 4005 (30 seconds) |
9.56 |
| High | 1,200~600~300 | 135+35+10 mins | 1130 | 1.80 |
| Proximity Sensor Stepdown | – | – | 386 | 0.55 |
| Med | 300 | 640m | 292 | 0.40 |
| Low | 50 | 55.5h | 38 | 0.07 |
| Moon | 5 | 15d | 0.01 |
Pulse Width Modulation
There’s no PWM on any mode.
The lowest mode does have a bit of a sawtooth, though, and I’ve zoomed out a bit and you can see a longer timescale below.
For reference, here’s a baseline shot, with all the room lights off and almost nothing hitting the sensor. Also, here’s the light with the worst PWM I could find. I’m adding multiple timescales, so it’ll be easier to compare to the test light. Unfortunately, the PWM on this light is so bad that it doesn’t even work with my normal scale, with is 50 microseconds (50us). 10ms. 5ms. 2ms. 1ms. 0.5ms. 0.2ms. In a display faster than 0.2ms or so, the on/off cycle is more than one screen, so it’d just (very incorrectly) look like a flat line. I wrote more about this Ultrafire WF-602C flashlight and explained a little about PWM too.
User Interface and Operation
The switch used on the Olight Seeker 3 Pro Forest Gradient is not unlike what we saw on the Marauder 2. It’s a plastic-covered e-switch that has a rotary feature.
Also, Olight did something a little different here. The rotary switch has a letter! In my case, there’s an “O” but you can collect all the models to get all the letters for spelling “OLIGHT.”
Around the switch are indicators. The right side indicates battery level, with four green marks being full. The left side indicates the output level, with one green mark indicating both moon and low, up to four marks, which indicate Turbo. These will indicate even if the light is off but unlocked (which requires the rotary dial to be turned maybe 1/2 a turn.)
People will probably go goo-goo over the rotary. I personally still prefer the stepped modes. They work together though. If you’re in low and dial up a bit, you get an output higher than low, but lower than medium. It’s a very good system!
Here’s a UI table!
| State | Action | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Off | Click or Hold | Battery indicator |
| Off | Rotate dial at least half turn | Unlock |
| Off (Unlocked) | Click | On (Mode memory)^ |
| Off (Unlocked) or On | Double Click | Turbo |
| On | Click | Off |
| On | Hold | Mode advance (LMH only) |
| Off (Unlocked) | Hold | Moonlight |
| Turbo | Double Click | Previous mode |
| Unlocked | Triple Click | Strobe |
| On | Rotate dial clockwise | “Stepless” increasing output |
| On | Rotate dial counterclockwise | “Stepless” decreasing output |
| On, after proximity sensor stepdown | Double Click | Temporarily disable the proximity sensor and activate Turbo |
^ The way I read the manual, High is not memorized. Only low or medium are memorized.
If you’ve had a good look at the front of the Olight Seeker 3 Pro, you probably noticed that little black dot near the emitters. It’s clearly evident in the photograph below, around the 4’oclock position. That’s a proximity sensor. On the highest two modes, when the sensor gets enough bounce-back feedback, the light will downshift to a lower level. It does not shift to medium, but something higher than medium.
I’m exceptionally happy that Olight allows us to turn off the proximity sensor. I dislike those in general, but this is a very good compromise. This is better than the Marauder 2 proximity sensor disable, too, because the sensor will go back on automatically. You may end up having to cycle modes a bit to be sure the sensor is off, but overall if burning something is a concern, this is definitely a safer solution. And it’s just two clicks, instead of 15 as on the Marauder 2.
LED and Beam
Olight doesn’t make an emitter claim here, but upon inspection, they appear to be Osram P9. That fits well with Olight, so it seems like a safe call. There are four emitters here.
Olight uses an optic for these emitters.
A toothed bezel is used on the front, and that allows a little light to escape when headstanding. The bezel is also very easy to unscrew. When removed, the optic comes right out, revealing the white cup which you can see below. I did not go any deeper than this.
LED Color Report (CRI and CCT)
Beamshots
These beamshots are always with the following settings: f8, ISO100, 0.3s shutter, and manual 5000K exposure.
Tint vs BLF-348 (KillzoneFlashlights.com 219b version) (affiliate link)
I keep the test flashlight on the left, and the BLF-348 reference flashlight on the right.
I compare everything to the KillzoneFlashlights.com 219b BLF-348 because it’s inexpensive and has the best tint!
Conclusion
What I like
- Output is just fantastic
- Levels lower than Turbo are extremely stable
- Probably possible to swap emitters on here – the bezel is not press-fit
- Charging works very well at around 2A.
- The rotary dial is great for mid-level mode changes (I would probably not use the rotary by itself, generally though)
- Nylon carry holster is both high quality
- Proximity sensor can be turned off very easily
What I don’t like
- 6000K – but at least the Olight claim is accurate here. So you should be comfortable knowing what you’re getting.
- Proprietary magnetic charging
- Proprietary customized 21700 cell
- There’s a proximity sensor
Notes
- 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!
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