Lumintop BR1 Headlamp Review
The Lumintop BR1 headlamp has throw and flood emitters and a mix of the two provides nice high output. USB-C charging rounds out the package.
Official Specs and Features
Here’s a link to the Lumintop BR1 headlamp product page.
Versions
There’s just one version of the Lumintop BR1 headlamp.
Price
The going price on lumintoponline.com is $29.99.
Short Review
This is a fine headlamp at a fairly reasonable price. The body is nearly completely plastic, which is common in this type of headlamp, but there are metal cooling fins on both sides of the light, which is a nice touch. USB-C charging is a great feature, too.
Long Review
The Big Table
| Lumintop BR1 headlamp | |
|---|---|
| Emitter: | Unstated emitter (Two sets – flood and throw) |
| Price in USD at publication time: | $29.99 |
| Cell: | xInternal Battery |
| Turbo Runtime Graph | |
| LVP? | ? |
| Switch Type: | E-Switch |
| Quiescent Current (mA): | ? |
| On-Board Charging? | Yes |
| Charge Port Type: | USB-C |
| Charge Graph | |
| Power off Charge Port | All modes |
| Claimed Lumens (lm) (Both emitters) | 440 |
| Measured Lumens (at 30s) (Both emitters) | 429 (97.5% of claim)^ |
| Candela per Lumen (Focus) | 6.5 |
| Candela per Lumen (Flood) | 0.9 |
| Claimed Throw (m) (Focus) | 100 |
| Claimed Throw (m) (Flood) | 16 |
| Candela (Calculated) in cd (at 30s) (Focus) | 118lux @ 4.479m = 2367cd |
| Throw (Calculated) (m) (Focus) | 97.3 (97.3% of claim)^ |
| Claimed CCT | – |
| Measured CCT Range (K) (Focus) | 6600-6800 Kelvin |
| Measured CCT Range (K) (Flood) | 6500-6700 Kelvin |
| Item provided for review by: | Lumintop |
| All my Lumintop 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
- Lumintop BR1 headlamp
- Carrying case
- Charging cable (USB to USB-C)
- Manual
Package and Manual
Build Quality and Disassembly
As stated above, the Lumintop BR1 headlamp is sort of exceptional because it has these cooling fins on the side. Those are metal (or seem to be metal). That said, I’m not sure how necessary they are, as this light doesn’t seem to get too hot anyway.
Lumintop promotes this tilt at “60 degrees” so that seems good enough. I don’t guess it would hurt my feelings if it tilted horizontally.
Size and Comps
If the flashlight will headstand, I’ll show it here (usually the third photo). If the flashlight will tailstand, I’ll also show that (usually in 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.
Also above is 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 Lumintop BR1 is a headlamp and not really anything else. The headband can be removed, and it’s not too difficult. But you would really use the BR1 off the headband anyway, I think.
I quite like the headband. Not only does it look nice, but it’s highly adjustable and also comfortable.
Power and Runtime
The BR1 is powered by a built-in battery. I can’t see any place where Lumintop describes this battery. In any case, it’s not accessible and therefore not user-replaceable.
Here are the runtimes for the three highest modes. This includes the mode that has both sets of emitters and the highest level for each set of emitters (separately).
There aren’t really any surprises here, because Lumintop describes these runtimes exactly in the manual! That’s pretty nice, I think.
Charging
Charging of the Lumintop BR1 headlamp is by way of a USB-C charging port on the bottom side of the light.
A cable is included – USB to USB-C.
Charging is fine, requiring just over 2 hours with either USB or USB-C (and it’s nice to note that USB-C to USB-C does work, too.
While charging, the little indicator (which is usually mostly hidden by the charge port cover) blinks red. When charging is complete, the indicator turns blue.
Modes and Currents
| Mode | Mode Claimed Output (lm) | Claimed Runtime | Measured Lumens |
|---|---|---|---|
| Med (Focus) | 100 | 8h | 95 |
| High (Focus) | 330 | 3.7h | 331 |
| Turbo (Focus + Floodlight) | 440 | 2.5h | 429 |
| High (Floodlight) | 120 | 7.7h | 92 |
| Low (Floodlight) | 10 | 70h | 9 |
Pulse Width Modulation
The mode order displayed here is the same as in the table above. This mode order is the same as if you click through all the modes in one go. Only the lower level of flood and focus have PWM, and it’s fairly fast.
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
Two switches control the BR1. First is the power switch, seen on the left below. It has a power icon. The other switch controls whether the motion sensor is on or off.
Here’s a UI table!
| State | Action | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Off | Click “Button 1” (Power button) | On (Focus Medium) |
| On | Press Button 1 | Mode advance (same order as in the table above) |
| On | Wait for 3s from any action, Click Button 1 | Off |
| On | Press Button 2 (Sensor button) | Iterate motion sensor |
| On with motion sensor On | Wave up or down (not side to side) | Iterate emitter on or off |
| On | Hold | No action |
It’s not possible to change modes using the motion sensor.
It doesn’t seem possible to turn the light off without cycling to off. That is, of course, unless you wait 3 seconds, in which case the next click is to off.
LED and Beam
I can’t see that Lumintop states what emitters are used in the BR1. It doesn’t matter, since we’ll characterize them below. The throw looks like an Osram P9, but again, it doesn’t really matter.
The domed throw or “Focus” emitter is in the center and has an orange peel reflector. The two flood emitters are domeless and very floody.
LED Color Report (CRI and CCT)
The order here is the same as above – in fact from here out, all the photos are in the same order as the mode table, which is the same order as the modes go in the light. CCT across the modes (and emitters) is quite cool, staying above 6400K or so in every mode. CRI is low, at around 71.
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
- Build quality seems good (more so I think, than just regular ol’ plastic headlamps)
- USB-C charging works
- Headband is comfortable
- Wave to turn on/off works well
What I don’t like
- User interface is just not my ideal. For example, hold while on should turn the light off
- The motion sensor is grossly underutilized. At a minimum, it should be possible to advance modes.
- Battery is not user serviceable.
Notes
- This content originally appeared at zeroair.org. Please visit there for the best experience!
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