Lumintop GT18 Flashlight Review
The 7,000-lumen Lumintop GT18 flashlight boasts powerful powerbank capabilities as well as USB-C charging. The unusual 46950 cell is included! Read on!
Official Specs and Features
Here’s a link to the Lumintop GT18 flashlight product page.
Versions
There’s just one version of the Lumintop GT18 flashlight but it’s available in black (seen here) or green.
Price
The Lumintop GT18 flashlight is listed for $87.95 at lumintoponline.com.
What’s Included
- Lumintop GT18 flashlight
- Lumintop 32,000mAh 46950
- Charging cable
- Spare o-rings (2)
- Manual
Package and Manual
Build Quality and Disassembly
The Lumintop GT18 flashlight is a hefty light. It’s big – the 46950 cell defines that (46mm in diameter and 95mm long). The light is surprisingly not much bigger than those dimensions.
Build quality is good, as you’d expect. Lumintop is not a new brand!
On the head end is a large contact point for the positive terminal. It’s not a spring, but it is springy. (The spring is under the bit you see below.) The tail end (on the right, below) doesn’t have a spring or anything – just bare aluminum for contacting the cell.
Both ends of the cell tube and all the threads are unanodized.
Size and Comps
Size 59.5 X 53 X 156mm
Net Weight About 760g (battery included)
If the flashlight will headstand, I’ll show it here. If the flashlight will tailstand, I’ll also show that here too!
Here’s the test light with the venerable Convoy S2+. The version below is a custom laser-engraved Convoy S2+ host by GadgetConnections.com. I did a full post on an engraved orange host right here! Or go straight to GadgetConnections.com to buy your Convoy S2+ now!
In the photo above, you may note that the SRM (standard reference material) flashlight for comparison has changed! I used a TorchLAB BOSS 35 for ages. Now, what you can see as the 18350 SRM is the Hanko Machine Works Trident. While I have not reviewed or tested the Gunner Grip version seen here, I have tested a Hanko Machine Works Trident Total Tesseract in brass. I love the Trident, and it’s a striking contrast next to the inexpensive Convoy S2+, which also makes a great standard reference material.
Retention and Carry
Nothing is included for carrying the Lumintop GT18 flashlight. There’s no belt clip or holder or magnet or anything. No lanyard loop is built in, either (and no lanyard is included.)
Power and Runtime
As stated above, the Lumintop GT18 flashlight is powered by a single lithium-ion cell. Lumintop includes one – it’s a 32,000mAh 46950.
A 46950 cell is gigantic – as stated above, 46mm in diameter and 95mm long. It’s just one cell, though, which is interesting. A light this size often has four 18650 or three 21700 cells and runs at 12V (or so, depending on the setup). But the Lumintop GT18 flashlight runs at the voltage of one lithium-ion cell (3.7V nominal, 4.2V max).
The cell should be installed in the usual way – positive end toward head.
The manual states that output on the higher two levels has a very brief duration, then output kicks down to medium. That seems approximately accurate according to these tests.
The Lumintop GT18 flashlight does shut off with low voltage protection.
Charging
Built-into the Lumintop GT18 flashlight is a USB-C charging port. It’s on the head, opposite to the e-switch.
I didn’t capture it in the photo but that little window above the charging port lights with blue LEDs when the light is charging. There are four indicators, and they work as you’d expect. At full charge, and while on a charger, they are all steady blue.
A USB-A to USB-C cable is included.
Charging can proceed at 5V or 12V. 12V charging is quick for such a large capacity (32,000mAh) cell. But again, it’s a huge (capacity) cell, so still takes a while. Charging at 5V is a bit slower, taking around 12 hours.
Powerbank
The USB-C port that’s used for charging can also be used as a powerbank. Output is quite great, going up to nearly 4A (with maybe a significant voltage drop). Still, that’s very high current output!
If you settle down to a more reasonable output of around 3.3A, the voltage recovers a bit (into the “in specification” range). There’s a ton of energy here, so the light will hold 3A for nearly 6 hours!
After that, the powerbank is essentially depleted – it’ll try a couple of times (seen below) but essentially shuts off around 3.2V
Modes and Currents
| Mode | Mode Claimed Output (lm) | Claimed Runtime | Measured Lumens | Tailcap Amps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turbo | 7000-1500 | 30s+9h50m | 5950 (0s) 4286 (30s) |
6.64 |
| High | 2800-1500 | 50s+9h50m | 2895 (0s) 2817 (30s) |
2.36 |
| Medium | 1500 | 10h | 1421 | 1.06 |
| Low | 300 | 48h | 187 | 0.41 |
| Moonlight | 3 | 60d | 3.5 | 0.01 |
Pulse Width Modulation
Moonlight does not use PWM, but the other modes do. Surprisingly, that includes Turbo.
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
Control of the Lumintop GT18 flashlight is through a single e-switch. This switch is on the side of the head and can indicate in both blue and green.
The switch is great!
Here’s a user interface table!
| State | Action | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Off | Click | On (Mode memory, LMH only) |
| Off | Hold | Moonlight |
| On | Click | Off |
| Moonlight, High, or On | Hold | Mode advance (LMH or HML, depending on the previous direction^) |
| On | Double Click | Turbo |
| Turbo | Double Click | No change (maintains turbo) |
| Off | Click 4x | Lockout |
| Lockout | Click 4x (or loosen the head) | Unlock |
| Lockout | Hold | Momentary On |
| Off | Click 7x | Iterate switch lighting |
| Any | Click 3x | Strobe |
| Strobe | Click 3x | Strobe group advance (SOS > Beacon > Strobe) |
^ This is very, very annoying.
LED and Beam
All Lumintop says about these eighteen emitters is that they’re “High Performance LEDs.” They use a small aluminum reflector.
This setup provides a surprisingly tight beam profile, which I quite like.
LED Color Report (CRI and CCT)
There’s no claim regarding CCT, but I measured from the lowest to highest range to be around 5700K to around 7000K (quite cool). CRI is also low, at somewhere under 70.
Beamshots
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 keep the test flashlight on the left and the BLF-348 reference flashlight on the right. These photos are taken around 18 inches from the door.
I compare everything to the KillzoneFlashlights.com 219b BLF-348 because it’s inexpensive and has the best tint!
Summary and Conclusion
The Lumintop GT18 flashlight has an unusual cell and a great beam profile. It’s nice that the cell is not built in, and also included. The large-capacity 46950 makes the Lumintop GT18 flashlight great for use as a powerbank, and the “reverse charging” has great current capabilities.
The Big Table
| Lumintop GT18 flashlight | |
|---|---|
| Emitter: | “High Performance LED” x18 ((unstated emitter)) |
| Price in USD at publication time: | $87.95 |
| Cell: | 1×46950 |
| Runtime Graphs | |
| LVP? | Yes |
| Switch Type: | E-Switch |
| Quiescent Current (mA): | ? |
| On-Board Charging? | Yes |
| Charge Port Type: | USB-C |
| Charge Graph | |
| Power off Charge Port | with cell: all modes without cell and/or body: lowest 2 modes (at least) |
| Claimed Lumens (lm) | 7000 |
| Measured Lumens (at 30s) | 4286 (61.2% of claim)^ |
| Candela per Lumen | 6.48 |
| Claimed Throw (m) | 400 |
| Candela (Calculated) in cd (at 30s) | 846lux @ 6.026m = 30721cd |
| Throw (Calculated) (m) | 350.5 (87.6% of claim)^ |
| Claimed CCT | – |
| Measured CCT Range (K) | 5700-7000 Kelvin |
| Item provided for review by: | Lumintop |
| All my Lumintop 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 I like
- Great powerbank capabilities
- Build quality
- Complete package
- USB-C charging at 12V is reasonably quick (for 32,000mAh)
- Beam shape (tighter than you’d expect!)
What I don’t like
- Weird user interface when selecting between low, medium, high
- Very brief output on high and turbo
- Low CRI
- Doesn’t hit target output
- Target output on turbo and high is very brief
Notes
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