Wuben L1 Review | A flashlight Swiss Army Knife

Disclaimer: This flashlight was send to me by Wuben free-of-charge for review. I don’t earn any money from the sale of Wuben products.

Table of contents:

Price and versions

There are two versions of the Wuben L1 available. One with the Osram P9 LED for the flood channel, or the Nichia 519A (the one that I have).

Link to the store page: Wuben L1 2000lm Flashlight (tracking link*)

Wuben gave me a -20% discount code: aff20

* – Tracking link disclaimer

I don’t earn money from the sale of Wuben’s products. The link has an “ref” at the end, so that Wuben can track sales and clicks coming from my review.

Packaging and contents

The package contains:

• Wuben L1
• Manual
• USB-C (C-C) cable
• Lanyard
• Holster
• Two spare o-rings

Shape

Wuben L1 is equipped with a rotating head that has two light sources, a floody and a throwy one.

The build quality is pretty good. I like the knurling on the tailcap, the flashlight doesn’t slip out of the hand.

You can use the L1 in a standard orientation and also as a right-angle light:

It’s also equipped with a pretty strong magnet.

Head’s rotating mechanism.

The head can rotate 180° and shine in any orientation.

The mechanism itself is quite smooth. It lets us set the angle at which the flashlight shines at (similar to the Wuben X3).

That way, we can set it up to light up what we want.

This proved quite useful when I was visiting my grandma. I needed to clean the dishes, so I just used the L1 to light up the sink.

Clips, lanyard and holster

The Wuben L1 uses quite a studry clip. It’s a pretty standard clip, not “deep carry”, can only be carried bezel-up.

The clip shape lets it slide into a pocket. The more aggressive knurling at the bottom prevents the flashlight from slipping out.

Sometimes, when putting the flashlight in a pocket, a part of the clip will catch the pocket prematurely (as seen in the video).

We also get a pretty decent lanyard. Nothing to write home about, gets the job done.

Lastly, the holster.

Doesn’t stand out in terms of quality from the rest of the accessories. It can fit both the flashlight and the charging cable. Fits the flashlight snug.

Size

Lenght	130mm – 122,5mm
Head diameter	28 mm
Center diameter	24 mm
Weight (w/o cell)	104g
Weight (w/ cell)	175g

Compared to other lights:

Convoy M21E | Wuben L1 | Sofirn SP35 | Wurkkos TS22 | Sofirn SC31 Pro | Skilhunt H04RC

Emisar D4K | Convoy S2+ | Wuben L1 | Emisar D4V2 | Convoy T3 | Wurkkos HD15R

Switch and UI

Wuben L1 has two buttons on the head, each for the two channels. Top controls the throw, bottom controls flood.
The buttons have short travel with a noticable click.

When carrying the flashlight in my pocket, the flashlight did accidently turn itself on a couple of times. The buttons are definetly easy to press.
The UI doesn’t have electrical loclout, but mechanical lockout (unscrew the tailcap 1/4 of a turn) is still possible.

UI as explained in the manual:

What I like:

• Simple and intuitive UI.
• Two separate switches for both channels.
• Both lights can be turned on at the same time (albeit, when turning on the throw channel, the flood can only go up to medium)
• No SOS or Strobe mode in the main modes group.

What I’d like to see changed:

• The throw and flood buttons use 2 different UIs, which can be quite confusing. I’d like to see them both the same UI.
• No shortcuts from OFF in the flood channel UI.
• No lockout in the UI (although mechanical lockout still works).
• No moonlight mode. The dimmest mode is 13 lumens (flood light), which is quite bright in total darkness.

Emitter and beam

The Wuben L1 uses the Luminous SST40 LED for the throw and (my model uses) the Nichia 519a for the flood.

Here’s how the beams look compare a white wall:

The throw light has visible tint-shift between the hotspot and spill (shift in color). The flood light has a ring around the hotspot.
Those things shouldn’t be very noticable in use outside, but some people pay a lot of attention to them.

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Light source	cd/lm
Flood	4
Throw	17

Candela/lumen ratio explanation

A good way to determine the beam profile of a flashlight is to divide its candela (cd) by the lumens (lm) it produces. In return, we will get the cd/lm ratio. Here’s an approximate scale of what those values mean:

• 0.1 cd/lm: light bulb
• 1-3: flooder
• 5-15: balanced EDC-style beam
• 30: compact thrower
• 100: dedicated thrower
• 500+: extreme thrower
• 10000: laser

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Opple Light Master measurments:

Mode -> High	CCT	Duv	CRI
Throw Hotspot	5646K	0.0145	64
Throw Spill	7542K	0.0019	73.1
Flood Hotspot	5061K	-0.0021	97

Beamshots

First set of slides showcases the L1’s brightness before and after Turbo stepdown, to give a good idea on how the sustained brightness look like in real life, compared to Turbo.

L1 compared to other lights:

Wuben L1 vs Sofirn SP35:

Wuben L1 vs Sofirn SC31 Pro:

Wuben L1 vs Wurkkos TS22:

Measurments and graphs

Here are the L1’s specifications given by the manufacturer:

Standard ANSI FL1

Standard ANSI FL1 describes how companies should measure flashlight specs. For lumen brightness, the measurment is supposed to be taken 30 seconds after turning the flashlight on. Runtime is measured by the time it takes the flashlight to reach 10% of the original output.

Learn more about the ANSI FL1 standard in this article.

Mode	Candela	Range	Estimated range*
Throw, Turbo @ 0s	29756cd	345m	115m-173m
Throw, Turbo @ 30s (ANSI)	19321cd	278m	93m-139m
Flood, Wysoki @ 0s	2256cd	95m	32m-48m
Flood, Wysoki @ 30s (ANSI)	812cd	57m	19m-29m

* – Explanation

The throw/range of a flashlight is defined by the ANSI FL1 standard. It says that a flashlight’s range is how far it will light up a surface to 0.25lux, which is about as bright as full moon.
This most of the time isn’t bright enough to actually see what you’re shining on, so I added in an estimate to what you can expect the maximum range of the flashlight to be.

Mode (Throw)	Brightness (0s)	30s	10 min
Turbo	1871lm	1118lm	308lm
High lv.3	1150lm	425lm	303lm
Medium lv.2	320lm	315lm	296lm
Low lv.1	22lm	22lm	22lm

Mode (Flood)	Brightness (0s)	30s	10 min
High lv.3	633lm	208lm	191lm
Medium lv.2	191lm	190lm	190lm
Low lv.1	13lm	13lm	13lm

At turn-on, the Wuben L1 reaches 1871lm and 345m, but the brightness starts dropping instantly. At the 30s (ANSI) mark the brightness and throw is lower than advertised.

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Graphs:

The driver doesn’t seem to be really well regulated. The brightness drops together with the decreasing voltage of the battery.

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To check how well the driver handles low battery voltage, here’s a runtime graph of the Turbo mode with a full and close to empty battery:

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Compared with the Sofirn SP35 and SC31 Pro (temp. limit set to 45C):

Here with the Wurkkos TS22 added:

Battery and charging

The Wuben L1 comes with a Wuben 21700 4800mAh (ABD4800) cell. I measured it at about 4600mAh.

The light is equiped with springs on both sides of the battery tube. Standard 21700 cells work without a problem.

The flashlight is designed to be charged with the build-in USB-C port. It’s located behind a rubber flap.

The flashlight can also be used as a powerbank.

Manual and warranty

Competition

• Nicron B70 – Cheaper (~50$). Smaller 18650 cell. Longer in size. One type of beam profile. Turbo lasts longer. Up to 30 minutes it sustains ~450lm and then steps down to 200lm-150lm. Lower max brightness.
• Wuben X3 or Nicron N7 – Much smaller flashlights. A good option for someone that searches for the same swivel head design, but in a smaller package. I wrote a review about the X3. X3 has a built-in cell. N7 can use a 14500 cell or a AA battery. Both lights less bright and with a much shorter runtime than the L1.

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Other than these, I could also suggest lights with a fixed head, but similar size. The main advantage of the fixed head is longer runtime on Turbo and higher sustained output.

• Sofirn SP35 – Cheaper (~32$). Beam very similar to the L1’s Throw. Very good driver, sustains 500lm and Turbo lasts for 2 minutes.
• Wurkkos TS22 – Cheaper (~40$). Very wide beam. 4000lm Turbo for 1 minute and 1250lm sustained.
• Sofirn SC31 Pro – Cheaper (~25$). Smaller 18650 cell. Shines a bit wider than the throw L1 or the SP35. Anduril 2 UI. Sustained output depends on the temperature limit set.

Pros and cons

+ Rotating head adds a lot of functionality.
+ Two beam types in a single flashlight.
+ Two buttons, to control two beams independently.
+ Build-in USB-C charging.
+ Works with standard 21700 cells.
+ Good build quality of the flashlight and included accessories.
+ Simple UI.
+ Strong magnet.

+/- I’d like to also see an option for a “deep carry” clip in the future.

– The flashlight can sometimes accidently activate itself in a pocket, the buttons are quite easily pressed.
– I think the UI should be the same for both channels.
– The throw beam has tintshift (green hotspot with rosy spill) and the flood has a slight ring around the hotspot.
– Doesn’t reach ANSI FL1 specifications when measured at 30 seconds after turn-on.
– Because of the detached head design, heat doesn’t effectively dissipate to the body. This causes the light to have less effective thermal mass compared to other lights of similar size, which leads to low sustained output.
– Turbo mode starts dropping instantly and the driver isn’t well regulated.
– The flashlight can sometimes get stuck when putting back in a pocket, a slight clip redesign would help.

Conclusion

Similar to other new Wuben models, the L1 brings something new to the table. With the rotating head, I like to think of it as a bigger version of the Wuben X3. It has similar functionality but with a much bigger battery and higher max brightness. I’d call it the “Swiss Army Knife of flashlights” because I feel like it can prove useful in various situations (the use is also more flexible than of a standard flashlight) , but usually isn’t the ideal pick for them.
Like if you had to cut a branch, a saw would be best, but a multitool with a small saw could also do the job and many other tasks a saw can’t do.

The flashlight is quite well made, together with the lanyard and holster. The use case is quite universal, as we have a flood light, throw light, a strong magnet and a swivel head, all in a single package.
Sadly, the thing that makes it unique is also its Achilles’ heel. The head being detached from the body causes the effective thermal mass to be quite low and the flashlight can’t sustain a very high output. Turbo mode starts dropping instantly too and the driver isn’t very well regulated.

Overall, I’d say this kind of flashlight does have a place in some peoples’ pockets, although it really depends on one’s needs. After reading the review, I hope you will be able to determine if the Wuben L1 suits you.

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Me, when using the Wuben L1: