Klarus Lighting Technology based in Shenzhen, China, is one of the newer flashlight innovators and manufactures to take advantage of what LED’s have to offer to the handheld flashlight industry.
The flashlight is no longer just a tube with some batteries, a lamp and a switch. LEDs combined with electronic circuitry have allowed the flashlight to become a really useful tool.
Long runtime and low output, shorter runtime and high output, strobe modes and many more functions are now possible out of a single product.
Boost circuitry now allows the use of a single battery to power lights with enormous output.This means no longer having to leave the light at home or in the car.
Klarus have used the latest generation of Cree LEDs in two new lights: the XP-G2 and XM-L(U2). The RS1A will give you up to 210 lumens (100m beam distance) and the RS11 up to 620 lumens (160m beam distance).
The AA battery form factor of the RS1A makes it easy to carry in jean’s pockets, with the larger 2xCR123 form factor RS11 allowing for easy jacket pocket carry.
Klarus have included features in these two lights that would appeal to the everyday user. For one thing, it has a body mounted switch rather than a tail cap switch. By doing this, they have left the real estate at the rear of the light available for the charger connector.
As versatile as these lights have become, this is not really a one-size-fits-all. You would still need to decide what the primary purpose of the light will be, choose the appropriate product whose primary function suits your need and then have the other functions as a bonus.
Law enforcement officers may require a light that always comes on as bright as possible the first time it is turned on without fiddling through modes and a tail cap switch (Klarus XT series).
The home user may want a light that comes on in a lower mode but then be able to ramp up the brightness as required. Whereas maximum output is important, LEDs with electronic switching are now able to give you really low output as well.
This is useful in the middle of the night when you just want a little light without waking up the family or when you need really long runtime in the event of a power outage. The RS1A will give you up to 68 hours and the RS11 up to 215 hours on a single fresh battery.
These two RS series lights from Klarus have an innovative charging setup. Both lights come with a charging cable that has USB plug the one end and magnetic plug the other end.
The magnetic plug automatically locates snapping into place at the base of the light. Many products these days will charge using a standard USB port, so why should torch flashlight be any different? To charge the battery you plug the cable into any USB power source.
This could be a USB port on your computer, cell phone charger or the USB receptacle in your car. Lwet’s see how it does on the gadget
