Review PalmStar EDC rocket
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Review PalmStar EDC rocket
本帖最後由 niwalker 於 2016-11-12 16:17 編輯
Another light i received from theoutdoorsplus.com (link is external) for a review was the little PalmStar. This little EDC light is a pocket rocket for a super floody beam. It may look not that bright to the eyes but it definately is.
dimensions:
lenght: 109mm
head diameter: 33mm
tailcap diameter: 24.7mm
weight (without battery) : 88g
I guess this light will polarise a bit because of the things i will mention in my review but i have to say that this one has a great price for such a light.
The PalmStar is one of the "outdoorsplus" own lights, at the moment they also offer a bike light with a build in battery under the "theoutdoorsplus" label. Both are fair priced, especially with the 10% coupon you get on their website.
The light comes in a simple evironmentally friendly cardboard box, similar to Niwalker or other brands. There is not even a sticker on it but therefore you get a decent price for the product.
The light comes with a lanyard, spare o-rings, a manual and a holster. The holster is a nicer one with a neoprene material inside.
Its a very short light for the 18650 format, the downside of the short format is the limited battery choice you have. My sample only accepts unprotected 18650 cells, i tested a green eagtac 3400mAh cell, which is the shortest protected cell i have in that format and it didnt fit. However you can safely use unprotected cells in this light, more about that later.
On the back you have a serial number and large and wide lanyard holes, the light can perfectly stand on its tail. Now some close ups of the light to see the machining and anodizing job.
As you can see the PalmStar has a super aggressive knurling pattern, i think Olight used to have a similar pattern but the edges were more rounded. You can imagine that this knurling gives you a decent grip and bites into your hand, by far the best of any lights i have. The light has an electronical switch with no indicator LED, it is recessed and needs some force to be pushed. I highly doubt that you can accidentally activate the light in your pants or jacket but you can twist the body for mechanical lockout if you so wish. According to the manual the light is made out of aluminum 6061. The head has the PalmStar and theoutdoorsplus.com logo.
To the UI:
It basically uses a Niwalker UI, you love it or hate it. With a single click you can switch the light on or off. There is also a momentary Turbo function (press and hold the switch).
Now the controversial thing for some people, a mode change requires single clicks within one second after you switched it on. If you wait to long the mode gets locked and you have to switch it off/on again and restart the procedure. So if you are in high mode and want the medium mode for example you have to switch it out / on again and ramp trough the modes with single clicks as long as you reach your desired mode. Keep in mind that every click will start the one second timer, so you have to make quick clicks until you reach your desired brightness level / mode.
A double click from off will result in a strobe mode. A double click from on will give you SOS and beacon. The light has mode memory excluding the hidden modes.
The bezel is not glued and can be removed without any problems, i just wanted to mention this.
Here is a view inside the light. The tailcap (in the center) is very lightweight and has a short thread. There is only one spring (head), the tailcap comes without a spring or spring loaded pin like you see on other lights. The middle part of the tailcap is raised and serves as a contact point with the minus pole of the cell.
The other end of the battery tube has a hidden USB port for charging the light. As you can see the thread is square cut, same as the tailcap.
The transparent plastic part at the front is red during charging and green when the charging process is finished. It has a good charging current of about 0.8A. It is important to have a good internal charging function as well as a low voltage cut of because the light uses unprotected cells and it fulfilled my expectations. The charging process ends at 4.19V and there is a pretty conservative low voltage cut off at 3.0V which i like. Lets look at the LEDs
The PalmStar uses 4x XPG2 emitters in a shallow reflector which will result in a very floody beam. L5 mode gives you 1300 Lumens (75min), L4 gives you 830 Lumens (70min), L3 is 500 Lumens (95min), L2 is 100 Lumens (6.3h) and finally L1 gives you 40 Lumens for 14 hours according to the manual. 282m Beam distance and 20K Lux. The light is IPX-8 rated.
A quick ceiling bounce test resulted in 1330 Lumens (peak). I mentioned earlier that the light will be seen controversial because of some aspects and one of it is probably the beam color, it is cool white (there is a bluish tint in the lower modes). This is maybe important to mention for the tint loving flashaholic, probably not so much for the normal "joe doe" customer or "Hans Müller" in germany.
The runtime test was done with LG HG2 3000mAh (fan cooled). There is a very early step thermal step down to L4 (830 Lumens). Of course 1330 Lumens in a small EDC pocket rocket will produce some heat but because of the early step down you can use the light for about 8 minutes until it gets hot(head). The PalmStar has an internal cut off, i removed the cell right after the cut off and it had 3.0V.
A size comparison with other smaller 18650 EDC lights, it is pretty compact for a light with internal charging. The head is wider than usual.
The lens comes with AR coated glas.
Some indoor beamshots next. The beam doesnt look purple, i dont know why the camera shows it like that. The tint color is cool and a bit bluish, especially in the lower modes but not purple.
white wall beamshots
outdoor shots (forest)
The little white camping table is 42m away this time, in the niwalker vostro test it was over 90m away.
As a GIF
As you can see the PalmStar is super floody, the beam even went ouf of the picture. I should have placed the camera a few meters back.
with optical zoom
As a Gif
I hope you liked the review of this little light. Im sure people will either love it or hate it because of the things ive mentioned. It looks and feels like a premium light, the machining and anodizing is perfect. Maybe interesting to mod as well because the bezel is not glued. Remember that this light is only 48 dollars, i could imagine a much higher price if this light would be from a different manufacturer. It has decent build quality, an insane grip because of the knurling, a great charging function and internal cut off. It is compact and super floody.
A con could be the tint color and the UI for some people like i mentioned above and the lack of protected 18650 support which is not that bad because the light has a conservative internal cut off and charges to 4.19V like it should unlike some other lights.
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