NightSearcher Magnum 3000

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NightSearcher Magnum 3000 specs

Brand & Model	NightSearcher Magnum 3000
Flashlight category	Professional HD
LED	Not claimed
Max. output	3,000 lumens
Max. beam distance	500 metres
Max. beam intensity	Not claimed
Battery config.	Proprietary 26650
Onboard charging	Yes, DC12V
Main modes	4
Blinkies	Strobe
Waterproof	IP67
Review publication date	January 2024

NightSearcher is not a brand I’ve come across before, although they claim to be a British brand and established since 1984 and to quote them “As leaders in portable and rechargeable LED Lighting, Nightsearcher are continuously investing in the research and development of cutting-edge solutions with innovation and product development at the heart of our operation.”.

A quick bit of Googling finds them on Companies House, but only incorporated since 2003. So I can’t really tell what products they have been making for the claimed 19 years prior to this. Although they do list many different products from mobile lighting to mobile power units on their website. So flashlights are only a part of their business.

NightSearcher seems to make big bold claims of British designed & manufactured on their website. But while the website is very glossy and smart looking, it lacks any real information or specifications on any of their products. And I can find no other claims of components or where they are built. But we will go with the assumption that they are, as claimed, made in Britain.

All of their flashlights seem to be aimed and marketed as “Professional” or Heavy Duty and market leader. And would appear to be priced accordingly for such branding. Personally, I’d like to know a little more about such things as the LED being used and cd claims and outputs for the individual modes. But this doesn’t seem to be how NightSearcher are branding these lights. Very little information is provided.

Package quality.

The Magnum 3000 comes in a plastic carry case along with a mains charger and plug adapters. The case is quite nice, robust and somewhere to keep the light. Although it does it make it more bulky to store any carry. The case does emphasis the “professional” moniker, in the sense that you can see it being stored away until needed and completely self contained.

Despite the carry case you don’t get much in the box. There is a pre-fitted heavy duty wrist carry strap and a very basic instruction manual. The Magnum 3000 does come with an included proprietary 26650 battery already installed in the light.

I’m not entirely certain what “professional” use would really entail and would suggest this is a marketing angle rather than anything practical or substantive. I’m guessing it could be used for Search & Rescue or by any kind of commercial or industrial use where the company might issue a high quality flashlight to a department or workers.

The Magnum 3000 sure does feel very hefty and solid and has a claim of a 5 year warranty. When I say hefty, it really is heavy in the hand for its size.

It isn’t all good news. While the machining quality looks to be good, the torch is made up of several different colours where the anodising of the different components doesn’t fully match. On a budget light you can forgive these things, but something touted and priced as a “professional” unit. It does beg the question where they have scrimped a little. Don’t get me wrong, mismatched anodising doesn’t impact performance or use. But it is one of those finer details that does bother me.

A unique feature of the Magnum 3000 is the switch guard. I can sort of see the intent, to avoid accidental activation. Although my default position on this would be to simply design a switch that isn’t prone to accidental activation in the first place.

This cover rotates over the switch to block access to it. But it does not act as a lockout. In fact you can turn the light on and then slide the cover over the switch to prevent it being turned off too.

The cover requires quite a lot of effort to rotate. I can just about with a lot of effort rotate it one handed with my right thumb. But mostly you will want two hands to do this. However, as a lefty I find this another irritation of the design, as it is completely impossible to practically rotate the cover to access the switch with your left hand. And once the cover is in the open position, it then makes the light uncomfortable to hold with your left hand.

The rest of the light seems to follow the same robust and heavy build quality. The threads on the tailcap appear to be trapezoid rather than square cut. But they are smooth without slop, so I can see no issue here.

NightSearcher make no claims to what LED is used in the Magnum 3000, although I’d say it looks like a Cree XHP70.2 or XHP70.3, either way the light is rather a shocking cool white and on the night I first used the light there was a heavy due and light frost and the very white light was somewhat shocking on the eyes.

The Magnum 3000 comes with a heavy orange peel reflector, so while the reflector is relatively large, this isn’t a light focus on a pencil thin beam. In fact the beam is quite nice, not exactly a flooder as the spill beam isn’t hugely wide, but the hotspot is large and the spill beam very bright. Meaning that the area it lights up, it illuminates it really well.

There is also what looks like an AR coated glass lens and a mildly crenulated aluminium bezel. The bezel is one of the areas where the anodising doesn’t fully match. 

Spectral measurements:  

I used an Opple Light Master to measure the flashlight at 3 metres distance. 

Mode:	CCT:	CRI Ra:	duv
Turbo	6650K	71.9	-0.0007

Dimensions: 

NightSearcher Magnum 3000	Millimeters	Inches
Length	172mm	6.77in
Head diameter	62mm	2.44in
Body diameter	35mm	1.38in

Dimensions are rounded to the nearest millimeter and the nearest tenth of an Inch.

Weight: 

NightSearcher Magnum 3000	Weight in grams	Weight in oz
Without battery:	351g	12.3oz
With battery	451g	15.9oz

Weight is rounded to the nearest gram and tenth of an Oz.

Flashlight size comparison with its competition:

Group 1: Convoy L21A, Astrolux FT03, NightSearcher Magnum 3000

Group 2: Lumintop AD01, Cyansky H3, NightSearcher Magnum 3000

Available modes: 

• Turbo, High, Medium, Low

Available blinky modes:

• Strobe

From OFF:

• Press and hold: Strobe
• Single click:  On

From ON:

• Press and hold: Strobe
• 1 click: If within 5 seconds of previous click it advances the to the next output mode 
• 1 click: If over 5 seconds of previous click it will turn off

Mode memory:

• No 

Shortcuts:

• To Low: No
• To Turbo: No
• To Strobe: Yes

Low voltage warning/protection:

• Colour LED in switch will indicate battery state and light will shut off below a certain voltage

Strobe/blinkies

• Strobe, by a press and hold

Lock-out mode: 

• Via tailcap
• Rotating plastic switch cover

PWM

• None that I can detect

Additional/summary info on the UI: 

• When I first started playing around with the Magnum 3000 I must admit I hated the UI. However, I realised you need to change your mindset. A light such as this is not intended as an EDC carry light or even one for camping. Which means if you are the sort of person to require a light like this, you will most of the time just turn it on and use it in that mode. And the UI works well for this, defaulting to Turbo every time. And assuming you will have the light on for more than 5 seconds (which you probably would real world use), clicking the button again turns the light off, which is likely what your intention would be.
• Should you be indoors or closer quarters and need less light, you can scroll to the desired output at the time of activation. Where the UI feels clunky is if you want to change modes after a few mins of use, here your only option is click the switch which will turn the light off, then click it again and scroll through to your desired output.
• Ultimately I feel the UI is likely well designed and suited to the lights intended use. But if you plan to use the light for other uses, you may find the UI a little restrictive or even a tad annoying.

Charge type	Fits	No fit	Charge time
Flashlight with DC 12v socket	Provided 26650 only	Any other battery*	5-6hrs

* The provided Fuel Bar 26650 has a unique positive end button cap, making the battery proprietary to the light. A regular 26650 will not work without modification. Although you could likely stack some rare Earth magnets to stimulate the positive end of the Fuel Bar battery.

Lumen measurements

How Lumens are Measured: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards How Lumens are Measured: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards: The ANSI FL1 standards specify that output in lumens should be measured 30 seconds after turning on, as this is the standardized time for measuring brightness according to the industry standard. This is why we focus on this part in our measurements. The ANSI FL1 standards require an ambient temperature of 22 ± 3°C. We record the ambient the ambient temperature to identify potential reasons for any observed discrepancies.

To test the performance I use a homemade integrated sphere for lumen testing using a dedicated light metre. I also use the CeillingBounce Android app for measuring throw (at 3m) and runtimes. Both are calibrated using a 1Lumen supplied calibration light.

Mode	Amps at start	Specified	0 sec.	30 sec.	10 min.
Low	0.16	Not claimed	91 lm	91 lm	Not tested
Med	0.88	Not claimed	459 lm	468 lm	465 lm
High	2.06	Not claimed	919 lm	919 lm	912 lm
Turbo	5.0	3000	2457 lm	2379 lm	1616 lm

Ambient temperature during testing:

• 18°C 

NightSearcher Magnum 3000 Battery Life: Runtime graphs

How Runtimes are Measured: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards About ANSI FL1 runtime standards: The runtime is measured until the light drops to 10% of its initial output (30 seconds after turning on). This does not mean that the flashlight is not usable anymore. The last column shows how long the light actually works till it shuts off. If there is a + symbol, it means that the test was stopped at that particular point, but the light was actually still running. This happens on certain occasions, with certain drivers, firmware, or batteries.

Mode	Specified	Runtime (ANSI FL1)	Time till shut off
Low	25h	Not tested	Not tested
Med	Not claimed	5h 30min	5h 30min
High	Not claimed	2h 27min	2h 27min
Turbo	1h 30min	1h 42min	1h 42min

Peak beam intensity and beam distance measurements

About Peak beam intensity: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards About peak beam intensity The calculated value of distance in meters at which the flashlight produces a light intensity of 0.25 lux. (0.25 lux is about the brightness of a full moon shining on an object). This means that the intensity has decreased so much, it becomes difficult to see darker objects, or objects that don’t reflect light. The columns ‘Meters’ and ‘Yards’ use rounded numbers.

To test the performance I use a homemade integrated sphere for lumen testing using a dedicated light metre. I also use the CeillingBounce Android app for measuring throw (at 3m) and runtimes. Both are calibrated using a 1Lumen supplied calibration light.

Mode	Specified	Candela measured	Meters	Yards
Low	Not claimed	1,339cd	73m	80yd
Medium	Not claimed	7,155cd	169m	185yd
High	Not claimed	13,012cd	228m	249yd
Turbo	Up to 500m	32,083cd	358m	392yd

Ambient temperature:

• 18°C

Camera settings and distance: 

• Camera: Canon EOS 200D DSLR, Canon 18-55mm EFS IS used at 18mm , Shutter: ¼, Aperture: F4.5 , ISO: 1600, White Balance: 5200k 

To take the photos the camera and torch are both mounted to a tripod using a timer on the shutter. Beam shots are taken at two different distances.

Distance: 100m to the building

Distance: 5m to the tree on the left and 11m to the compost heap

Beamshots of the following flashlights compared:

• NightSearcher Magnum 3000
• Lumintop AD01
• Astrolux FT03
• Noctigon KR1
• Emisar D1K
• Emisar D1 SBT90.2

Please note that the following beamshots are mainly intended to showcase the beam pattern and beam quality, rather than overall performance. These images are typically taken directly after activation, and in different seasons or weather conditions, and therefore do not fully represent its overall performance. For accurate performance metrics, such as output, beam distance, and runtimes, you need to look at the performance section of this review.

Disclaimer: This flashlight was sent to us for review at no cost by NightSearcher. We have not been paid to review, nor have we been holding back on problems or defects.