bfg9000
Flashlight Enthusiast
- Joined
- Jan 7, 2005
- Messages
- 1,119
This interesting specimen has inertial switching, like the Fliklite only much more sensitive. Wave it in the air and it turns on, wave it again and it turns off.
Construction is plastic, and it appears to have no waterproofing seals whatsoever. At 14" long, it is disappointingly large for a 2AAA light. No pocket clip or holster is included, but it did arrive in a fancy presentation case. No accessory gun rail mount option is available.
The tailcap appears roughly finished on the outside, as if hewn from a tree branch or the like. The protrusions resemble barnacles, and positively prohibit tailstanding but allow a firm purchase when turning the cap.
The internal threads are reasonably smooth in operation despite being supplied dry from the factory. The contacts look somewhat flimsy, but I was sure to apply Deoxit before testing.
Ugh, the beamshot looks simply horrible on a white wall, despite the TIR optic tip. It appears to be the result of having a single uncut 5mm white LED with its internal optic, firing into the exposed secondary optic. The color is very warm white for a 5mm, and the ringiness is not very noticeable in use outdoors. It does throw a tight spot as can be seen in the photo.
Output is variable by means of a side-mounted momentary button. The UI ramps the output between low (pictured here, about 1 lumen) to high over 6 seconds, then high to low and the cycle continues for as long as the button is pressed. This UI requires an inordinate amount of attention to select the lowest or highest level, because it does not stop and require another button press unlike the Gladius. The steps are extremely small so appear nearly continuously variable, compounding the problem. Output on high appears to be similar to other 5mm lights rated about 10 lumens, which hardly seems enough to cast a patronas spell. The head is completely sealed so swapping emitters would likely be extremely difficult.
Perhaps most disappointing to many readers will be the PWM used at all levels, which is even slightly noticeable on high when the light is (gently) waved about. Since presumably a boost converter is employed, this may have been done in the interest of improving efficiency or runtime--though I cannot help but wonder why they did not just use 3 or 4 AAAs and run a more efficient buck converter if that was the goal. As I do not have the equipment to accurately measure output there will be no graphs of regulation or runtime, but a 5mm LED should run a reasonably long time, even with inefficient regulation.
To sum up, this is an interesting product that is marred by enough serious flaws to make many consider it to be more of a toy than a serious illumination tool.
Construction is plastic, and it appears to have no waterproofing seals whatsoever. At 14" long, it is disappointingly large for a 2AAA light. No pocket clip or holster is included, but it did arrive in a fancy presentation case. No accessory gun rail mount option is available.
The tailcap appears roughly finished on the outside, as if hewn from a tree branch or the like. The protrusions resemble barnacles, and positively prohibit tailstanding but allow a firm purchase when turning the cap.
The internal threads are reasonably smooth in operation despite being supplied dry from the factory. The contacts look somewhat flimsy, but I was sure to apply Deoxit before testing.
Ugh, the beamshot looks simply horrible on a white wall, despite the TIR optic tip. It appears to be the result of having a single uncut 5mm white LED with its internal optic, firing into the exposed secondary optic. The color is very warm white for a 5mm, and the ringiness is not very noticeable in use outdoors. It does throw a tight spot as can be seen in the photo.
Output is variable by means of a side-mounted momentary button. The UI ramps the output between low (pictured here, about 1 lumen) to high over 6 seconds, then high to low and the cycle continues for as long as the button is pressed. This UI requires an inordinate amount of attention to select the lowest or highest level, because it does not stop and require another button press unlike the Gladius. The steps are extremely small so appear nearly continuously variable, compounding the problem. Output on high appears to be similar to other 5mm lights rated about 10 lumens, which hardly seems enough to cast a patronas spell. The head is completely sealed so swapping emitters would likely be extremely difficult.
Perhaps most disappointing to many readers will be the PWM used at all levels, which is even slightly noticeable on high when the light is (gently) waved about. Since presumably a boost converter is employed, this may have been done in the interest of improving efficiency or runtime--though I cannot help but wonder why they did not just use 3 or 4 AAAs and run a more efficient buck converter if that was the goal. As I do not have the equipment to accurately measure output there will be no graphs of regulation or runtime, but a 5mm LED should run a reasonably long time, even with inefficient regulation.
To sum up, this is an interesting product that is marred by enough serious flaws to make many consider it to be more of a toy than a serious illumination tool.
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