This is from the "Annamerria Dallasandra" collection linked from www.peakledsolutions.com front page. It's the lug body light at the bottom of the page, $24.95 plus $3.85 shipping in US. I saw it as a replacement for the lamented Arc AAA and ordered it last week and eagerly anticipated it. It arrived today. It's about what I expected, not an absolutely perfect Arc replacement, but quite close. Details:
1. Packaging: the light came in a boxlike clear plastic hang package (no molded fittings for the light and battery) so it sort of bounced around in the package. There is an attractive cardboard insert with a color picture of a lake with some mountains, saying "Peak Led Solutions, Regulated Electronic Circuit, made in USA, battery included, LED circuit designed for maximum light output & battery life". It doesn't mention on the front what type of light it is, so I suspect they use the same package for several models. On the back there's a runtime chart labelled "AAA battery life test". The back is printed in monochrome, so they may have done the 4-color front for a bunch of different models with one expensive press run, then done the monochrome back for individual models with several cheaper runs. Clever. The runtime graph shows about 26 hours to 50% brightness. Frankly I'm skeptical and I want to see some independent tests before I believe anything like that. There was a Varta "high energy" alkaline AAA cell (made in Germany) inside the light.
2. The light itself looks exactly like an Arc AAA with a black finish. It appears to use exactly the same metal parts that the Arc used, not surprising since it's apparently made at the same factory, probably with the same CNC programs (see old threads for the long and sad history). There is no lettering anywhere on the light, which solves the M*g circumferential lettering problem and the Arc longitudinal ugly logo problem. I congratulate Peak for being willing to ship a light with no lettering. The one visible difference from the Arc is that the Peak LED is a little further forward in the head, maybe because they weren't able to miniaturize the electronics quite as much. This has some noticable effects on the beam, more below. There is no pocket clip included. The card says "The shape, style, and appearance of this flashlight is trademarked", which is a little bit amusing since the light looks absolutely identical to the earlier Arc product.
3. The LED reaches to about 0.5mm behind the front face of the LED, which is enough to protect it from scratches and let you stand the light head down on a table. This is compared with about 2mm of setback on the Arc, while on the original Peak prototype, the LED actually stuck out around 1mm past the front, which was pretty cheesy.
4. The Arc is somewhat brighter than the Peak, as is consistent with Peak's philosophy of running the LED's at lower current, within the LED manufacturer's spec. Arc overdrives its LED's significantly to get more output. If you want more power from the Peak light, they offer a version with three LED's, though I don't see an ordering option for three LED's and the lug body at the moment. I think the Peak's brightness is fine. The difference is maybe 1/2 a stop, i.e. much smaller than the difference between a CMG Infinity and CMG Ultra. In practice I don't think most people would notice the brightness difference between the Peak and the Arc except by direct comparison. Unfortunately I don't have a convenient way to measure battery current.
5. The Peak "snow" led has more neutral color than the Arc, but it turns out to not be that big a deal with a light this low-powered. One doesn't really pay that much attention to color in low-light situations. The Peak has about the same diameter spill beam as the Arc (I'd been afraid of a narrow spill like the Inova X1) but the Arc's spill is quite a bit smoother. The Peak's is somewhat ringy, and there's a large diameter ring way past where the regular spill area ends. I think these are artifacts of the LED being further forward in the reflector as mentioned above. Again, I don't think it's a big deal in practical use, but I notice it as a connoisseur.
6. The Peak uses a larger diameter split ring (like 1/2") in the lug body. I can understand why they did that: the Arc's 3/8"(?) split ring is a pain in the a** to get on and off of the light. They saved themselves some assembly hassle using the larger ring. But the Peak's split ring's larger diameter doesn't look so well-matched to the light. That gives the Peak split ring a slightly cheap appearance. It doesn't help that the Peak also uses thinner metal in its split ring. Also, if the light is on your keys, the larger ring effectively makes the light about 3mm longer. The Sandwich Shoppe sells Arc-like split rings so maybe I'll do a transplant sometime.
7. Internally, the Peak body appears to be bare aluminum, no Chemkote like the Arc has. The head is epoxy potted with a solder blob contact like the Arc. There is no foam washer on the head, so the epoxy potting is visible. The foam washer is at the tail end instead. That seems to works perfectly well at stopping battery rattle. I was able to put the Arc head on the Peak body just fine. Trying to put the Peak head on the Arc body resulted in some thread interference so I didn't force it.
8. Despite having some lube on the threads as delivered, the Peak head squeaks a little when you put it onto the body (for the first few threads, not when you turn it on and off). The threads don't seem to operate quite as smoothly as the Arc. I'd consider this to be a minor QC problem that Peak needs to get in order. It's a little bit puzzling, since as stated, I think the Peak was made with the same machines and programming as the Arc.
9. All in all I think the small 1AAA keychain light vacuum created by Arc's collapse has now been filled (the CMG Sonic really didn't satisfy and the two-piece Peak 1AAA was bigger and kludgier than the Arc). There are a few small bugs to work out of this light but the Arc had its own bugs. The Peak has not yet failed to turn on after about 20 tries. However, you have to turn it on firmly or else it doesn't come to full brightness--some resistance in the solder blob, I guess. I've never liked this solder blob concept and I might try to put something better there.
10. I fear that posting this review is going to cost me some money, since Arc AAA's are selling in the $50+ range (I've heard of some going over $100 on ebay) and I have a spare new-in-package unit. But I think the Peak is really a satisfactory substitute and I no longer see a reason to buy an Arc at 2x the Peak's price, except for collecting purposes. I think the availability of this light may fill a lot of the demand for old Arcs, and therefore lower the obtainable prices.
11. I'll see if I can later post some photos of the Peak light, its packaging, and comparative beamshots with the Arc AAA, but don't hold your breath.
12. Suggestions to Peak: a) Get the QC together for this light so the threads operate smoothly. b) Publish an honest runtime graph using the actual type of battery included with the light. c) Apply chemkote to the interior unless there's really no advantage. d) Offer an "ultra power" (overdriven) version since lots of people want it. (I'm not sure whether I want it). e) Offer more anodization colors--you can't go wrong with black, but I think the red Arc CPF special was really beautiful.
Update: I've begun an overnight runtime test. We'll see how the light is doing tomorrow.
Update 2: I should mention, the black finish has a slightly rougher texture than either my HA natural Arc AAA, or the HA black on my Firefly FF1 or the HA green on my Ultra-G's. So, maybe this is another area for improvement.
Update 3: 4.5 hours into the test the Arc is seriously clobbering the Peak, by at least a full stop. Ceiling bounce test makes me think the Peak is making a little less total output than a CMG Infinity (non-Ultra). This isn't obvious from the Peak hotspot which seems a little brighter, though. It's still a completely useable light at this brightness but the runtime graph on the package is nonsense. If one of the regular CPF testers has the equipment to do an accurate graph, I'm willing to lend the light for a few days for that purpose. Note that with a lithium battery, the graph should be pretty flat, instead of this sloping.
Update 4: I accidentally stopped the test for a few hours this morning, but with around 18 hours of "on" time so far, the light is still running at useable brightness. It's considerably below a CMG Infinity (non-Ultra) but I could certainly find my way to the can using it. As mentioned on another thread, I'm happy with this light, but Arc AAA aficionados looking for maximal brightness probably should get the 3-led version.
Update 5: It's now just short of a full three days after I started the runtime test, and the light was off for 5-6 hours on the morning of the 2nd day, so it's been on for over 65 hours on its original battery. It's still running and it turns on and off just fine (no problem starting the oscillator even with the battery this weak). It's pretty dim, about 1/2 the brightness of my original green-led Photon II running on a single CR2032, but as before, it's useable for "finding the can" or reading in the dark. It's much brighter than the "moon mode" of the Arc AAA which starts at about 6 hours.
Direct drive and resistor-limited lights have traditionally had a very long, tapering brightness curve, as compared with regulated lights which stay bright for a while and then go stone dead. This Peak light is acting more like an unregulated light than a regulated one, despite its boost converter. It can reasonably be said to be combining the advantages of both approaches. The main gripe people will have is that it's not bright enough in the initial part of the curve. So there should be a 3-led or ultra-power model of this light.
Update 6: Saturday Jan 22, light has been on since Monday night except for a few hours Tues morning, so over 100 hours or 4 solid days. It's still running but is quite feeble, not useable without first spending a minute getting dark adapted (I took it into a closet). But with dark adaptation, I can still find my way around with it. The led is probably getting less than one mA. I turned the light on and off a few times, which it could still do. I'm going to turn the light off for an hour or so and see if letting the battery recover gets more light from it, but I don't have a meter so it may not be obvious.
Update 7: I didn't see any obvious difference after a few minutes of battery rest, so I shut it off for about 5 hours and turned it on again. It does seem to have regained some brightness but is still pretty feeble, maybe 2x-3x what it was. This is different from the Arc AAA's dropping into a near-useless "moon mode" but coming back to a good fraction of normal brightness after a few minutes of battery rest. The Peak right now is maybe 10x brighter than what I remember the Arc's moon mode as being. It's a few times brighter than the Photon Freedom Micro at the lowest setting. The Peak is bright enough to walk around carefully with a minute or two of dark adaptation but not without it. I guess that's good enough for a blackout situation. I guess I'll just let it keep running for a few more days and see if it manages to crap out completely. I think this test is basically finished and what happens next isn't of much practical use, but it's got me curious.
Update 8: After 6 full days less about 10 hours of off time (130+ hours on-time), it's down to a faint glow, no longer really useable for illumination. It still turns on and off ok.
1. Packaging: the light came in a boxlike clear plastic hang package (no molded fittings for the light and battery) so it sort of bounced around in the package. There is an attractive cardboard insert with a color picture of a lake with some mountains, saying "Peak Led Solutions, Regulated Electronic Circuit, made in USA, battery included, LED circuit designed for maximum light output & battery life". It doesn't mention on the front what type of light it is, so I suspect they use the same package for several models. On the back there's a runtime chart labelled "AAA battery life test". The back is printed in monochrome, so they may have done the 4-color front for a bunch of different models with one expensive press run, then done the monochrome back for individual models with several cheaper runs. Clever. The runtime graph shows about 26 hours to 50% brightness. Frankly I'm skeptical and I want to see some independent tests before I believe anything like that. There was a Varta "high energy" alkaline AAA cell (made in Germany) inside the light.
2. The light itself looks exactly like an Arc AAA with a black finish. It appears to use exactly the same metal parts that the Arc used, not surprising since it's apparently made at the same factory, probably with the same CNC programs (see old threads for the long and sad history). There is no lettering anywhere on the light, which solves the M*g circumferential lettering problem and the Arc longitudinal ugly logo problem. I congratulate Peak for being willing to ship a light with no lettering. The one visible difference from the Arc is that the Peak LED is a little further forward in the head, maybe because they weren't able to miniaturize the electronics quite as much. This has some noticable effects on the beam, more below. There is no pocket clip included. The card says "The shape, style, and appearance of this flashlight is trademarked", which is a little bit amusing since the light looks absolutely identical to the earlier Arc product.
3. The LED reaches to about 0.5mm behind the front face of the LED, which is enough to protect it from scratches and let you stand the light head down on a table. This is compared with about 2mm of setback on the Arc, while on the original Peak prototype, the LED actually stuck out around 1mm past the front, which was pretty cheesy.
4. The Arc is somewhat brighter than the Peak, as is consistent with Peak's philosophy of running the LED's at lower current, within the LED manufacturer's spec. Arc overdrives its LED's significantly to get more output. If you want more power from the Peak light, they offer a version with three LED's, though I don't see an ordering option for three LED's and the lug body at the moment. I think the Peak's brightness is fine. The difference is maybe 1/2 a stop, i.e. much smaller than the difference between a CMG Infinity and CMG Ultra. In practice I don't think most people would notice the brightness difference between the Peak and the Arc except by direct comparison. Unfortunately I don't have a convenient way to measure battery current.
5. The Peak "snow" led has more neutral color than the Arc, but it turns out to not be that big a deal with a light this low-powered. One doesn't really pay that much attention to color in low-light situations. The Peak has about the same diameter spill beam as the Arc (I'd been afraid of a narrow spill like the Inova X1) but the Arc's spill is quite a bit smoother. The Peak's is somewhat ringy, and there's a large diameter ring way past where the regular spill area ends. I think these are artifacts of the LED being further forward in the reflector as mentioned above. Again, I don't think it's a big deal in practical use, but I notice it as a connoisseur.
6. The Peak uses a larger diameter split ring (like 1/2") in the lug body. I can understand why they did that: the Arc's 3/8"(?) split ring is a pain in the a** to get on and off of the light. They saved themselves some assembly hassle using the larger ring. But the Peak's split ring's larger diameter doesn't look so well-matched to the light. That gives the Peak split ring a slightly cheap appearance. It doesn't help that the Peak also uses thinner metal in its split ring. Also, if the light is on your keys, the larger ring effectively makes the light about 3mm longer. The Sandwich Shoppe sells Arc-like split rings so maybe I'll do a transplant sometime.
7. Internally, the Peak body appears to be bare aluminum, no Chemkote like the Arc has. The head is epoxy potted with a solder blob contact like the Arc. There is no foam washer on the head, so the epoxy potting is visible. The foam washer is at the tail end instead. That seems to works perfectly well at stopping battery rattle. I was able to put the Arc head on the Peak body just fine. Trying to put the Peak head on the Arc body resulted in some thread interference so I didn't force it.
8. Despite having some lube on the threads as delivered, the Peak head squeaks a little when you put it onto the body (for the first few threads, not when you turn it on and off). The threads don't seem to operate quite as smoothly as the Arc. I'd consider this to be a minor QC problem that Peak needs to get in order. It's a little bit puzzling, since as stated, I think the Peak was made with the same machines and programming as the Arc.
9. All in all I think the small 1AAA keychain light vacuum created by Arc's collapse has now been filled (the CMG Sonic really didn't satisfy and the two-piece Peak 1AAA was bigger and kludgier than the Arc). There are a few small bugs to work out of this light but the Arc had its own bugs. The Peak has not yet failed to turn on after about 20 tries. However, you have to turn it on firmly or else it doesn't come to full brightness--some resistance in the solder blob, I guess. I've never liked this solder blob concept and I might try to put something better there.
10. I fear that posting this review is going to cost me some money, since Arc AAA's are selling in the $50+ range (I've heard of some going over $100 on ebay) and I have a spare new-in-package unit. But I think the Peak is really a satisfactory substitute and I no longer see a reason to buy an Arc at 2x the Peak's price, except for collecting purposes. I think the availability of this light may fill a lot of the demand for old Arcs, and therefore lower the obtainable prices.
11. I'll see if I can later post some photos of the Peak light, its packaging, and comparative beamshots with the Arc AAA, but don't hold your breath.
12. Suggestions to Peak: a) Get the QC together for this light so the threads operate smoothly. b) Publish an honest runtime graph using the actual type of battery included with the light. c) Apply chemkote to the interior unless there's really no advantage. d) Offer an "ultra power" (overdriven) version since lots of people want it. (I'm not sure whether I want it). e) Offer more anodization colors--you can't go wrong with black, but I think the red Arc CPF special was really beautiful.
Update: I've begun an overnight runtime test. We'll see how the light is doing tomorrow.
Update 2: I should mention, the black finish has a slightly rougher texture than either my HA natural Arc AAA, or the HA black on my Firefly FF1 or the HA green on my Ultra-G's. So, maybe this is another area for improvement.
Update 3: 4.5 hours into the test the Arc is seriously clobbering the Peak, by at least a full stop. Ceiling bounce test makes me think the Peak is making a little less total output than a CMG Infinity (non-Ultra). This isn't obvious from the Peak hotspot which seems a little brighter, though. It's still a completely useable light at this brightness but the runtime graph on the package is nonsense. If one of the regular CPF testers has the equipment to do an accurate graph, I'm willing to lend the light for a few days for that purpose. Note that with a lithium battery, the graph should be pretty flat, instead of this sloping.
Update 4: I accidentally stopped the test for a few hours this morning, but with around 18 hours of "on" time so far, the light is still running at useable brightness. It's considerably below a CMG Infinity (non-Ultra) but I could certainly find my way to the can using it. As mentioned on another thread, I'm happy with this light, but Arc AAA aficionados looking for maximal brightness probably should get the 3-led version.
Update 5: It's now just short of a full three days after I started the runtime test, and the light was off for 5-6 hours on the morning of the 2nd day, so it's been on for over 65 hours on its original battery. It's still running and it turns on and off just fine (no problem starting the oscillator even with the battery this weak). It's pretty dim, about 1/2 the brightness of my original green-led Photon II running on a single CR2032, but as before, it's useable for "finding the can" or reading in the dark. It's much brighter than the "moon mode" of the Arc AAA which starts at about 6 hours.
Direct drive and resistor-limited lights have traditionally had a very long, tapering brightness curve, as compared with regulated lights which stay bright for a while and then go stone dead. This Peak light is acting more like an unregulated light than a regulated one, despite its boost converter. It can reasonably be said to be combining the advantages of both approaches. The main gripe people will have is that it's not bright enough in the initial part of the curve. So there should be a 3-led or ultra-power model of this light.
Update 6: Saturday Jan 22, light has been on since Monday night except for a few hours Tues morning, so over 100 hours or 4 solid days. It's still running but is quite feeble, not useable without first spending a minute getting dark adapted (I took it into a closet). But with dark adaptation, I can still find my way around with it. The led is probably getting less than one mA. I turned the light on and off a few times, which it could still do. I'm going to turn the light off for an hour or so and see if letting the battery recover gets more light from it, but I don't have a meter so it may not be obvious.
Update 7: I didn't see any obvious difference after a few minutes of battery rest, so I shut it off for about 5 hours and turned it on again. It does seem to have regained some brightness but is still pretty feeble, maybe 2x-3x what it was. This is different from the Arc AAA's dropping into a near-useless "moon mode" but coming back to a good fraction of normal brightness after a few minutes of battery rest. The Peak right now is maybe 10x brighter than what I remember the Arc's moon mode as being. It's a few times brighter than the Photon Freedom Micro at the lowest setting. The Peak is bright enough to walk around carefully with a minute or two of dark adaptation but not without it. I guess that's good enough for a blackout situation. I guess I'll just let it keep running for a few more days and see if it manages to crap out completely. I think this test is basically finished and what happens next isn't of much practical use, but it's got me curious.
Update 8: After 6 full days less about 10 hours of off time (130+ hours on-time), it's down to a faint glow, no longer really useable for illumination. It still turns on and off ok.
