KevinL
Flashlight Enthusiast
I had a little time to walk around today and guess what I saw, a spotlight. $24.95. "FIVE MILLION CANDLEPOWER!!" oh of course. Let's try this baby out. I've had a newfound fascination with crazy bright lights recently and felt this might be worth my time and $$ (fortunately, not too much $$) to add to my collection.
I bought one and took it home, lit it up and guess what?
(Before we get to the goodies, no, I cannot get the Thor locally. Shipping one in would cost me a fortune, far more than the light's cost.)
My U2 Digital Ultra and *SUREFIRE P90* laughed themselves into the next week - this 5MCP spot puts out ~120 lumens. I'd be laughing too except that it's just sick? I mean I KNOW the MCP ratings are way overrated but I didn't expect the U2 to have the last laugh. It's a little brighter than the P90 but it gets stomped by the U2 that I brought to the store with me! I bought it to keep the Mag85 company and the '85 completely steamrollers it flat. I'm serious, this thing's beam and output resembles the Mag85 - BEFORE I MODDED IT!
This poor light needs help, lots and lots and lots of help... oh and guess what? they claimed it was a 100W bulb. I'm sorry but I have trouble believing that. Really. My adventures with the Osram Silverstar H4 automotive bulb and a 12V voltage-regulated 350W power supply have shown me what real 55/60W's are capable of and this doesn't even hold a candle to it.
The good thing about it, however, is that it promises to be easy to mod. I'm thinking that for starters, it needs a real bulb.. and real gel-cell SLAs if possible. It has two gel-cells in series for 12V, maybe I can get one nice solid 12V Yuasa SLA and replace it. I use the Yuasa cells in my UPS systems and they are pretty decent.
The fundamentals are kinda somewhat there, I should think. The wiring seems ok, maybe good for up to 8-10A (guesstimate). It's an extremely simple design, classic battery-switch-lightbulb circuit, with an additional port for the dumb unregulated wallwart charger for the SLAs. Believe it or not the circuit is resistored. The light can be used while on the charger. Comes with car charger as well.
Outer plastic housing is cheap and cheerful, but functional. More importantly, the reflector is a big metal dish, that has a flat center that almost seems perfect for mounting a Lamina LED array for 500 real lumens out of a spot, AND awesome runtime with one of George's drivers. There is a generous amount of space aft of the lamp, where you could stuff the driver. This info is for the LED people, I don't plan on doing this conversion myself.
Forward, the lens is one BIG massive slab of glass, perfect for glass freaks like me. Realistically, I feel that this light IS mechanically configured for a high-power bulb, just that whoever built it wimped out at the last moment and used a hopelessly underpowered bulb. I think the bulb is a H3 and I forsee a Phillips Rally 100W bulb in my future. Not legal for use on public roads, but nobody said anything about its use....on foot /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif (ie. me walking and carrying the light).
I bought one and took it home, lit it up and guess what?
(Before we get to the goodies, no, I cannot get the Thor locally. Shipping one in would cost me a fortune, far more than the light's cost.)
My U2 Digital Ultra and *SUREFIRE P90* laughed themselves into the next week - this 5MCP spot puts out ~120 lumens. I'd be laughing too except that it's just sick? I mean I KNOW the MCP ratings are way overrated but I didn't expect the U2 to have the last laugh. It's a little brighter than the P90 but it gets stomped by the U2 that I brought to the store with me! I bought it to keep the Mag85 company and the '85 completely steamrollers it flat. I'm serious, this thing's beam and output resembles the Mag85 - BEFORE I MODDED IT!
This poor light needs help, lots and lots and lots of help... oh and guess what? they claimed it was a 100W bulb. I'm sorry but I have trouble believing that. Really. My adventures with the Osram Silverstar H4 automotive bulb and a 12V voltage-regulated 350W power supply have shown me what real 55/60W's are capable of and this doesn't even hold a candle to it.
The good thing about it, however, is that it promises to be easy to mod. I'm thinking that for starters, it needs a real bulb.. and real gel-cell SLAs if possible. It has two gel-cells in series for 12V, maybe I can get one nice solid 12V Yuasa SLA and replace it. I use the Yuasa cells in my UPS systems and they are pretty decent.
The fundamentals are kinda somewhat there, I should think. The wiring seems ok, maybe good for up to 8-10A (guesstimate). It's an extremely simple design, classic battery-switch-lightbulb circuit, with an additional port for the dumb unregulated wallwart charger for the SLAs. Believe it or not the circuit is resistored. The light can be used while on the charger. Comes with car charger as well.
Outer plastic housing is cheap and cheerful, but functional. More importantly, the reflector is a big metal dish, that has a flat center that almost seems perfect for mounting a Lamina LED array for 500 real lumens out of a spot, AND awesome runtime with one of George's drivers. There is a generous amount of space aft of the lamp, where you could stuff the driver. This info is for the LED people, I don't plan on doing this conversion myself.
Forward, the lens is one BIG massive slab of glass, perfect for glass freaks like me. Realistically, I feel that this light IS mechanically configured for a high-power bulb, just that whoever built it wimped out at the last moment and used a hopelessly underpowered bulb. I think the bulb is a H3 and I forsee a Phillips Rally 100W bulb in my future. Not legal for use on public roads, but nobody said anything about its use....on foot /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif (ie. me walking and carrying the light).
