Haze, Scratched, or film? SUREFIRE lights with T.I.R. lenses??

[IceManArnold]

Hello everyone. My question is for everyone that has an LED light, especially one of SUREFIRE'S LED T.I.R. lens lights. The L5 and L4 lights I own have an "orange peel" look to the reflector, and it looks clean and crisp on or off. The reflector on my new E2DL 120 lumen light appears to be smooth. When the light if is off, the reflector appears flawless, and clean. When I turn the light on to either setting of 5 lumens (low) or maximum power of 120 lumens, the reflector appears to look "slightly scratched" or "hazed" Now, this does NOT seem to affect its performance. It blows the L4 and L5 out of the water in terms of power, whiteness, and distance illumination. Very impressive indeed. I was just wondering since I have never owned a light that had a "smooth" reflector like a Total Internal Reflection design SUREFIRE offers... is the way the reflector looks normal? Am I being too picky, or should it look flawless regardless of the light being on or off?? The orange peel reflectors do not seem to have this issue, but maybe it's there and I just can't notice due to the orange peel look. Please Advise.

 

[Yoda4561]

That sounds fairly normal. It's not "really" a reflector. It's a lens that surrounds the led itself and allows more light from the led than a reflector can. The downside is that there are often minor artifacts (rings) in the beam and the lens surface looks odd compared to what we are used to. On Khatod optic's webpage (the guys who gene malkoff gets his optics from, not sure who surefire contracts) states something to the effect that "flow marks" on the lens aren't a defect but rather a byproduct of the manufacturing process, and as long as they don't affect the optical characterisics of the beam they aren't important. I'm guessing that's what you're seeing.

 

[Gunner12]

The L4 and L5 have an orange peel reflector.

The E2DL has an optic. It might be how the optic works.

Do you have any mods planned for the L4 or L5? A good one should easily beat the E2DL in performance.:naughty:

:welcome:

 

[IceManArnold]

Thanks for the reply, that makes me feel much better about my newest purchase. My girlfriend and I went out last night about 1:30 a.m., on a very dark road to really test the difference between L4, L5, & the new E2DL. Impressive. Very, impressive. It's like a spot light that fits in your pocket. The effective illumination distance on this little powerhouse is INSANE. I highly recommend SUREFIRE'S new E2DL 120 lumen Defender to anyone looking for some serious power, and the ability to use it as a defensive weapon. I would post a picture, but I do not have permission to post attachments. How do I post pics??

 

[IceManArnold]

Gunner12: I was actually not aware of the fact that mods could be done to SF's lights. I am curious as to what you mean. I really was hoping SF would come out with their 120 lumen upgraded L5, but they did not, even though it's in the 2007 catalog. They upgraded the run time, and led instead.

 

[WildChild]

Those artifacts looks like fingerprints on the external side of the optic. All my E2L, L1 and E2DL have a few but if you look directly into the optic, not from the side, you will never see them! The beauty of internal reflection.

 

[Kiessling]

Some of the "haze" that is more or less present with lights sporting the new optics used by SF is a holographic diffusion film to smooth out the beam pattern. It si not a defect, but a feature

However, I do not know which light or version has it it which doesn't have it.

bernie

 

[WildChild]

Some of the "haze" that is more or less present with lights sporting the new optics used by SF is a holographic diffusion film to smooth out the beam pattern. It si not a defect, but a feature

However, I do not know which light or version has it it which doesn't have it.

bernie

My E2DL has this "diffusion" film.

 

[Aluminous]

I would post a picture, but I do not have permission to post attachments. How do I post pics??

The attachment feature is turned off at this forum. What people do instead is, upload images to a free outside host such as www.imageshack.us, and paste the code into a post here to display them. Note that if your images are larger than 800 pixels in width or height, you should be sure to use the thumbnail-linking-to-fullsize version of Imageshack's display code.

 

[Kiessling]

Mine hasn't, or at least I can't spot it.

I am just regurgitating things I learned from knowledgeable members, I can't say anything more though, sorry.

bernie

 

[Gunner12]

The P60/P90 accepting lights(G2L, 6P, Z3 etc) would be the easiest to "mod" just drop in a different light module.

The other ones are harder to mod. Many people here choose to pay another modder to modify the light for them.

Milkyspit is a well known one. Here's one of his threads.

The current gen LEDs are at least twice as efficient as the last gen LEDs, so for the same power the current gen LEDs will have at least double the output of the last gen LEDs. The L5 will probably receive such an upgrade, so a bit more output can result in up to twice the runtime.

The E2DL has a current gen LED.

 

[LukeA]

The attachment feature is turned off at this forum. What people do instead is, upload images to a free outside host such as www.imageshack.us, and paste the code into a post here to display them. Note that if your images are larger than 800 pixels in width or height, you should be sure to use the thumbnail-linking-to-fullsize version of Imageshack's display code.

OT, but Photobucket.com is better.