yowzer
Enlightened
A while back I was in the market for a fairly small, bright floody light, as well as wanting to try a Peak light. I ended up picking up a K2. P7 LED, advertised as putting out 325 lumens, hasn't gotten a whole lot of attention here for some reason. Now that I've used it for a while, mini review time.
The Good: Very bright, and great at lighting up a big area. It can tailstand when I pull out the plastic ring that fits around the tailcap a bit; normally the tailcap (A forward clicky) protrudes. Being able to adjust it is nice. The light also doubles as a hand warmer; important now that winter's coming. :laughing:
The Bad: It's advertised as having a 1 inch head diameter, so I was hoping the Surefire 1-inch diffusers would fit, but it's a bit too narrow for a F04. The Al. body feels thin and cheap; I was expecting something more solid given Peak's reputation for tough solid construction. Maybe that's just the steel and brass lights?
The Ugly: The beam's hotspot is ugly, with lots of shadows and blotches. I think it's mostly from the multi-die design of the P7. An OP reflector or diffuser would clean it up nicely. (Does the light have a reflector or an optic that's the same shape? I recently proved that I can't reliably tell the difference just from looking.) It's not bad outside in trees or grass, but against a wall indoors, or sidewalk, it's noticeable and distracting.
Other observations: IIRC, I measured the current draw of the light as 1.2A, which is higher than I'm comfortable with for using a normal RCR123. I'm using the bigger, higher capacity 18350 (Which I wish I could find in a protected version), but for the smaller size, I'd want to stick to IMR cells.
There's also a 18500 body tube available, but I think that'd make the light bigger than what I was looking for. As it is, it's longer than a Surefire E1 series light, which is my upper limit for pocket carry. I haven't done any real run time tests, but I'm guessing I'm getting about 45 minutes from a fully charged 18350.
Doing a ceiling bounce comparison with a Surefire LX2 (200 SF lumens, something like 240-250 actual per some of the integrating sphere threads) and my Mk. 1 Eyeball light meter, they're equally bright. If the 325 lumen figure is emitter lumens, that sounds about right.
If the beam was cleaner, this would be a great light (And it is in an outdoors setting.) As it is, it's a good but not outstanding one. But it's enough to make me want to get more Peak lights.
The Good: Very bright, and great at lighting up a big area. It can tailstand when I pull out the plastic ring that fits around the tailcap a bit; normally the tailcap (A forward clicky) protrudes. Being able to adjust it is nice. The light also doubles as a hand warmer; important now that winter's coming. :laughing:
The Bad: It's advertised as having a 1 inch head diameter, so I was hoping the Surefire 1-inch diffusers would fit, but it's a bit too narrow for a F04. The Al. body feels thin and cheap; I was expecting something more solid given Peak's reputation for tough solid construction. Maybe that's just the steel and brass lights?
The Ugly: The beam's hotspot is ugly, with lots of shadows and blotches. I think it's mostly from the multi-die design of the P7. An OP reflector or diffuser would clean it up nicely. (Does the light have a reflector or an optic that's the same shape? I recently proved that I can't reliably tell the difference just from looking.) It's not bad outside in trees or grass, but against a wall indoors, or sidewalk, it's noticeable and distracting.
Other observations: IIRC, I measured the current draw of the light as 1.2A, which is higher than I'm comfortable with for using a normal RCR123. I'm using the bigger, higher capacity 18350 (Which I wish I could find in a protected version), but for the smaller size, I'd want to stick to IMR cells.
There's also a 18500 body tube available, but I think that'd make the light bigger than what I was looking for. As it is, it's longer than a Surefire E1 series light, which is my upper limit for pocket carry. I haven't done any real run time tests, but I'm guessing I'm getting about 45 minutes from a fully charged 18350.
Doing a ceiling bounce comparison with a Surefire LX2 (200 SF lumens, something like 240-250 actual per some of the integrating sphere threads) and my Mk. 1 Eyeball light meter, they're equally bright. If the 325 lumen figure is emitter lumens, that sounds about right.
If the beam was cleaner, this would be a great light (And it is in an outdoors setting.) As it is, it's a good but not outstanding one. But it's enough to make me want to get more Peak lights.