Surefire's lack of interest in neutral, warm, and High CRI LED's

[TyJo]

+1 ZMZ67

I'd like to know, out of curiosity, how many flashlight users, under the assumption that they never knew about high CRI, would consider the use of a flashlight beyond its basic necessities: intensity, longevity, portability, and given thought to consider what it should look like when used? Suppose they do know the existence of NW, WW, and high CRI LEDs, given their needs are excepted from that of photography or studio lighting, what bearing would they consider say Malkoff devices over turnkey packages?
We have had the opportunity to explore Malkoff products and understand its potential in usability, but how much of it really matters out there in the layman's hands begs the question. Some of us go for neutral or high CRI LEDs because over the years we have learned and are driven by desire rather by need. Before NW, WW, CRI LEDs entered our peripheral vision, cool white suited needs just fine. It didn't resemble anything close to tungsten incandescent, but I haven't heard of anyone that couldn't do what they needed to do with a cool white light.

There's no doubt surefire's lights offer some room for improvement, but if the cost doesn't equate to the perceived benefit, there's no point wasting the money for it.

I agree somewhat. What car do you drive? My mother tells me a car is a box that gets you from point A to point B. For others a car is one of the most important aspects of their lives. I am somewhere in the middle on the subject of cars, and also in the middle of lights. Just because the general public is naive and unaware of technological advances in flashlights doesn't mean we should accept anything Surefire produces. I am fully aware of Li-ion cells, IPX-8 waterproof ratings, warm tints, and I expect a flashlight manufacturer to cater to me. If they don't that is fine... I understand their place in the market but at the same time I have no problem declaring I have no interest in their products.

 

[Sparky's Magic]

Based on what's been seen by SF, we'll see neutral/High CRI in 8-12 years, simply based on their past performance. Best to buy one of their soon-to-be discontinued incan versions and add a a Malkoff or nailbender drop-in, unless you're willing to wait a decade for a stock neutral/High CRI.

Still, SF hosts are the best, so get one and juice it up with an aftermarket drop-in

+1
So easy too. I recently put together a C2 with a Malkoff M61W. This is a gorgeous beam in a great host - An instant favorite.

Started out as a C2 LED Centurion, then with a head from O/R and a Malkoff M61W. voila the "Ducks' Guts".

 

[Burntrice]

We've all seen the newcomers posts that start "what's the best / brightest light" People presume brighter is better until 'educated' regarding use / batteries / tints / runtime / flood or throw / ansi ratings (or lack of) etc etc.

I think most people align cost with lumens so i went to a uk site and clicked on the first 'similar' lights from some popular brands,

Surefire 6P LED =============== £76===80 lumens===95p per lumen
Nitecore INFILUX IFE2 XP-G R5===== £94===345 lumens==27p per lumen
Wolf Eyes Champion X Digital R5==== £64===260 lumens==24p per lumen
Fenix PD30==================£48===140 lumens==34p per lumen
Jetbeam BC20================£45===305 lumens==14p per lumen
Thrunite Scorpion V2============£100==1000 lumens==10p per lumen

Now i know most of you will think this is a bizarre way of looking at things but just think 1) newcomer, and 2) bang for your buck. These are all 2 x cr123's, regardless of other features.

At pretty much triple the price per lumen as the next expensive brand, the last thing surefire are going to want to do is mess around with tints and produce lights with less lumens.

 

[pjandyho]

At pretty much triple the price per lumen as the next expensive brand, the last thing surefire are going to want to do is mess around with tints and produce lights with less lumens.

I think they had just proven you wrong with the Minimus Vision. I think Surefire have a very solid tract record and they don't really feel that they need to compete price wise. For me, I just buy whatever they produce as long as I can afford it. What you said about layman associating price to lumen output is very true though, but I am certain many (not all) who have tried or even heard about Surefire would be curious enough to buy one, if they can afford.

 

[FPSRelic]

Haven't Surefire always been reluctant to let go of incan technology for most of the reasons why people like warm tint LED's these days? My understanding is that the human eye has evolved to work with the light spectrum based on sunlight, and that as such, can work out color illuminated from within that spectrum better, and pick up light from that spectrum at further distances, which was why flashlights designed for long rifles were always incan's.

With this in mind, you would think Surefire would be all over the neutral/warm tint LED's. But could it also be argued that Incan lights can do these things anyway, and that Surefire already have several models of flashlight in this area?

 

[Swedpat]

Highly agree with OP. Out in the field a warmer higher CRI tint will be more useful than a cool tint with 20-30% higher output.
I hope Surefire soon will offer warm or neutral options. Even if I prefer warm tints I love my Outdoorsmans and Defender. I am pleased with the tint of them, none of my 3 complete Surefires suffer from greenish or bluish tint, but are nice white. But undisputable they would be even better with a warmer tint.

 

[silentlurker]

OP, why do you think Surefire needs to be everything to everyone and have certain specific product offerings? Surefire caters to consumers -- soldiers, policemen, and firemen -- who need to light up the night as much as possible with durable, unbreakable tools. This intended audience isn't taking leisurely strolls to look at flowers or paintings, and I'm sure the market research to back this up has been done. Consumers in the market for a high-CRI light have options from other companies from which to choose.

 

[angelofwar]

Haven't Surefire always been reluctant to let go of incan technology for most of the reasons why people like warm tint LED's these days? My understanding is that the human eye has evolved to work with the light spectrum based on sunlight, and that as such, can work out color illuminated from within that spectrum better, and pick up light from that spectrum at further distances, which was why flashlights designed for long rifles were always incan's.

With this in mind, you would think Surefire would be all over the neutral/warm tint LED's. But could it also be argued that Incan lights can do these things anyway, and that Surefire already have several models of flashlight in this area?

Surefire was only reluctant to let go of incans due to their ability to be used in IR applications...IR LED's just weren't bright enough. Now that they are, SF has the vampire heads, which are IR and White LED's combined, so now there's an efficient IR emitter...no need for them to hang on to incans anymore, which is why, sadly, they pretty much dropped all but the most basic models...expect to see bigger IR LED lights down the road.

 

[PPGMD]

You might want to reread the OP. While Surefire makes some of the best lights available, they are not using the most efficient emitters. HighCRI/tint will not affect reliability at all. Better CRI/tint can allow a soldier to identify colors and contrast better, which might be useful for medical personnel, etc.

Many of the type of people that could use the warmer emitters are in positions that require a headlamp, like medics. Which will be served by the Minimus Vision.

 

[Illum]

I agree somewhat. What car do you drive? My mother tells me a car is a box that gets you from point A to point B. For others a car is one of the most important aspects of their lives. I am somewhere in the middle on the subject of cars, and also in the middle of lights. Just because the general public is naive and unaware of technological advances in flashlights doesn't mean we should accept anything Surefire produces. I am fully aware of Li-ion cells, IPX-8 waterproof ratings, warm tints, and I expect a flashlight manufacturer to cater to me. If they don't that is fine... I understand their place in the market but at the same time I have no problem declaring I have no interest in their products.

Hello,
My pride and joy is a 1996 Nissan Quest given by my father since I learned how to drive some odd 8 years ago. The old whirlpool has lost power steering twice, replaced battery on the side of the road twice, milage counter stopped working at 143K, A/C doesn't work, theres a leak in the exhaust manifold somewhere because I can smell exhaust under the hood. I suspect theres a gas line leak somewhere out back because I get wiffs of 87 octane towards the trunk. My mom tells me the same, so I never gave the thought to replace it. For my current uses, it gets from point A to point B just fine

Theres no less than two ways to market a product: the essentials, and the extras. Essentials is like Maglite in the flashlight industry, it fulfills all the basic criteria in the operation of a flashlight. The customer buys it to fulfill those features, and that would be that. The extras is like apple in the cellphone industry, fueling curiosity makes the customers buy it, exposing them to features they never had to rely on, then through familiarity become dependent on them...which causes more products to be sold.

Surefire is a little different, we have already seen that companies can produce cheaper lights with the same reliability and output, but surefires significance appears to be based on their governmental contracts and market price. From their catalogs I feel that their emphasis on the civilian market is not very pronounced... which could explain why there is this "lack of interest" perception.

 

[ebow86]

OP, why do you think Surefire needs to be everything to everyone and have certain specific product offerings? Surefire caters to consumers -- soldiers, policemen, and firemen -- who need to light up the night as much as possible with durable, unbreakable tools. This intended audience isn't taking leisurely strolls to look at flowers or paintings, and I'm sure the market research to back this up has been done. Consumers in the market for a high-CRI light have options from other companies from which to choose.

Because, many of us, including myself, feel that the LED's that feature better color rendition is a tremendous advantage over the cooler, flat, dull, colorless LED's that are flooding the market right now. Being able to distinguish your surroundings as quickly as possible as well as see colors in their more natural state is an advantage to virtually everyone, soldiers, policemen, firemen, emt's, and the average Joe taking his dog for a walk.

Surefire's goal is to make the most effective illuminations tools possible for the task to be completed, and many of us feel that the high CRI LED's can accomplish this with greater effectiveness than the cool white LED's surefire is using. Color rendition and depth perception is more important than sheer output, but the way these High CRI LED's are improving, we are getting to the place where we can have both.

It seems there is a common misconception that Surefire only designs and caters to the military and government users, this is simply not the case. Although they are the great bulk of Surefire's sales etc, we civilians also play a large role in Surefire's product line, development and sales. Surefire is smart enough to know how many of us civilians are actually using their products, and different lines that they produce, like the outdoorsman series and saint headlamps, are proof of this.

If I was in combat or patrolling the streets in my squad car, and my life depended on identifying my target as quickly as possible, I would take a high CRI LED any day over a cool white LED that offers slightly more efficiency with 50 more meaningless lumens.

 

[ampdude]

I think though, that Surefire produces a lot more lights for the defense market than they do the commercial market. I don't think Surefire will switch over to HCRI type LED's until they are available in the quantity needed for mass production. They may experiment though, with some lights. Until then, my LED dollars (what few there are) will go towards aftermarket HCRI lights that are of the same quality as Surefire, like Malkoff.

 

[richpalm]

....and the average Joe taking his dog for a walk.

That's me... all I know is that neutrals are much better on my eyes and cools, as much as I like maximum output, are much harsher.

Rich

 

[MichaelW]

Surefire's leadership

Did you mention to Surefire the 'outdoor-white' type of LEDs by Cree?
They are neutral-white LEDs 'hot-rodded' to get cool-white output at the expense of CRI. The Xeno E03 had an outdoor-white xp-g R5 (circa 4800-5000K CCT) and that was the end of 2010.
So they, Surefire, could get a CCT that matches their discharge lamps, and still have the full output of cool-white. And for those that liked the M6 Guardian with the super high output lamp, another at the high end of warm-white.

From an OLD Cree B&L; xp-e: R3 outdoor-white @ 4300K, Q3 80-CRI minimum @ 3500 CCT. xp-g: R5 outdoor-white, R2 80-CRI minimum.
and the xm-l outdoor-white & high CRI has yet to be released.

If Surefire only offered those two LED options, which match lights they were producing WAY before LEDs, who wouldn't be happy?

 

[ElectronGuru]

Similar to Maglight, Surefire has to churn out an incredible amount of flashlights. I think that all the R&D and the sheer amount of lights they produce results in them having slightly outdated emitters (they must use emitters that are available in large quantities). This problem probably prevents them from using Warm/Neutral emitters as well, and as others have stated, no body cares about tints except some of us on CPF.

There's also a secondary issue. Assuming they wanted to provide a given warm/neutral across much of their line, they cannot then discontinue the brighter cool version. The result would be a model split, creating 2-3x the SKU's for the same models. For example 6PX pro and 6PX tact becomes 6PX pro cool 6PX pro warm and 6PX tact cool and 6PX tact warm. Then again with the G2X versions, and again with any other split. This, from a company that just killed half their line up to reduce the shear number of SKU's.

 

[carrot]

I think we will start seeing more High CRI LEDs from Surefire if the Minimus Vision is well-received. But they will probably not be universally adopted across the lineup... I'd suggest that the rest of the outdoorsman-oriented lights will see some high-CRI LEDs if the Vision proves popular, but I think a lot of Surefire's tactical buyers are quite satisfied with the cool white beams...

For instance, making the E1L and E2L high-CRI would help differentiate them better from the fairly similar (but marketed differently) E1B and E2DL.

 

[ZMZ67]

Because, many of us, including myself, feel that the LED's that feature better color rendition is a tremendous advantage over the cooler, flat, dull, colorless LED's that are flooding the market right now. Being able to distinguish your surroundings as quickly as possible as well as see colors in their more natural state is an advantage to virtually everyone, soldiers, policemen, firemen, emt's, and the average Joe taking his dog for a walk.

Surefire's goal is to make the most effective illuminations tools possible for the task to be completed, and many of us feel that the high CRI LED's can accomplish this with greater effectiveness than the cool white LED's surefire is using. Color rendition and depth perception is more important than sheer output, but the way these High CRI LED's are improving, we are getting to the place where we can have both.

It seems there is a common misconception that Surefire only designs and caters to the military and government users, this is simply not the case. Although they are the great bulk of Surefire's sales etc, we civilians also play a large role in Surefire's product line, development and sales. Surefire is smart enough to know how many of us civilians are actually using their products, and different lines that they produce, like the outdoorsman series and saint headlamps, are proof of this.

If I was in combat or patrolling the streets in my squad car, and my life depended on identifying my target as quickly as possible, I would take a high CRI LED any day over a cool white LED that offers slightly more efficiency with 50 more meaningless lumens.

I have to agree that if I were in LE or combat I would absolutely want at least neutral/warm tint if not high CRI.

 

[uknewbie]

How many lights do Surefire sell to military/police/fire service etc?

I keep seeing people repeat this and do wonder how anyone knows this?

I imagine as others have said that most people don't know or care about this issue. I have used my cool white M1X in my job as a Police Officer for some time and found it better than required.

 

[dirtech]

I have a modded u2 with a high cri xpg. Love it. Would consider buying their non p60 lights if they offered them in neutral or warm. I absolutely love the quality of surefires, just want a better tint.

 

[ebow86]

How many lights do Surefire sell to military/police/fire service etc?

I keep seeing people repeat this and do wonder how anyone knows this?

I imagine as others have said that most people don't know or care about this issue. I have used my cool white M1X in my job as a Police Officer for some time and found it better than required.

If one doesn't care about the tint and the ability to render colors, then why care about the output, or throw, or runtime? The tint and ability to render colors is just as important of a attribute as anything else. Just because the general public isn't aware of the superiority of high CRI LED's doesn't mean we shouldn't demand it.