Well, it's been a GREAT week at the ol' mail box! I received three (...count 'em: THREE!!!) new lights, and a Traser H3 tritium diver's watch (you can read about that in the Knives, Watches and Multitool forum)!
This isn't gonna be a "review" of the lights, per say; just a quick comparison of their relative output using the ol' MK-1 standard issue eyeball as the guage.
The players: Peak LED Solutions CPF Special; Amilite Neo T3; iLUMiBEAM ULTEON TF-1; and Peak LED Solutions Mediterranean (SS).
Everyone should be familiar with the two Peaks and the AmiLite; here's a link to the iLUMiBEAM:
http://cgi.ebay.com/iLUMiBEAM-ULTEO...t_W0QQitemZ8732070336QQcategoryZ16037QQssPage
I'll apologize in advance for my lack of pics...as stated in another thread, I don't own a digicam, probably due to the fact that I've spent all of my $$ on LIGHTS (...go figure...).
Without a bunch of "pomp and ceremony", I'll say right off the bat that the CPF Special just plain blows all the others away in terms of throw AND overall output. You don't need a lux-meter or an integrating sphere to confirm that...it's THAT obvious! It's the hands-down winner. The suprising thing is how well the Mediterranean did against the highly touted AmiLite! To my naked eye, the AmiLite appears to be a hair (...and I mean a HAIR!) brighter than the Mediterranean. I will add that the emittor on the AmiLite is obviously a "better" bin. It's VERY white, while the Mediterranean has an OBVIOUS HIDish blue tint. That's NOT a flaw on the part of the Mediterranean. I specifically asked for and received an emittor of this color temperature from Peak on my Mediterranean! That's a tribute to their CS! Coming in behind the others (albeit, not by much!) is the iLUMiBEAM TF-1. I hafta say that for a light that costs about $28.00 plus shipping, this light is very nice, and has pretty good output for a 1 watter. It has a tight beam that's suprisingly smooth for using a smooth reflector, and has a very nice, wide spill beam. The color of the output has an HIDish blue tint that others may not be too keen on...but I find it very pleasing; in fact, I almost PREFER it. The "hype" on the e-bay link where I purchased the iLUMiBEAM says it's brighter than a QIII. In the hotspot, I'd definitely agree! I've owned three "stock" QIII's and the iLUMiBEAM has a noticeably brighter hotspot than any of my QIII's had. However, the QIII's, to my recollection had a noticeably brighter outer corona to the hotspot, as well as outer corona/spill light. As far as diameter of the spill light is concerned, the iLUMiBEAM is the widest, followed by the AmiLite, and then the Peaks (the spill light of the Mediterranean and CPF Special are identical in diameter... the Special being MUCH brighter obviously).
As far as throw is concerned, I'll hafta edit this post later, after I've had a chance to pla...er, I mean, do some "scientific comparisons" after it gets dark (...yeah, THAT's the ticket...scientific comparisons!). However, I KNOW before I even attempt the throw comparison that the CPF Special WILL win. It's just gonna be a matter of determining the order of the other three. I'll get back on the throw comparison later tonight.
EDIT Well, I just got done doing my "unscientific throw test"...since there's a relatively bright moon outside, I did this: I stood 65 feet away from my opened garage door, and shined all of the "players" to the back of my 35 foot deep garage, for a distance of 100 feet, and simply determined which light lit the back wall of the garage the brightest (...once again, only using my MK-1, standard issue eyeball as the "guage"). The results are as follows: as already anticipated, the CPF Special won hands down. It lit up the back of my garage like it was mid morning...no suprises there. The AmiLite just BARELY edged out the Mediterranean, and I attribute that as much to beam tint as I do intensity. I had to go back and forth between these two lights MANY times to determine a "winner", because the difference was that negligable. From an overall performance standpoint, I'd have to give the edge to the Mediterranean over the AmiLite because of it's published/tested longer run-time with almost identical "real world" performance. I know and I've read what the "numbers" say on Quickbeam's site; but in my "un-sterile" testing environment, this is in fact how they panned out. The big suprise here is that the iLUMiBEAM did VERY well against the high-dollar competition! The intensity of it's beam against the back of my garage was dimmer than the Mediterranean and AmiLite...but not by very much as far as the naked eye is concerned! The main difference here is that the Mediterranean and the AmiLite lit up a noticably LARGER area at the back of the garage with their full intensity. The iLUMiBEAM has a noticably tighter beam than the other players, but it's damn near as intense at a distance!
All in all, these are ALL some very nice lights that all have their good points, and not many bad points to note. YMMV...I hope this comparison was helpful to some (in spite of not having pics) as far as making a determination of which light to get, if you were undecided on one or another. HERE's an idea...buy them ALL!!! I did!
PJD
This isn't gonna be a "review" of the lights, per say; just a quick comparison of their relative output using the ol' MK-1 standard issue eyeball as the guage.
The players: Peak LED Solutions CPF Special; Amilite Neo T3; iLUMiBEAM ULTEON TF-1; and Peak LED Solutions Mediterranean (SS).
Everyone should be familiar with the two Peaks and the AmiLite; here's a link to the iLUMiBEAM:
http://cgi.ebay.com/iLUMiBEAM-ULTEO...t_W0QQitemZ8732070336QQcategoryZ16037QQssPage
I'll apologize in advance for my lack of pics...as stated in another thread, I don't own a digicam, probably due to the fact that I've spent all of my $$ on LIGHTS (...go figure...).
Without a bunch of "pomp and ceremony", I'll say right off the bat that the CPF Special just plain blows all the others away in terms of throw AND overall output. You don't need a lux-meter or an integrating sphere to confirm that...it's THAT obvious! It's the hands-down winner. The suprising thing is how well the Mediterranean did against the highly touted AmiLite! To my naked eye, the AmiLite appears to be a hair (...and I mean a HAIR!) brighter than the Mediterranean. I will add that the emittor on the AmiLite is obviously a "better" bin. It's VERY white, while the Mediterranean has an OBVIOUS HIDish blue tint. That's NOT a flaw on the part of the Mediterranean. I specifically asked for and received an emittor of this color temperature from Peak on my Mediterranean! That's a tribute to their CS! Coming in behind the others (albeit, not by much!) is the iLUMiBEAM TF-1. I hafta say that for a light that costs about $28.00 plus shipping, this light is very nice, and has pretty good output for a 1 watter. It has a tight beam that's suprisingly smooth for using a smooth reflector, and has a very nice, wide spill beam. The color of the output has an HIDish blue tint that others may not be too keen on...but I find it very pleasing; in fact, I almost PREFER it. The "hype" on the e-bay link where I purchased the iLUMiBEAM says it's brighter than a QIII. In the hotspot, I'd definitely agree! I've owned three "stock" QIII's and the iLUMiBEAM has a noticeably brighter hotspot than any of my QIII's had. However, the QIII's, to my recollection had a noticeably brighter outer corona to the hotspot, as well as outer corona/spill light. As far as diameter of the spill light is concerned, the iLUMiBEAM is the widest, followed by the AmiLite, and then the Peaks (the spill light of the Mediterranean and CPF Special are identical in diameter... the Special being MUCH brighter obviously).
As far as throw is concerned, I'll hafta edit this post later, after I've had a chance to pla...er, I mean, do some "scientific comparisons" after it gets dark (...yeah, THAT's the ticket...scientific comparisons!). However, I KNOW before I even attempt the throw comparison that the CPF Special WILL win. It's just gonna be a matter of determining the order of the other three. I'll get back on the throw comparison later tonight.
EDIT Well, I just got done doing my "unscientific throw test"...since there's a relatively bright moon outside, I did this: I stood 65 feet away from my opened garage door, and shined all of the "players" to the back of my 35 foot deep garage, for a distance of 100 feet, and simply determined which light lit the back wall of the garage the brightest (...once again, only using my MK-1, standard issue eyeball as the "guage"). The results are as follows: as already anticipated, the CPF Special won hands down. It lit up the back of my garage like it was mid morning...no suprises there. The AmiLite just BARELY edged out the Mediterranean, and I attribute that as much to beam tint as I do intensity. I had to go back and forth between these two lights MANY times to determine a "winner", because the difference was that negligable. From an overall performance standpoint, I'd have to give the edge to the Mediterranean over the AmiLite because of it's published/tested longer run-time with almost identical "real world" performance. I know and I've read what the "numbers" say on Quickbeam's site; but in my "un-sterile" testing environment, this is in fact how they panned out. The big suprise here is that the iLUMiBEAM did VERY well against the high-dollar competition! The intensity of it's beam against the back of my garage was dimmer than the Mediterranean and AmiLite...but not by very much as far as the naked eye is concerned! The main difference here is that the Mediterranean and the AmiLite lit up a noticably LARGER area at the back of the garage with their full intensity. The iLUMiBEAM has a noticably tighter beam than the other players, but it's damn near as intense at a distance!
All in all, these are ALL some very nice lights that all have their good points, and not many bad points to note. YMMV...I hope this comparison was helpful to some (in spite of not having pics) as far as making a determination of which light to get, if you were undecided on one or another. HERE's an idea...buy them ALL!!! I did!
PJD
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:thumbsup:
