Inexpensive "Weapon Light"?

kjk200 · Sep 16, 2007

I am looking for an inexpensive "weapon light" to mount on my .45 ACP. What I would like is one that is

1. bright
2. reliable
3. LED (probably more "shock proof")
4. about 1" to fit the rings I have
5. no more than 6" long
6. have a pressure switch available
7. can be taken off and used as a hand held if needed (not quickly, just possible)

Does anyone have any recommendations? This is not a LEO handgun, just a reliable handgun what will be available when things go bump in the night.

Thanks
http://www.huntingpictures.net/photo/008189

tatsuosan1964 · Sep 16, 2007

Where would you be mounting the 1 inch rings on your pistol? It does not appear that you have much room left. Would the scope be coming off and you would use those rings? If you could find an aftermarket rail adapter to fit under your frame, the Streamlight TLR-1 is a very popular weapon light. It meets several of your criteria-small, bright, reliable, LED, has a pressure switch available (or soon available. I haven't looked lately), and can be used handheld in a pinch. To remove, simply unscrew the tension bolt, can be done by hand if you tightened by hand. It will not mount with your 1 inch rings however. There are much brighter LEDs available but in the short distances for home defense, there is such a thing as too many lumens as these can make white or light colored walls very bright to you. SureFire makes a modified version of the L4 that is called the Scout but I'm not sure if it uses 1" rings. It also may be too long. The new G2 LED may work for you. Plenty of SureFire and aftermarket pressure switches available and I know several people on other forums that I participate in sucessfully use the standard G2 as a weapon light even without an isolated shock bezel.

Personally I use the TLR-1 on my handgun and shotgun. Plenty of light and does not add much weight or change balance. On my AR-15 I use a Lumapower M1 mounted to the picatinny rail with a 1" ring.

djblank87 · Sep 16, 2007

I would say the SL TL-3.
211 Lumens, Shockproof, six inches or shorter yeah it could work. There are a lot of lights out there for 1" rings hhhmmmmmm being shock proof is the key thing.

Any amount of CP/Lumens you want or need?

kjk200 · Sep 16, 2007

tatsuosan1964 said:
Where would you be mounting the 1 inch rings on your pistol?
.

Yes, the scope and mount are already off.

Patriot · Sep 16, 2007

If you remove the optic from your weapon to mount a light, what are you going to do for sights?? :thinking:

kjk200 · Sep 16, 2007

Patriot36 said:
If you remove the optic from your weapon to mount a light, what are you going to do for sights?? :thinking:

At close range, who needs sights--just point and shot. Bad Guy dead!

Well, maybe I will put the regular sights back on if I can find them.

JohnB · Sep 16, 2007

Urnabeam has some good affordable tactical mounted lights. The Freedom series has a couple of small models for this type of application.

Good luck

Patriot · Sep 17, 2007

kjk200 said:
kjk200 said:

At close range, who needs sights--just point and shot. Bad Guy dead!

Click to expand...

Patriot36 Hopefully you're just funning........Using a firearm without sights would have the be one of the most enormous liabilities to your own life, more importantly, your children, wife, or innocent others. I won't even get into the legal liabilities.

[quote kjk200]Well, maybe I will put the regular sights back on if I can find them.

Click to expand...

Even with the sights back on you wont be able to use them because the mount blocks the sighting plane. That's why they're not on there right now.

You're dealing with the same problems that has existed for the last 30 years with regards to effectively firing your weapon while putting light on your target. That's why so many military and police weapons have been manufactured with rails that allow the mounting of lights.

If your just shooting at beer cans from the waist out in the boonies then it really doesn't matter If you don't have sights. If you even have the slightest expectation that you might implement your 1911 in a self defense situation then you should probably put your sights back on an practice the Rodgers technique.

The ideal thing would be to purchase a firearm with built in mounting rail and get yourself a nice weapon light like the Streamlight TRL-1 for about $100 bucks.

boosterboy · Sep 17, 2007

tatsuosan1964 said:
Where would you be mounting the 1 inch rings on your pistol? It does not appear that you have much room left. Would the scope be coming off and you would use those rings? If you could find an aftermarket rail adapter to fit under your frame, the Streamlight TLR-1 is a very popular weapon light. It meets several of your criteria-small, bright, reliable, LED, has a pressure switch available (or soon available. I haven't looked lately), and can be used handheld in a pinch. To remove, simply unscrew the tension bolt, can be done by hand if you tightened by hand. It will not mount with your 1 inch rings however. There are much brighter LEDs available but in the short distances for home defense, there is such a thing as too many lumens as these can make white or light colored walls very bright to you. SureFire makes a modified version of the L4 that is called the Scout but I'm not sure if it uses 1" rings. It also may be too long. The new G2 LED may work for you. Plenty of SureFire and aftermarket pressure switches available and I know several people on other forums that I participate in sucessfully use the standard G2 as a weapon light even without an isolated shock bezel.

Personally I use the TLR-1 on my handgun and shotgun. Plenty of light and does not add much weight or change balance. On my AR-15 I use a Lumapower M1 mounted to the picatinny rail with a 1" ring.

Hows your M1 doing on your AR? How many rounds has it survived?

I'm still haven't tested my M1 with my AR yet, i gotta go off to private land and do it.

boosterboy · Sep 17, 2007

Streamlight TLR-1 is a good choice.

it's 109$ at

http://www.talonarms.com/talonarms/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=544

tatsuosan1964 · Sep 17, 2007

boosterboy said:
Hows your M1 doing on your AR? How many rounds has it survived?

I'm still haven't tested my M1 with my AR yet, i gotta go off to private land and do it.

So far it is doing fine. Lens gets dirty. I haven't done much low light shooting with it yet but LEDs are supposed to be inherently shock resistant. We will see.

Monocrom · Sep 17, 2007

"Inexpensive" and "weapon light" are words that don't belong together. :shakehead

My recommendations:

1 - Surefire X300 LED.

2 - Streamlight TLR-1 or TLR-2.

3 - The ones made by PentagonLights.

I consider them all to be inexpensive.... when compared to what I think my Life is worth.

kjk200 · Sep 17, 2007

Monocrom said:
I consider them all to be inexpensive.... when compared to what I think my Life is worth.

You have a very valid point. I guess I was just think that any light was better than NO light. And, I was thinking that it would be better to have 2 lights (one on gun when needed, one in hand) than only one.

Quote "Even with the sights back on you wont be able to use them because the mount blocks the sighting plane. That's why they're not on there right now.

You're dealing with the same problems that has existed for the last 30 years with regards to effectively firing your weapon while putting light on your target. That's why so many military and police weapons have been manufactured with rails that allow the mounting of lights. "

I have taken the scope mount off, and I am looking into a light rail to be added to the dust cover under the barrel---it would be great if I cound find one that used the same screw holes as the scope mount. I doubt that will ever happen!

I have seen the pics of the Streamlight TLR-1--how does 2 3volt batteries fit into what looks like a very small light? They are the CR123 Batteries right?

PayBack · Sep 17, 2007

Patriot36 said:
Patriot36 Hopefully you're just funning........Using a firearm without sights would have the be one of the most enormous liabilities to your own life, more importantly, your children, wife, or innocent others. I won't even get into the legal liabilities.

Even with the sights back on you wont be able to use them because the mount blocks the sighting plane. That's why they're not on there right now.

You're dealing with the same problems that has existed for the last 30 years with regards to effectively firing your weapon while putting light on your target. That's why so many military and police weapons have been manufactured with rails that allow the mounting of lights.

If your just shooting at beer cans from the waist out in the boonies then it really doesn't matter If you don't have sights. If you even have the slightest expectation that you might implement your 1911 in a self defense situation then you should probably put your sights back on an practice the Rodgers technique.

The ideal thing would be to purchase a firearm with built in mounting rail and get yourself a nice weapon light like the Streamlight TRL-1 for about $100 bucks.

Click to expand...

Agree with the aiming issue. Point shooting at close range may be possible, but unless you want to reply on luck you need a LOT of practice, and even that would tend to go out the window when facing a real threat.
I use a Streamlight M6 with light and laser on my HK, as even the "high visibility" sights aren't great in the dark even with a light, where as the laser is great. I also have a mount for my shotty and although I've yet to use it on my pistol, it's survived a number of rounds while on the shotty.

Sure it doesn't fall into the cheap catagory, but the fact it lights the target and tells me where I'm aiming at the same time is a great help.

Patriot · Sep 18, 2007

kjk200 said:
You have a very valid point. I guess I was just think that any light was better than NO light. And, I was thinking that it would be better to have 2 lights (one on gun when needed, one in hand) than only one.

Quote "Even with the sights back on you wont be able to use them because the mount blocks the sighting plane. That's why they're not on there right now.

You're dealing with the same problems that has existed for the last 30 years with regards to effectively firing your weapon while putting light on your target. That's why so many military and police weapons have been manufactured with rails that allow the mounting of lights. "

I have taken the scope mount off, and I am looking into a light rail to be added to the dust cover under the barrel---it would be great if I cound find one that used the same screw holes as the scope mount. I doubt that will ever happen!

I have seen the pics of the Streamlight TLR-1--how does 2 3volt batteries fit into what looks like a very small light? They are the CR123 Batteries right?

You're exactly right...you won't find an existing rail that utilizes your existing scope mounting holes on your dust cover. A few companies make them but most of them are 3 hole per side with wider spacing than the holes on your dust cover. You may be able to purchase a machined rail without holes and have a machinist/gunsmith match it to your dust cover with the correct hole spacing and thread pitch. The labor alone would run about $175 dollars if he didn't have to build up the thickness of your dust cover first..which is sometimes nec. Even at that the dust cover is so thin that the longevity of this arrangement is questionable because of the shorter bearing surface and limited number of screws. After enough firing cycles there is still the possibility of the mounts loosening even with the screws epoxied...(the screw securing method beyond red loctite)

The TRL-1 and all similar rail lights stack the batteries side-by-side. That's why they're so short.

tatsuosan1964 · Sep 18, 2007

Yes, it is 2 3volt CR123A that sit side by side in the battery compartment just behind the reflector.

tatsuosan1964 · Sep 18, 2007

I tried doing a search and found that most aftermarket adapters for non railed 1911's run anywhere between $150-$175, so it's quite a bit more than adding a rail to a GLOCK or Sig without a rail. Once it's done though, you will truely have a very useable weapons light platform. I agree with a previous statement that you made. I have the TLR-1 mounted on my GLOCK but I also have a second hand held light, a SureFire L4 in the same bedside lockbox so that I can light up the bump in the night without unknowingly pointing my firearm at my son who may have gotten up to get a drink of water :ohgeez:

. Try here to see the setup from SureFire. http://www.surefire.com/maxexp/main...r=6&prrfnbr=23518&sesent=0,0&search_id=479901

NoKarma · Sep 21, 2007

http://www.evike.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/SF_610R_lg.gif

Why not just pick up a classic surefire 1911 mount that has the extended slide lock pin that held the light on. Remember guys surefire was making great lights long before rail mounts where ever heard of. I am sure with some looking you could find a used mount in the $150 range. The will take the 6p bulb and work very well.
NoKarma

Biggoggs · Sep 22, 2007

Question from non--firearm-friendly Australia, but why do you have a scope on a pistol? Wouldn't it weigh it down, slow your aim, and need special holsters?

As for the cost, it still sounds like it's cheaper than a car headlight. The flashlight + laser combo sounds rather cool

kjk200 · Sep 22, 2007

Biggoggs said:
Question from non--firearm-friendly Australia, but why do you have a scope on a pistol? Wouldn't it weigh it down, slow your aim, and need special holsters?

As for the cost, it still sounds like it's cheaper than a car headlight. The flashlight + laser combo sounds rather cool

This pistol (as shown) was put together as a "combat" shoot pistol. This type of shoot is where you shoot at man sized target with score rings, bolling pins, assorted steel plates etc of different sizes and at differeant distances. It is scored by using number of hits and total time to fire all shoots. So the scope helps increase the speed and accuracy of the beginner--and maybe experienced shooter to. Special hosters and gear are also used that latch onto the trigger guard, so the scope does not get in the way. This type of holster allows you to draw faster.

1911 with the Gilmore Speed Holster
http://www.huntingpictures.net/photo/008187

Since I don't shoot this type of shoot any more, the scope and mount are going to be taken off and the original sights put back on so I can use it for protection.

This is what I was looking at for the mount:
http://www.cylinder-slide.com/fullsize/CS264xlg.jpg

Inexpensive "Weapon Light"?

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