The much-maligned Coast brand

I've heard some pretty convincing negatives about Coast lights, and I agree with most of them.
That having been said, I have never seen a Coast light with an unattractive tint. Are they all winners of the Luxeon lottery?
-Winston

my multi-color recon's white tint is pretty blue/purplish (3 white LED's) but that's never been a issue with me. It's good enough and does the job I wanted, so I'm happy with Coast

I have been happy with my Coast lights..........after I modded them that is!

I have a couple and a mooded Coast.

Just wish they had regulation, rather than direct.

The coast (aka Zweibrueder) lights have two major drawbacks: Most are not water proof at all and almost all of them have no regulation, just direct drive (as fluke said).
On the other hand they are some of the besst looking flashlights out there and even have some very nice innovations which almost no other manufacturer can offer (e.g. focusable LED lights).
However most people here are hardcore flashaholics and for those the two drawbacks outweigh the advantages.

I've owned four Coast lights but none of the more expensive models. Two are small button-cell lights with forward clickies and nicely machined bodies. They work very well.
The other two had unacceptable problems and I returned them. They were both 1xAA models with 3x5mm LEDs. One was the version sold at Walmart and the other was the black version sold at Home Depot.
I think it was the Walmart version that had a defective circuit. If you ran the light with a new battery for one hour and then turned the light off, it wouldn't refire (battery read 1.3v when tested). If you left it on the light would have kept running, but I didn't bother to check for how long in total. Tried several batteries all with the same results.
The other one had a terrible flicker problem with the switch.

For any who haven't tried it, I highly recommend FlashCrazy's Coast Seoul mod: https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/174532

I run mine on 3xAAA eneloops, and, though direct drive, it really does maintain pretty constant output. The Coast body is high quality, and the momentary switch is great. The output simply amazes.

Plus, FlashCrazy is a terrific guy to deal with. :thumbsup:

I modded a LED Lenser as well, adding a Downboy 1000, reflector, and sapphire lens to it. At the time it was a prerelease model and I had one of only a dozen or so of them in the U.S. at the time. My mods improved it in all ways except one: it's still not water-resistant at all. Despite that it's been my EDC for years now.

Nothing like turning a $45 flashlight into a $95 flashlight...

oO

I've got the Coast (LED Lenser) Police Focus and am pretty happy with it. On alkalies it's not very good for steady light output but with NiMh (3 AAA's), it's very bright (as bright as my L2D-CE, and I haven't modded it to a SSC P4 yet!) and almost constant output for an hour. Good quality body (no scratches on mine yet) and it seems water proof to me (suction test). Plastic lens but it doesn't seem to have affected output/durability. Nice hard-topped forward clicky. 8.5/10

So nobody with a bad tint? That just seems peculiar.
-Winston

AFAustin said:

For any who haven't tried it, I highly recommend FlashCrazy's Coast Seoul mod: https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/174532

I run mine on 3xAAA eneloops, and, though direct drive, it really does maintain pretty constant output. The Coast body is high quality, and the momentary switch is great. The output simply amazes.

Plus, FlashCrazy is a terrific guy to deal with. :thumbsup:

Click to expand...

+1 I still like this light after having it for a few weeks. The build quality seems great, and the size is just perfect for me.

I also have a 4 color Coast I'm happy with.

So i would judge each of their lights individually for the desired task.

winston said:

So nobody with a bad tint? That just seems peculiar.
-Winston

Click to expand...

All of the Coast's I have had, had perfect white tints.

My unmodded Focusing LED Lenser 7438 has a nice neutral looking white beam.

winston said:

I've heard some pretty convincing negatives about Coast lights, and I agree with most of them.
That having been said, I have never seen a Coast light with an unattractive tint. Are they all winners of the Luxeon lottery?
-Winston

Click to expand...

The Coast V2 Is the light that got me into flashlights. There are several that go by that name however. The first one had 1 Lux 1 in it with absolutly perfect tint and the next 2 had 3 5mm leds with the worst tint I've ever seen . A cheap $2 light from DX had far better tint.

My friend also had the lux 1 version and it too has perfectly white tint.

I have had 5 Coast lights all with great tint, but 3 began to flicker within several weeks of use. I'll take a less than perfect tint over a flickering beam anyday.