Not too happy with SF's LED color

OK, I have compared a 1watt costco LED $cheapo light against my older U2, three (or 2?) new Cree E1L and a new Cree L1. Only one of the E1L matches the whiteness of my U2. The costco cheapo is a tint green, but bearable, but the L1 and two E1L's are ugly green. What is up with SF? Do they really expect to sell non-white lights for $100+ ? Not sure about the members here, but I buy SF (and pay good money) for their uniformity, clean white lights. Tech support tells me to go to an authorized dealer and try out a light until I find one I like vs. mail ordering and finding out the tint is not to my liking. Decent answer but which dealer will cut open plastic so I can try say 10 lights?

winger said:

... but the L1 and two E1L's are ugly green. ...

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I bought a L1 not long ago and didn't like the color tint either. I know it's not a fair comparison, but the Fenix T1, P3D, and Dereelight DBS I bought during the same time period all had very good tint, to my eyes anyways.

Having said, that. L1 has best knurling and feels very comfortable in hands.

So, I've just got a SF C2 with Dereelight 3 SD drop in. A SF 6PL is on the way as well.

The Dereelight 3SD drop in works fine in SF C2, but I don't like the whining noise it makes when on Low and Mid levels. It also flashes for about 0.3 seconds or shorter whenever I turn it on.

I have yet to see how 6PL looks. If it's good, I will get another P60 led drop in from Surefire. Anyways, I think at this point, SF's LED bins are slightly behind most other manufactures. But my C2 host is really nice. I just wish I could get a Malkoff drop in for it soon. It would be a perfect pocket light for me.

I used to carry a Fenix T1 in the pocket and a P3D as backup. But now I have a C2 w/ dereelight drop-in in the pocket and the P3D is still my backup light.

:=P.

I had the same problem with my Sf lights, for these overpriced lights I expected better, I now by other lights which are not only much cheaper they also have better tints and are quite reliable

When you are paying a premium, you would at least expect the emitters to come from the highest bins, and the best tint bins.

Heck, even some of the cheap DealExtreme flashlights state have Cree Q5 WC emitters. About as bright and as white as it gets.

Guys, first I am just letting off a little steam. The L1 and one of the E1L's belong to two close friends and what gets me little hot under the collar is I recommended SF to them and they both love my U2 and E1L (the one that is bright white - I returned the other bad greenie already). I feel bad when someone/thing I recommend is not as high quality as I would have like it.

I am thinking SF is getting bigger and as companies get bigger, sometimes laziness and complatency (and sometimes even cockiness) sets in. Sometimes it is as simple as greed, the bottom dollar "how can we cut corners and costs so our profits increase" becomes the glaring question of the day, week, month and year.

Every KL3 led head that I have, has a purpleish tint. I dunno if it is because of the 2 x RCR123 that drives it too hard. :thumbsdow

My HDS's has a perfect tint. Thats a real "premium" light.

I gonna jump in here and agree with mikesalt...

BUT WAIT: i do like surefire, i did just buy an L1 waiting for it to arrive, i KNOW its great warrenty, I KNOW that the build quality really is fantastic, plus the knurling, plus the great switching mechanisms. I really do know.

BUT, if other companies can get the tint right, why not surefire, its just puzzling to me.

And i think its no excuse for people to say that "you dont notice the tint outdoors anyway" of course you dont, but that isnt an excuse.

I have an L1 on the way, and i have handled an, i would say, very green E1L before, and also based on many previous threads about "puke green" tints, that im writing this. I know alot of us will disagree, thats fine, if the greenish tint works for you, then im happy that you found something you like.I know there is a lottery, but then why have all my other lights had almost perfect tint so far?

I honestly hope that surefire isnt cutting corners on the quality of its product, that would shatter just about every high regard i have for them now.yes i know that its Made in the USA, therefore labour is more expensive, and thus they have to cut corners somewhere, i get it, but if that cutting corners mean sacrificing quality, then it sort of defeats the purpose of making it in the USA yes?

I also honestly think and hope that surefire isnt getting lazy or complacent..i mean,in a company where the people at the top are all flashaholics who probably lurk here, how could they?

for me, the bottom line is, if other companies are getting it right, why not surefire? believe me, i WANT them to get it right, in no way do i hate surefire.

lets see what size15s has to say...

Crenshaw

bad luxeon lottery....:shakehead
why aren't we hearing the wails of CREE lottery's?

Maybe SF can't source enough premium bins to cover all the LED lights they make, but it would be nice if they offered premium binned lights, say "Q5 WC" or "Q5 WG" etc. There are other manufacturers out there that are upfront with us and tell us exactly what CREE they are using, say Q5 WC, R2 WH, etc, so we know what to expect.

I've yet to get a CREE from a stated tint bin that didn't meet my expectations of what the tint should look like from the particular tint bin quoted.

My SF L1 Cree is a bit on the green side, but only slightly, so I can live with it.

I wasnt happy with the tint on my 6pL, its just to blue compared to my fenix p3d q5. but I figured I would just get a good dropin and take care of color and output. Its not going to be my edc so I could live with the tint, if output was enough.
im hoping I will have some funds when a malkoff comes up, but ordered a cheap-e from dx to see if it would satisfy.

WadeF said:

Maybe SF can't source enough premium bins to cover all the LED lights they make, but it would be nice if they offered premium binned lights, say "Q5 WC" or "Q5 WG" etc. There are other manufacturers out there that are upfront with us and tell us exactly what CREE they are using, say Q5 WC, R2 WH, etc, so we know what to expect.
...

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Good point, but if this were the case and I were SF mgmt, I would not sacrafice my company's good name in using these 'sub-prime' LED's. I will demand the LED manuafacturers give me better color LEDs before I stamp my name on the light.

winger said:

Good point, but if this were the case and I were SF mgmt, I would not sacrafice my company's good name in using these 'sub-prime' LED's. I will demand the LED manuafacturers give me better color LEDs before I stamp my name on the light.

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Maybe they can't demand something that isn't there. CREE can't just make Q5 WC's, it's hit or miss, so there will only be so many Q5 WC's, R2 WC's, etc. So there just may not be enough premium bins to cover the quantity of lights SF wants to make. Again, this is just speculation. Maybe SF feels the tints are within what they feel is okay for the intended use of their individual lights. The majority of their customers probably don't have an issues with the tints.

WadeF said:

... The majority of their customers probably don't have an issues with the tints.

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Maybe a suggestion is SF has sets aside the units with known premium LEDs and if a CPF member orders, we get one of those? There are a few of us out there who are picky!

BTW, one of the two E1L's I sent back for bad green tint was my wife's. Any recommendations on a small (E1L was perfect) EDC light with a good run time and lumens (with GOOD probability of a clean white lite) for her? A link would also help.

winger said:

Maybe a suggestion is SF has sets aside the units with known premium LEDs and if a CPF member orders, we get one of those? There are a few of us out there who are picky!

BTW, one of the two E1L's I sent back for bad green tint was my wife's. Any recommendations on a small (E1L was perfect) EDC light with a good run time and lumens (with GOOD probability of a clean white lite) for her? A link would also help.

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SF may well keep some premium tints set aside for customers that complain about a non-white tint. Be it for CPF'ers, or whoever. We know they will exchange lights if a customer is unhappy with the tint.

WadeF said:

SF may well keep some premium tints set aside for customers that complain about a non-white tint. Be it for CPF'ers, or whoever. We know they will exchange lights if a customer is unhappy with the tint.

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Well, with my wifes first light, I think they returned the exact same unit back to me. Still old ugly green

This is exactly why I didn't buy a 6PL... I just wouldn't pay extra and take a chance that the tint would be something less than white. So I got a 6P and recently ordered a $10 buck drop in from DX and it turns out to be white, not cool white or bluish/greenish white... but the nicest white tint I could ask for. And, btw, very bright! Guess I just got lucky.

So what's up with that? Surely, SF could test or at least do sample testing of their led emitters. I dunno... but with all the good quality P60 drop ins available, I won't by any SF leds. But I love everything else about the quality of their products. :wave:

My G2L and my P2D Premium Q5 are almost exactly the same (appart from the difference in brightness).

This is from memory, and i will check when i get off work.

EDIT:

The surefire dropin seems just a little bit blue/purple. But not by much...
(just got a Dereelight DBS to play with, suprised i remembered this)

WadeF said:

The majority of their customers probably don't have an issues with the tints.

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I'm pretty sure that's the answere. Why fix anything that 95% of their customers don't consider is a problem. There's no doubt about that CPFrs are pickier when it comes to their lights than the average guy, since they have so much knowledge about lights and so many lights to compare with. But really, I don't think a shift in tint is that much of an issue, as long as you don't compare the tint to another light (or maybe it's just me who have been lucky so far). I was happy as a lark with my very blue Fenix L1P until I got my Fenix L2D (a very warm white, which I now prefer over almost anything else).
And I'm guessing that most of the smaller manufacturers we like as Fenix, Dereelight etc etc has a customer base that consists of a lot of CPFrs, so it's more vital for them to have lights with a good tint.

I hope... I REALLY hope that this new Surefire E1B Backup has a "ice cold" white tint!

:thumbsup:

My L1 has a more yellowish green tint than any of my Q5 lights.

If I am looking at a wall, and judging color, I'll say the more white light wins, but shouldn't you be looking at something other than a wall and judging how accurate the colors look?

I turn one light on, and look at something, then I turn it off and look at it with another light on.

I think my L1 wins hands down compared to my really white lights for how good things look when lit by the light.

Check out some beamshots in the reviews section and tell me which lights you can actually see better with, that's really what we're looking for, isn't it?