Laser Flashlight.. 400 Yard throw anyone??

I just got a sale flyer in the mail the other day. Noticed they had a Laser Genetics "flashlight" that has an adjustable optic and will throw a illuminating beam 400 yards.
Kinda cool if you like a "cool" green tint to your light :green:.

Anyone tried one of these??

http://www.lasergenetics.com/nd5-laser-designator.aspx

This looks like something that I have got to have!:twothumbs

Um, not sure what to think about this product, perhaps it's miss informed advertisement, but according to their data this thing does not make sense. Example at maximum focus the beam is supposedly 45mm in diameter at 1 foot "304.79mm" that would give a beam divergence of 8.5 degrees, while in a no side spill light that's not to bad, with say 60 lumens "somewhat around 20mw:thinking:" it could probably throw 400 yards, but the Tiablo A9 S makes a 4.5 degree beam that will throw 500+ yards. Also on it's wide setting the light would have a beam diameter of 530mm, which would make for a 120 degree beam, that's all flood, last I checked you can't get 60 lumens of flood to go 400 yards:laughing:, in fact I don't think you could get 60 lumens at 8.5 degrees to go 400 yards. So judging the fact that these stats must be wrong one must conclude on their own about it's maximum performance. First the only way 60 lumens are going 400 yards is if it's at least a 2.5 or smaller degree beam. That is much smaller then the Tiablo A9 S's beam so if you think it's beam is not practical for normal purposes, then the ND-5's beam will be even worse. Lastly if a regular 5mw laser can go 2 miles and this 20mw laser can go 5 miles one must concur that's it's minimum beam diameter would be about twice that of a 5mw laser and twice as intense, so at maximum focus this is a laser and no longer a flashlight.

That's my two cents.

This is of course ignoring the fact the beam is green "yuck:green:".

Light does not travel a finite distance and then stop. The throw of any light is theoretically infinite. You need to define throw in a quantifiable manner in order to make any useful comparison between lights.

I have been looking at this as well.

Although I know nothing about this light yet, I can tell you that this light (ND3) was designed to be mounted on a scoped rifle for varmint hunting.

I can also tell you that it does not take a large amount of light to make targets in the dark visible at a large distance when looking through a good scope. I have a River Rock 1AA (modded with ssc) mounted to the side of a springer air rifle, output barely 40 lumens I would guess, and I can see possums for a long ways in the dark, way farther than 100 yards.

Im seriously considering this light. Should make night time coyote hunts interesting.

This isn't a flashlight. It's a laser. Not a very powerful one either. Not at all worth the price imho.

The ND5 Laser Locator light utilizes a proprietary 20MW Green Laser

Click to expand...

Wow, 20 MegaWatts. I wonder what they use for a power source.

My penlight laser pointer is 5 mW. 20 mW doesn't seem like anything all that exciting, other than being able to focus the beam.

Doesn't the FDA frown on anything over 5 mW?

You used to be able to buy 300 mW penlight laser pointers.

Good grief, you guys are PICKY. What do you want for only $350.00??

A green laser with a second lens to spread the beam a bit for $350?
F no.

That's crazy:tinfoil:

Anybody want to buy one for review? You could always send it my way I you didn't like it.
It would sure be a fun toy to have.

It's HUGE for a laser(flashlight).

i know little, but it seems like a great idea to me, we have all see the laser pointer 'toys' that can put a very intense spot of red on an object a long way away.looks to me like this light takes that 'toy' idea and upgrades everything to 'professional'

obviously if the laser was not diffused A LOT it would damage peoples retinas quickly, but this light in tight focus seems to have the laser intensity down A LOT, but still would out throw a normal flashlight easily.

make that green beam white, and work the technology a little, and you have a laser/flashlight that can throw for miles, or get floody.

an underpowered laser has to be better then an overdriven led.?

8 hour runtime

$350?

maybe forget the white?

from that link,

Why Green Light?
Green light is the most visible to the human eye (See Chart) and requires the least amount of eye adjustment at night.

An eye that has adapted to daytime conditions generally has a maximum sensitivity around 555nm. Compared to the color red which optical spectrum is around 630 – 650nm our eye is closer to the Green region of the optical spectrum at 510 - 530nm.

thats a good product to have, if youre stranded in the middle of nowhere

what i gathered from the info is that its best used as a signaling device for search parties. especially since the emphasis was put on the beam being visible from such a distance

waddup said:

maybe forget the white?

from that link,

Why Green Light?
Green light is the most visible to the human eye (See Chart) and requires the least amount of eye adjustment at night.

An eye that has adapted to daytime conditions generally has a maximum sensitivity around 555nm. Compared to the color red which optical spectrum is around 630 – 650nm our eye is closer to the Green region of the optical spectrum at 510 - 530nm.

Click to expand...

The reason they use the green light? A marketing scheme, is just that "a scheme". True, green light is easiest for humans to see, however it is not the light source one wants for identification. The only reason they praise their "green" light use is because it is the most easily produced wavelength with their laser. A white laser is exponentially more expensive and complicated to make. It's sort of like a car company saying "oh, we made our car run on gasoline because it's cheaper then diesel" they feel to mention that a comparable diesel engine would save so much fuel that operational costs would be much cheaper. Call it twisting the facts.

Lasers are by definition monochromatic. There is no such thing as a 'white' laser.

Exactly. There is no such thing as a white laser. The simplest one to make is Red. But we are having trouble seeing that wavelength. The second simplest to make is Green, which our eye picks up much easier. Bang for the buck so to speak, at least if you want to see the spot and not use it to burn things. You also have the expensive as hell blue ones, and a few more in between. (orange, yellowish, cyan, purple...).

And about this flashlight... I say wth, the specs arent worth poop. I was hoping for some high power colored emitter, that could be fun. A laser seems powerfull because its concentraded in a really tiny spot. Difuzing it would be like poking someone with the whole lenght of a needle. Not much fun.

As this is a laser, I'm moving it to the Lasers section.

I see the output is given as 20MW. That sounds quite a lot for a handheld - I think they probably mean 20mW, lol.

NO it's MW.

They had another page that showed them cooking hotdogs and chicken with it but I guess they took it down. Can't find it now.
:laughing:

You do realise mW = milliwatts, and MW = megawatts? A 20MW handheld would be quite something... lol

Yeah

That's why it works faster than deep frying!