About 2 weeks ago my Quark AA2 R5 finally arrived after being on back order. This light is amazing to say the least. The brightest light I owned before this was a 160 lumen Dorcy. When I bought the Quark I didn't think it would be much bright since it was only a little over 40 lumens brighter. Boy was I wrong. The Dorcy has a good throw but it will only light up about an 8x8 ft. spot from 75 yards. The Quark illuminates about 5 times this from this distance. With a good amount of distance left to go.
I told you it was a good light!
The little quark has replaced every light I own as it works better than all of them with the exception of tight hotspot throw compared to a MagLED 3D, but not by much and the hotspot is better with a LOT more spill.
I threw some Eneloops in this thing and it seems like it got even brighter compared to the Duracells it came with. My only Concern is that it will get a little warm after about 15 min. on Max. I'm a little worried that this may degrade my eneloops if I do my own runtime tests. Is there anything to worry about?
Don't worry about it.
:thumbsup:
The aluminum head/tube is designed to sink the heat away from the LED. If it's not warm, then it's not sucking away the heat as it should. 4Sevens told me the light can run continuously at full output without issues. I've only done it once to check runtime at full brightness of 206 lumens and as a "burn in" test to make sure it's reliable and can do what I need when I need it.
Something I really like is how the brightness drops to 109 lumens when the rechargeable cells get low to indicate that you need to change cells soon. It then drops to 85 lumens very soon after and probably down to 22 shortly after that, but I never let it get that low as the cells need to be changed out at that point. The cells are sitting at about 0.9v each which is considered a fully depleted NiMH cell, so they need to be removed and recharged. If you run a single AA cell in an AA tube on the same head, it will start to drop at around the same per cell voltage to indicate it's time to change, which is perfect for Eneloop/Duraloop cells. I'm very happy with how the Quark handles depleted NiMH cells. With protected Li-Ion rechargeables the light will drop brightness briefly, but when it decides to shut down at ~3.0v, the light instantly goes dead - not good. With the NiMH cells you get some runtime at Med and Low for a while, long enough to find and replace the cells. Excellent.
:twothumbs
