Which Quark throws the farthest?

I am considering purchasing the following Quarks as my first real flashlight:
Quark 123 2 Tactical, R2 Edition
Quark 123 2 Tactical, R5 Edition
Quark 123 2 Turbo, R5 Edition

Which Quark throws the farthest?

Thanks in advance!

It'll be a tossup between the R2 Tactical (XP-E) and the R5 Turbo (XP-G) due to the LED packages. The Turbo announcement post says it throws 5% more than the R2 editions (the only ones available at the time of that announcement), but a couple people have said that subjectively they feel the R2 throws better.

The R5 Tactical has less throw than both of them; its XP-G hotspot is spread out much more than the XP-E package, and it doesn't have the Turbo's deep reflector to compensate.

If this is your first real flashlight, might I suggest you spend some time reading the welcome mat? There's a GREAT questionnaire there that will really point you in the right direction as far as your uses, needs, and carry habits. You really can't go wrong with a 4sevens light, but even amongst the Quarks, the Turbo line is really meant to throw and not meant for EDC unless you like carrying around that size of a light regularly (some do, but it's not really Every Day Carry for most).

That being said, I agree with Quension. If you're out for purely throw, do NOT get the Warm limited edition that is being sold. You'll be disappointed with the throw since it's a little bit less bright than a NON warm, NON neutral Turbo. Good luck and :welcome:

Turbo has 8120 lux @1m, where R2 tac has 5700. R5 has ~ 4200. More lux @1m - more throw.

vvs said:

Turbo has 8120 lux @1m, where R2 tac has 5700. R5 has ~ 4200. More lux @1m - more throw.

Click to expand...

It's going to depend a little on the particular turbo itself. Several that I have received have serious large donut hole type dark centres in the hotspot making them less than able throwers since those tended to shine a large ring around what one wanted to look at but a dead zone on the thing itself. Some Turbos appear to be better than others from what's been posted on this site and also newer Turbos may have had the issue addressed but I never saw an R2 model's beam with a similar issue.

Before I could put them to serious use I had to modify two of my turbos to create a better hotspot.

I have several turbos and several r2 models and the difference between them (battery type for battery type) in terms of throw is far far less than would be apparent going by first glance at those figures above.

PS I don't actually believe that lux at 1m tells the whole story of which will throw better either. Better measured at five metres or more I reckon and there are other factors involved too.

A donut actually represents the best possible focus for long throw, though it may not be the best focus for user happiness.

Maybe in theory but that's not how it worked out in practice with my 2-123 turbo (first batch).

Like I said, it just shone out a ring of light, not a circle (and I recall at least one other member's torch at the time being reported the same) and the dark centre was so bad that I could barely see my tyre on the fencepost test marker from 150 yards but when I tuned the reflector depth and removed the dark cente I could see the marker very clearly. There's now more light in the cente of the beam than before and in that particlar torch's case at least, it put more/brighter light on a small distant target and to me in my practical mechanics laymans terms that means "better throw".

Good point...

jblackwood said:

If this is your first real flashlight, might I suggest you spend some time reading the welcome mat?.....

Click to expand...

I can never understand why newbies ask these "open-ended" questions without apparently carrying out any of their own research.

There're literally hundreds of reviews on CPF that answer ALL of these sorts of questions. And yet some folks seem to expect other people to do their very basic, preliminary investigations for them!

And unless some member actually owns each of these three flashlights — and can comment from a practical. real-time, user perspective — then there's really no more info available to any others of us.

It's very similar to the oft-asked question "what's the best light for checking my yard" type.

Totally pointless.

And a waste of bandwidth... and my time ploughing through endless forum pages in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Epimetheus said:

Good point...


I can never understand why newbies ask these "open-ended" questions without apparently carrying out any of their own research.

There're literally hundreds of reviews on CPF that answer ALL of these sorts of questions. And yet some folks seem to expect other people to do their very basic, preliminary investigations for them!

And unless some member actually owns each of these three flashlights — and can comment from a practical. real-time, user perspective — then there's really no more info available to any others of us.

It's very similar to the oft-asked question "what's the best light for checking my yard" type.

Totally pointless.

And a waste of bandwidth... and my time ploughing through endless forum pages in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Click to expand...

Just a little too harsh I think. Maybe give this guy some slack?

Epimetheus said:

Totally pointless.

And a waste of bandwidth... and my time ploughing through endless forum pages in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure if you've just joined and are trying to do your due diligence by reading reviews, etc., or if you've lurked for awhile and just joined in order to post your opinion. Either way, kudos to you.

Looking back when I first started in this hobby (two years ago, scantly), I asked questions without searching as well and I had people politely point me to search for myself. I've since done that. The search function is NOT too hard to use, I almost always find my answers using it!:huh: Every now and then I get someone ask me questions in PM and that's really gratifying, especially since they're not starting unnecessary threads and cluttering up my favorite site.

So while you can catch more flies with honey, I will point out (as one of my favorite TV character before me already pointed out) that you can catch even more with excrement. PM me if you want to know who said it . . . or use google, that's what it's for!!! :thumbsup:

Epimetheus said:

Good point...


I can never understand why newbies ask these "open-ended" questions without apparently carrying out any of their own research.

There're literally hundreds of reviews on CPF that answer ALL of these sorts of questions. And yet some folks seem to expect other people to do their very basic, preliminary investigations for them!

And unless some member actually owns each of these three flashlights — and can comment from a practical. real-time, user perspective — then there's really no more info available to any others of us.

It's very similar to the oft-asked question "what's the best light for checking my yard" type.

Totally pointless.

And a waste of bandwidth... and my time ploughing through endless forum pages in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Click to expand...

Epimetheus,

This was not an open ended question. It was very specific question. I have read countless threads, youtube videos, user reviews, etc. on the Quark series of flashlights over the past two weeks and did not find a definitive answer IMO. Where better to ask this question then on a forum of flashaholics who may very well own all three lights or have experience with all three lights. There is a member on this forum who actually modded thier Quark Turbo head with the same led that it is the Tactical R2 edition to get more throw.

You are the only one wasting bandwidth. Don't reply to a thread if you have nothing valuable to add to the discussion. Don't read a thread you think is chaff... it has a pretty clear title at the top.

Thanks to all who have actually added to the discussion. I appreciate your responses!:thumbsup:

Epimetheus said:

I can never understand why newbies ask these "open-ended" questions without apparently carrying out any of their own research.

Click to expand...

the title and premise of the thread looks to determine which of a bunch of Quarks "throws the farthest" and as you can see from some of the comment put forward not even all of us Quark owners are in complete accord on the answer to that despite all our reading and all the personal experience we've acquired, therefore I think the question is quite valid and not at all "newby-ish" nor imperfectly researched.

Epimetheus said:

And unless some member actually owns each of these three flashlights — and can comment from a practical. real-time, user perspective .

Click to expand...

I think it's quite clear that several of us do and therefore can...............

Just wanted to clarify, when I suggested good ole SharkyZiff spend some time with the welcome mat, it wasn't because I thought the answer to his question was already out there, though my Turbo out-throws most of my other lights its size (all my other Quarks, though my Javelin does give it a run for it's money, but that's 3xAA verses 2xCR123) and it's a warm version, but because he said it's his first real light and I find it to be a specified animal, built for throw and not too useful up close, even on the lower levels. For that, I personally don't even use a quark but a Zebralight (why carry a prism with me if an H501 is smaller and more versatile?).

Honey applied. :twothumbs

What is your timeline to purchase? If you can wait a while, the G5 (or is it G500? I can't remember which ones they truncated the numbers of) should be coming out.

It will be somewhat larger than the turbo, and will support 18650 as well as 2xcr123.

If you plan on using it as an EDC, it will probably be too large, but if you want something within that rough size range, it may be a viable option for you, if you can wait for it.

edit - I forgot to say that the G5 should be the strongest thrower of the lights coming out (except maybe the S18, but I don't know, and that is definitely in a different size range), as it will have a larger (deeper and wider) reflector, as well as be driven harder, I believe - don't quote me on the last part, but I believe it is correct. We will know much more when it is formally introduced and for sale.

jblackwood said:

my Turbo out-throws most of my other lights its size and it's a warm version, but because he said it's his first real light and I find it to be a specified animal, built for throw and not too useful up close, even on the lower levels.

Click to expand...

I guess we all look at these things differently but I find the Quark Turbos to be a more useful torch up close than their R2 models were. Why? Because the XP-G seems to put out brighter spill level for level than the R2 and also the spill zone of the Turbo is smaller and thus more concentrated which also helps increase its intensity by a further amount.

For that reason I find the Turbo to be a much better general use torch than their R2 models and I might add that in my work that uses throw outdoors much more than closeup I also find the Turbo to be a more useful compromise than their R5 regular models with the Turbo doing closeup reasonably but the R5 regular version having terrible throw out in the bush.

gnef said:

What is your timeline to purchase? If you can wait a while, the G5 (or is it G500? I can't remember which ones they truncated the numbers of) should be coming out.

Click to expand...

I am looking to purchase very soon.

Planned uses:
Occasional EDC
Neighborhood watch handheld light
Attach to long gun

Thanks again for members experience & feedback!

Hello SharkyZiff and :welcome:.


I think these guys have already answered your questions, so I'll just add some beamshots for you to look at. These are actually gif's that I've made from my pictures. I feel this makes it easier to see the difference. Distance from the light to the tree is roughly 23 feet in every picture. This should give you an idea about how these lights compare with one another.


Here's the Quark 123-2 XP-E R2 vs the Quark 123-2 XP-G R5:




This is the Quark 123-2 XP-E R2 vs the Quark Turbo modded with an XP-E R2. (The one you mentioned earlier):




This next gif shows how close the hotspot of the Quark 123-2 XP-E R2 is to the Quark Turbo XP-G R5. These two pictures are of less quality than the previous pictures, but I don't have any higher quality pictures of my Quark Turbo XP-G R5 to make a gif with at the moment. It's been my experience that the Turbo XP-G R5 has a brighter hotspot and therefore throws or lights up a target brighter at a longer distance than the Non-Turbo XP-E R2 Quark. Also, it's been my experience that the Quark Turbo XP-G R5 has enough spill or flood to be a very versatile light.

Epimetheus said:

I can never understand why newbies ask these "open-ended" questions without apparently carrying out any of their own research.

There're literally hundreds of reviews on CPF that answer ALL of these sorts of questions.

Click to expand...

The problem with forums is that they're horrifically bad at actually organizing information. Unless you spend a significant amount of time reading nearly everything yourself, you won't collect all of the relevant information available on a particular topic. Searching after the fact won't find it all. Hell, I have a hard enough time finding posts I've read before in order to link them for reference purposes, even when I remember enough about them to come up with a dozen specific keywords.

I don't see anything wrong with someone asking a targeted question to get responses from people who have already organized the relevant information in their heads.

And a waste of bandwidth... and my time ploughing through endless forum pages in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Click to expand...

And you think people looking for specific information are having a better time than you?
If forums are so frustrating for you, perhaps should spend time browsing other media -- wikis, for instance.

Epimetheus said:

Good point...

I can never understand why newbies ask these "open-ended" questions without apparently carrying out any of their own research. There're literally hundreds of reviews on CPF that answer ALL of these sorts of questions. And yet some folks seem to expect other people to do their very basic, preliminary investigations for them!

And unless some member actually owns each of these three flashlights — and can comment from a practical. real-time, user perspective — then there's really no more info available to any others of us. It's very similar to the oft-asked question "what's the best light for checking my yard" type.

Totally pointless. And a waste of bandwidth... and my time ploughing through endless forum pages in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Click to expand...

SharkyZiff, welcome to CPF. You're in the right place asking the right questions. Thanks for taking the time to ask for other's perspective.

Epimetheus, slow down, buddy. Of all the threads/posts I've read over the past two years on CPF, yours has been the most hilarious. Your overkill response just reminded me of when I first joined CFP and how incredibly welcoming, warm, and generally excited other members were in response to my newbie questions. Over the course of the past two years, it's those very responses/perspectives that have helped shape my taste and collection, and it's other's great responses that have kept me engaged on the forum itself.

Keep in mind that passing on knowledge and expertise can be a fulfilling/rewarding process if you set aside your pride. Also keep in mind that CPF is just a place to relax, read, ask questions, discuss, learn, and skip the topics in which one may not be interested. The latter might be a good lesson learned for you, man. As I often tell my three year old, just chill. Or in big boy terms: keep you (proverbial) mouth shut if you don't have anything of value to add to the topic at hand. Anything else, my friend, is a waste of bandwidth, for sure.

As far as the insightful question itself, SharkyZiff, I've personally found that R2's in general throw further than my R5's hands down. The R5 hotspot, as previously noted, is wider which, of course, generally translates to less throw.

Great question. Keep'em coming.