Does anybody have a ZeroHour Relic XR?

drmaxx

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Jun 16, 2005
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According to their Kickstarter Website and their blog the light was shipped out to backer mid July. There must be somebody here that has gotten this light? Can you give us a little run-down of the light? Is it worth it?
 

Czw

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May 4, 2014
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I have one, it is my only expensive (>$50) flashlight, although I do own expensive bike lights. For me it is worth it, I have two cheap Chinese lights with similar functions. One just does not work, the other is not waterproof.

The relic is waterproof, and a USB charger. It provides 1000lm, but I cannot test this. It provides several modes of light. A fixed low power mode, a fixed 1000 lumen mode, a variable low power to 1000 lumen mode, and three flashing modes. The three flashing modes are a long morse SOS mode, slow beacon mode (it pulses one for about 1s then off for about 3s), and a migraine mode designed to ward off buskers, street artists and perverts.

The relic is large, just over twice as long as its 16580 battery, and the head is twice the diameter of the battery. It has an on/off clicky switch at the base, and a magnetic selector ring to adjust brightness, to put it into migraine mode. The clicky switch can be depressed slightly for turning it on without clicking.

The selector ring moves through about 320 degrees. Pointing away from your face the ring has two click points, followed by a continuously adjustable section followed by three click points. The first click point is a low power mode, the second is USB power mode, then the adjustable section. The third point is 1000 lumen, followed by SOS and migraine. Beacon mode can be selected by putting the light into USB mode, and turning off and on quickly, it is also activated when power is removed from the charging port. The big downside here is that is dead space between low power mode, and adjustable mode, to move from low mode to adjustable mode by moving the ring, you have to make a decent amount of movement or the light will turn off. I think having USB mode on the selector causes problems, but then where else could it be put.

If the selector ring is in the low power position, then turning it on will put it into low power mode. Briefly turning it off and on will put it into 1000lm mode, and briefly turning off and on again it migraine mode. If the flash light is off, then two quick taps and full on will very quickly put it into migraine mode, so you can ward off the politician of you choice.

Charging.

The two USB ports are covered by a metal ring, that should keep them waterproof. The ring cannot be unscrewed whilst the pocket clip is in place, so I will probably be ditching the pocket clip. The ring also covers a blue/red led that indicates when the battery is half discharged, and also turns on when being charged, but I was not paying enough attention to see what is was doing, just relying on my decent USB charger. To charge something, put it into USB mode, and plug the USB cable into the USB A port (the big one). The light got quite hot when I charged my smart phone.

To charge the flashlight plug the cable into the micro-B port, the other end into a computer, USB charger etc. I did not pay attention, but the red/blue LED does something here. When it stopped drawing current, my charger's relevant LED turned off. If it is in USB mode when unplugged, or looses power, it goes straight into beacon mode, this is useful in a powercut. (charger used is a Portopow Crystal).

To sum up, for its light output and battery size, it is big and heavy, but makes up with its versatility as a charger. It has a few bad points, but is well constructed. Unfortunately I cannot post pictures.
 
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drmaxx

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Jun 16, 2005
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Home of chocolate and chalets
Thank you very much Czw for this account. It's just odd that I couldn't find anything after the light was delivered - after all the buzz over the Kickstarter event. It's good to see that you like it. Did you try the 1000lm mode over longer periode? Does it step down after a few minutes?
 
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