Fyrstormer's Lumenarium

fyrstormer

Banned
Joined
Jul 24, 2009
Messages
6,617
Location
Maryland, Near DC, USA
(I don't know if "lumenarium" is a real word, but it sounds good, so I'm going with it. :D)

I had wanted to make this thread in honor of Flashlight Day 2018 (December 21st for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere), but a combination of work, taking care of the baby, and bad weather got in the way. (did we really get a thunderstorm with a rainbow on the shortest day of the year??). So I finished it a few days late, but that means I was able to take some new photos outside on a day with the sun barely-obscured by thin wispy clouds, so it was nice and bright but the sunlight was diffused -- perfect conditions for photographing shiny objects. There are lots of ways to organize this list -- material, brightness, cost, etc. -- but I'm going with a roughly chronological order because it's easy. ;) Right now, this list only contains lights that I currently own; as I dig through my photo archive I'll add lights that I no longer own, if I can find records of them. Unfortunately records of most of my early lights have been lost to the mists of time, but the important ones are listed here, because I still own them. :) I own multiples of some of these lights, but unless there's something interesting and different about each one I'll only post a single photo of each model.


2001

Arc Flashlight AAA
Status: Retired
Material: Aluminum
Emitter: Nichia BS
Tint: Very cool
SDeJuzk.jpg

Thoughts: This was my third LED flashlight ever. The first one was a 2xCR2016-powered squeeze-light made by Emissive Energy Corp, Inc., which I believe eventually renamed itself Inova, and the second one was a Photon 2. The Photon 2 was much more durable than the Inova, but the Arc AAA outlasted them both. (I do still have some Photon 2's kicking around, though; they make great gifts for people who think they have no use for a flashlight.) I eventually bought an Arc AAA DS, which was even better, but I lost the damn thing after a couple years; I bought an Arc AAA GS to replace it, but by then Arc's build quality was obviously deteriorating and I went in search for something better to use instead.


2002


2003


2004


2005


2006


2007


2008 (...I didn't become a flashaholic until I found CPF while looking for a replacement for my Arc AAA)

Arc6 + McGizmo C-Pak
Status: Retired (#1), Shelf Queen (#2)
Material: Titanium and Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L (#1), Cree MC-E (#2)
Tint: Neutral (#1), Cool (#2)
wkaBZI0.jpg

Thoughts: The Arc6 was always a bit of a disappointment in stock form. It was a very ambitious light, and it was well-designed, but it suffered from inconsistent build quality and long shipping delays. I managed to get my hands on two of them that worked well, and eventually I modded them to have better emitters. (I only knocked-loose a few capacitors in the process! Fortunately most of the capacitors on the circuit board are so small their absence has no meaningful effect on the circuit's operation.) I also installed them in C-Paks so mode-selection would be done with a progressive-twist UI instead of a Lumamax UI. That made mode selection a little more difficult, but much more reliable, because unlike the Lumamax tailswitches, the McGizmo PD switch requires a death-grip on the button to keep the high setting reliably engaged. A second spring-loaded contact for the high setting would've gone a long way towards making the McGizmo PD switch easier to use, but it's all water under the bridge now.


2009

Early Flashlights - see below for list
Status: Sold
Material: Various
Emitter: Various
Tint: Cool (the only feasible tint at the time)
QcJmVz8.jpg

Thoughts: I don't have individual pictures of most of these, so I'm posting them as a group. From rear-left to front-right: Fenix P3D, "Stylish Fighter" from DealExtreme, PhotonFanatic Tasklight Two, Arc6, McGizmo LunaSol 20, Nitecore EX10, Fenix P1D, Peak McKinley, Jetbeam Jet-II IBS, Lummi Raw Ti, Peak Shasta 3-LED, Arc6 w/ Peak Matterhorn 3-LED head, Lummi Wee NS. I occasionally miss the P1D, because it was my first high-power flashlight, and I still remember that first experience of being astounded by how bright it was. I also miss the Peak McKinley (the first of two that I owned), which had the best-tinted 5mm LEDs I would see for years to come, but I ruined it when I attempted to use Norland 61 to fill-in the head and make a solid epoxy "lens" to protect the LEDs from damage. It didn't work and made a terrible mess. I also miss the Peak Shasta, which I really should've kept, but at the time its output was unimpressive and 5mm LEDs didn't seem retro-cool like they do nowadays. If I knew then what I know now...

McGizmo LunaSol 20
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: OSRAM Golden Dragon and 3x Nichia DS
Tint: Very cool
BDan9XB.jpg

Thoughts: My very first titanium light. It was so cool! I kept it for years, but eventually I decided to sell it in favor of keeping the LunaSol 27 that I would later acquire secondhand.

McGizmo Ti PD-S
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Seoul Semiconductor P4
Tint: Neutral-Cool
HYZu2y9.jpg

Thoughts: Despite what I said above about the McGizmo PD switch being somewhat difficult to use reliably on the high setting, I forgive this light for its imperfections because it's a freaking classic. Someday these things will end up in museums alongside other seminal turn-of-the-millennium technologies.

McGizmo Haiku
Status: Retired
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XP-L Hi
Tint: Neutral
RaD5hHO.jpg


McGizmo McLux + Aleph 19
Status: Sold
Material: Aluminum
Emitter: Seoul Semiconductor P4
Tint: Cool
2IE0AM9.jpg

Thoughts: My first "retro" light and my first "lego" light, assembled from a McLux body kit and an Aleph 19 head that I bought specifically for this purpose. I sold it years later after deciding that I was never going to actually carry it because it was too precious. I miss it every now and then, but the thing I liked most about it was its appearance, and I can admire it in the photos I took of it.

McGizmo Ti PD-S27
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Seoul Semiconductor P4
Tint: Cool
kVTrtSP.jpg


Fenix P2D
Status: Sold
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: Cree XR-E
Tint: Cool
ZyaUQPE.jpg


McGizmo Ti PD-XR19
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XR-E
Tint: Cool
goI3JPJ.jpg



2010

McGizmo Ti McLux III
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Philips Luxeon K2
Tint: Neutral
RrOz2S9.jpg


McGizmo Sundrop XR-U
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Nichia NCSU033B Cree XP-L Hi
Tint: 365nm UV Neutral-warm
QB3YbTv.jpg

Thoughts: I originally bought this with an early Nichia Hi-CRI emitter, and I never really enjoyed it in that configuration; the lens optic caused the 6 emitter dies to generate a series of overlapping circles of light, and the interference pattern around the edges of the beam irritated my vision. So I moved the Nichia Hi-CRI light engine to a Ti Mule once those became available, and I put a UV light engine in the Sundrop instead. But the 365nm "color" of the UV emitter turned out to be far less useful than I had anticipated; most of the things that people expect to fluoresce under UV light are most responsive to 390-400nm wavelengths instead. Finally I bought a Cree XP-L Hi light engine for the Sundrop, and now it's the perfect indoor flashlight; a nice neutral-warm beam with almost perfectly even brightness edge-to-edge -- no hotspot to accidentally blind me in a dark room.

McGizmo Sapphire 25
Status: Indoor Use (#1), Shelf Queen (#2)
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Nichia DS (#1 and #2)
Tint: Warm (#1), Very cool (#2)
ePEReXa.jpg

Thoughts: I never could make up my mind whether I preferred the very cool stock Nichia DS or the Nichia DS Warm emitters that I found online...so I kept both. Mostly the very cool Nichia DS is a homage to my long-lost Arc AAA DS, which I loved and should've bought many more of, but I was young and not yet accustomed to everything I like being discontinued when I'm not looking. Oh well; it doesn't matter though, because the Sapphire is a better light in every way, and I do have spare Sapphires.

Jetbeam E3S
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: Cree XP-G
Tint: Cool
GtcTFX6.jpg


McGizmo Lunasol 27 Centauri
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XR-E and 6x Nichia CS
Tint: Cool
wdxNRVh.jpg

Thoughts: This was the light that I used to test my Centauri mod, which I offered here on CPF years ago. The light is showing its age, but in a "vintage" way instead of an "obsolete" way. It's interesting to see that the dual-beam-pattern design keeps popping up from time to time (because it's just a really good idea), but its limited adoption suggests it must cost more to implement than the designer can recoup by actually selling lights.

HDS Clicky Ti
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: OSRAM Golden Dragon
Tint: Neutral-cool
B0EbwMA.jpg

Thoughts: The knurling on this light was to die for, but I ended up selling it because of the quirky UI and the lack of a pocket clip. Years later I would rectify this by attaching a pocket clip to a HDS Rotary, but it's still not titanium. I really wish all HDS lights were available in titanium, even if only on a pre-order/group-buy basis.

Mac EDC SST-50
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Edison SST-50
Tint: Cool
rMYMyqd.jpg


Cool Fall Tri-V
Status: Sold
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XR-E (spotlight), Cree XP-G (tasklight), Cree MC-E (floodlight)
Tint: Cool (spotlight), Neutral-cool (tasklight), Warm (floodlight)
aSgKicC.png

Thoughts: By far the most technically-complex light I have ever owned -- and the most expensive by at least a factor of 2. (and that was back when the Tri-V cost a mere $2000, compared to the current price of $5200!) What a gorgeous piece of engineering this thing was. I still say it is the ultimate manifestation of the concept of "flashlight". Eventually I had to sell it, though; despite being so incredibly expensive, it always struck me as being disconcertingly fragile with all of its thin edges and exposed lenses and emitters -- I mean, god help me if I dropped a $2000 flashlight on the ground! Even if I didn't break it, the cosmetic damage would ruin its resale value, and I'd never forgive myself for that moment of clumsiness. But if I won the Mega Millions lottery, I would buy ten of these in a heartbeat, so I could carry one at all times without worrying about it anymore.


2011

Jetbeam TC-R2
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XP-G
Tint: Cool
ybadrM9.jpg

Thoughts: I loved this light. For years it was everything I wanted in an EDC flashlight -- small, bright, durable, infinitely-adjustable, and pretty. I carried one of these from 2011 until 2017, when I started taking a new medication that made me absent-minded when it wore-off, and I lost the damn thing. I started EDCing an aluminum RRT-0, and then I lost that one too. I was most distressed. That problem has since been resolved, but nonetheless my spare TC-R2 remains a shelf-queen, where it's safe.

McGizmo Mule
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Nichia 083 Hi-CRI
Tint: Neutral-Warm
YObyepp.jpg


Jetbeam PC25
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L
Tint: Cool
fD6cnM7.jpg

Thoughts: I like this light because it has a two-button interface that can be operated entirely from the tailcap, which is handy for a light this large. I recently borrowed an idea from Oveready and attached a short clip to the tailcap, thus resolving a years-old issue of how to pocket-carry this light comfortably. It's a pretty obvious idea in retrospect, but I had to spend a few years drilling and tapping holes into cheap Chinese RC-car parts before I felt comfortable drilling holes in my fancy flashlights.

Jetbeam RRT-0
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L
Tint: Cool
2Tb7BGK.jpg

Thoughts: Everything I love about the TC-R2's UI, in a less-pretty but also less-expensive package. I gave these as gifts for a few years, and I still have a couple kicking around in my box of spares.

Nitecore EX10 + kuku427 Shell
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium
Emitter: OSRAM Golden Dragon
Tint: Cool
h05BXrT.jpg


Peak LED Solutions McKinley
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: 7x Unknown
Tint: Cool
Z3cFWHY.jpg

Thoughts: I've always thought arrays of 5mm LEDs looked cool in an anachronistic way. This is nowhere near my brightest light, but it throws a spot a decent distance indoors, and it looks neat.


2012

McGizmo + TnC + TorchLab Triple
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium and Copper
Emitter: 3x Nichia 219B
Tint: Neutral-Cool
PEtIXUA.jpg


Jetbeam TC-R1
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XM-L
Tint: Cool
1TV9Id2.jpg


Mac Tri-EDC
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Copper
Emitter: 3x Nichia 219B
Tint: Neutral-Cool
0lcB6pX.jpg

Thoughts: We miss you, cmacclel.


2013

Muyshondt Aeon Mk.2
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Nichia 219B
Tint: Neutral
pezfF0H.jpg

Thoughts: My favorite Muyshondt light. This version has 3 brightness settings instead of the original 2. I bought two of these lights, but eventually sold the second one to fund my RC hobby. I eventually regretted that, so I recently bought two more. :)


2014


2015

Tain Ottavino Mk.2
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XP-G2
Tint: Neutral
7nbVTOs.jpg


TorchLab E2E Triple
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Anodized aluminum and Copper
Emitter: 3x Nichia 219B
Tint: Neutral
RZCL11o.jpg

Thoughts: I owned a couple E1E's and E2E's in the past, but I always ended up selling them because they were too dim and I wanted fancy feature-rich UIs. Oveready solved the dilemma for me by packing a TorchLab v5 Triple into a bored-out E2E shell, so I could have the iconic Surefire design and a feature-rich UI.


2016

Olight S1
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Cool
hjFrGQg.jpg

Thoughts: I EDCed this light for over a year, in a pocket full of stainless-steel pocket tools. The anodizing obviously took a beating during that time, but honestly it looks better than I thought it would when I started EDCing it. I really like the S1's UI, which is why I own about 10 of them now. :D

Another McGizmo Mule
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Nichia 119B
Tint: Neutral-Cool
jX4pDjV.jpg



2017

Olight S1 Cu
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Copper
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Neutral-Cool
KxtFSw5.jpg

Thoughts: As I've gotten older I've learned to appreciate the dull patina that copper develops as it weathers, but I still want it to be as uniform as possible, so I gave this light a salt-and-baking-soda bath for a couple hours, then washed it and put it outside on a windowsill for a month. I couldn't ask for a better patina than this light has.

Olight S1 Cu
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Plated Copper
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Neutral-Cool
L4pJcCm.jpg



2018 -- The Relapse

Prometheus Alpha Shorty
Status: Sold
Material: Nickel-plated Aluminum
Emitter: Cree MC-E
Tint: Neutral
pLwyPlg.jpg



Peak LED Solutions Eiger Ultra
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: Cree XP-G Hi-CRI
Tint: Neutral-Cool
I0Dp9YL.jpg

Thoughts: I owned a couple Eigers with variable-brightness QTC inserts in the past, but I always found them difficult to adjust one-handed. The Eiger Ultra solves that problem by having a wider-diameter head, which gives my thumb and forefinger more leverage to turn the head against the drag caused by the threads rubbing together hard as the QTC insert is compressed.

HDS Rotary
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XP-L
Tint: Neutral-Cool
k9mzGDA.jpg

Thoughts: I can't believe it took me so long to get around to trying a HDS Rotary. It's pretty much everything I love about the Jetbeam TC-R2, in a package that might be literally bombproof. (I'm not inclined to try, though.) The big thing that kept me away before was the lack of a bezel-down pocket clip, but after a few years of drilling and tapping holes into cheap Chinese RC-car parts, I worked up my courage to install my own bezel-down clip on this light. Now it's one of my top 3 EDC lights.

Klarus Mini One
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XP-G3
Tint: Neutral-Cool
D9apcSe.jpg

Thoughts: I owned a Lummi Wee years ago. The Klarus Mini One is what I wished the Lummi Wee could've been; it's not handmade like the Lummi Wee was, but it's a better flashlight in every respect.

McGizmo Makai
Status: Shelf Queen (#1), Indoor Use (#2)
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Cree XM-L2 (#1), 29x 5-die LEDs (#2)
Tint: Cool (#1 and #2)
Lft1SRZ.jpg

Thoughts: I avoided the Makai for years because I didn't need a thrower. I still don't, technically, but every now and then I travel to the middle of nowhere, and a thrower would actually be useful there. Also the Makai's large head gave me the opportunity to indulge an idea I'd had for a while, to build a modern interpretation of a 5mm-array "showerhead" flashlight. It was a worthwhile project, and I occasionally carry that light instead of a "more sensible" one.

Jetbeam RRT-02
Status: Sold
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Cool
1OtDZ3D.jpg


Oveready BOSS
Status: EDC Rotation (#1), Shelf Queen (#2)
Material: Titanium and Copper
Emitter: Nichia 219C (#1 and #2)
Tint: Neutral (#1 and #2)
8Zkf9CL.jpg

Thoughts: It took me a long time to appreciate the design of the BOSS. I didn't like the "rocketpunk" look very much, until I saw the shiny machined-titanium finish, and then suddenly it hit me in a whole new way. The power, UI, build quality, and aesthetics of this light are all amazing.

Surefire E1E
Status: Shelf Queen (#1), EDC Rotation (#2 and #3)
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Incandescent (#1 and #2), 3x Nichia 219C (#3)
Tint: Warm (#1 and #2), Neutral (#3)
zFY2VaD.jpg

Thoughts: I've owned a few E1E's and E2E's before, but I kept selling them because they didn't have the feature-rich UIs I really wanted, and I didn't want to risk chipping the anodizing. And yet, I keep buying new ones because they're just so iconic. As I've gotten older I've started to appreciate the simplicity of a flashlight that just freaking turns-on when I press the switch, and the concern about chipping the anodizing is easy enough to solve by keeping one as a shelf queen.

More Olight S1 Cu's
Status: Shelf Queen
Material: Copper
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Neutral (#1-4)
EmO2V0I.jpg


Surefire L1 Lumamax (driver circuit removed) + KL4 Head
Status: Shelf Queen (#1), EDC Rotation (#2)
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Philips Luxeon V (#1 and #2)
Tint: Cool (#1 and #2)
YH3gYWI.jpg

Thoughts: The Lumamax is another Surefire that I always sort of admired from afar. I liked the way it looked, but between the quirky UI, the lack of 11ty billion brightness settings, the anodizing that was just asking to be chipped, and the narrow throwy beam pattern, it just wasn't the light for me. Time moves on and tastes change, and I can appreciate the simple choice of two brightness settings a lot more now. As for the beam pattern, I just gritted my teeth and threw money at the problem -- I bought several L1's and L4's to use as parts-donors, removed the L1s' driver circuits so they could work properly with "smart heads" instead of the "dumb heads" they came with, and installed the KL4 "smart heads" from the L4's. Now I have a couple Lumamaxes that have nice floody "tasklight" beams, just the way I like. (also I prefer the designs of the flutes on the KL4 heads vs the L1 heads.) The nicer of the two is a shelf queen, and the other is one of my top 3 EDC lights.

Olight S1A
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Neutral-Cool
g510iYc.jpg


Surefire EDCL1-T
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L2 (I think)
Tint: Neutral-Cool
aq7DA1n.jpg

Thoughts: I decided to give this light a try based on my recent experience with my modded L1 Lumamaxes. It's a very good iteration of the Lumamax concept, and I'm quite impressed by the beam pattern of the TIR optic, which I anticipated would be very narrow but is actually quite similar to a reflector. The tailcap is a bit narrow and hard to operate one-handed, but I fixed that by installing a 16mm x 26mm x 5mm O-ring on the tailcap. It fits super snugly and makes the tailcap easier to grip in a variety of handholds. It even functions as a cigar-ring.

Surefire T1 Titan
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Titanium
Emitter: Seoul Semiconductor P4
Tint: Cool
4rklpZV.jpg


Surefire C2 Centurion
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Anodized Aluminum
Emitter: Incandescent
Tint: Warm
oH6lzke.jpg

Thoughts: Add this to the list of iconic Surefire flashlights that I wanted to be able to appreciate when I was younger, but could never quite seem to. My recent discovery that the E-series bezel-down clips would also fit the Centurion suddenly made it plausible that I could actually enjoy carrying one. I love the styling of this light; both the Centurion and the E1E remind me of the early 2000's, when the "war on terror" was ramping-up and military aesthetics were super-cool. I wouldn't say I was a happier person back then, but I was definitely calmer and more secure in some ways, and holding this light reminds me of that a little bit.

Coast A10 Penlight
Status: Sold
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: Cree XP-G2 (I think)
Tint: Cool
XRgMHxY.jpg

Thoughts: A nice single-mode penlight, but I ultimately decided that a light this long is just too much trouble for me to carry around.

Coast A5 Penlight
Status: Cannibalized
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: Unknown -- some generic 5mm LED
Tint: Cool
Hwz2yrH.jpg

Thoughts: I ended up using the body from this light in combination with an A10 head to make a smaller A10 with a tasklight-style beam. There's nothing wrong with the round, perfectly-even "inspection beam" that the A5 comes with, and since I have a bunch of interchangeable parts I may revert back to that beam style eventually, but the 5mm thru-hole LED used by the A5 left something to be desired in terms of brightness.


2019

Surefire LX2 Lumamax
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: Cree XR-E
Tint: Cool
mxLfpnI.jpg

Thoughts: I had my eye on this light a few years ago, but I never got one because I was anti-aluminum at the time. Since I'm currently on a Surefire kick, I picked this up to give it a try. I recently fitted it with a slightly-modified McR 19XR reflector instead of the original TIR optic, and now it has a beam that suits my preferences much better.

Surefire "E1T-MV" Tactician
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: Cree XM-L2
Tint: Cool
R86hseo.jpg

Thoughts: This is how the E1B-MV should've been built -- two modes that are selectable by tightening or loosening the head.

Arc AAA HAIII
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: Nichia BS
Tint: Very cool
TYfMmWQ.jpg

Thoughts: A slightly newer companion to my first aluminum LED flashlight -- a first-run Arc AAA with black cosmetic anodizing. Not the model I really really want, which is the Arc-P AAA with the Nichia DS emitter, but it's nice enough to add to the collection anyway.

Coast A5 + 10
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Stainless Steel
Emitter: Cree XP-E
Tint: Cool
LbFoJLD.jpg

Thoughts: A nice little single-mode penlight, assembled from an A5 body and a slightly older A10 head than the A10 listed above uses -- hence the older XP-E emitter. However, it looks to be super-easy to mod, so I'll probably drop a XP-L emitter in there eventually. The original XP-L won't fit because the dome is slightly too big to fit into the hole in the base of the reflector, but the domeless "XP-L Hi" should fit just fine. I also need to figure out what kind of driver this uses -- assuming it uses a driver at all, instead of a simple resistor -- because it's running on half the intended voltage. Then again, the XP-L emitter might be so much more efficient that the stock driver(resistor?) setup would be just fine for close-up work, which is all a penlight is really supposed to handle anyway.

ASP TacLite
Status: EDC Rotation
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: Incandescent
Tint: Warm
YfFG3w6.jpg

Thoughts: My very first grail light, mine at last! I saw the ASP TacLite in a catalog (Herrington or Sharper Image, perhaps?) when I was a teenager in the late 90's. I could tell it was much better-built than my cheap 2xAA Mini Maglite, and I really wanted one, but I was too young to work and I had no money to speak of. By the time I did get a paying job, my interests had moved-on to replacing my childhood Huffy Sonic 6 bike with a real adult mountain bike, and later buying my mom's old car from her. (I was not given a choice about this, but it did turn out to be a reliable car. It lasted me through a year of high school, 5 years of college in New Jersey, an internship, and 6 months of job interviews -- before being totaled while parked in front of our house by a distracted teenage girl rushing to get a good seat at church on Sunday morning. Getting a good seat in church is a Very Important Thing in Lynchburg, VA -- but I digress.) I never quite forgot about the ASP TacLite, but it seemed impossible to find them by the time I got around to wanting one again.

About a month ago I saw an old thread here on CPF that directed me to a Greek tactical-equipment website that still had a few in stock; I bought several, just to be sure I got enough parts to build a couple really good ones, in case there were defective or damaged parts on some of them. As it turns out, I got two really good ones, and one of them is now in my EDC rotation. I modernized it a bit by texturing the reflector, replacing the plastic lens with a crystal-glass wristwatch lens, replacing the 6V bulb with an 8.4V bulb from TAD Customs, and installing a pocket clip -- and unlike Surefires, it can tailstand without mods! :p Future mods may include having the tube bored to accommodate 18350 cells (it's way wider than necessary for that) and replacing the stock switch with a McClicky...somehow. But for now, I'm happy just to have one. Something about the design of the ASP TacLite just makes me feel good, like this is how basic flashlights should be designed, and something far in the back of my mind has quietened since I got this light.

Surefire A2 Aviator
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: LED/Incandescent
Tint: Warm
VgPL5xU.jpg

Thoughts: I'm not sure how popular the A2 Aviator was back in its day, but I can definitely see why the white LED version wasn't as popular as some of the other versions. The "white" LEDs were so cool-blue they look like they belonged on a ricer-boi car, and were a very stark contrast against the warm-white incandescent bulb. Fortunately, technology has advanced a bit in the past 15-ish years, and I have a stash of warm and neutral-warm Nichia DS 5mm LEDs on-hand for other projects. So I dug out my soldering iron and mixed two warm LEDs and one neutral-warm LED to match the tint of the incandescent bulb as closely as possible. It's a very nice dual-mode dual-beam light now.

Surefire 6P
Status: Indoor Use
Material: Anodized aluminum
Emitter: Incandescent
Tint: Warm
csQ46fd.jpg
 
Last edited:

ven

Flashaholic
Joined
Oct 17, 2013
Messages
22,533
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Manchester UK
What a wonderful flashlight family of awesomeness you have. Great thread, thanks for taking the time with pics/info/thoughts................outstanding for sure!:wow:
 

tech25

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Jul 26, 2010
Messages
1,285
Location
Near the Big Apple
Beautiful collection, thanks for bringing us along on your journey!

The patina on the Macs is really nice and I still love how you solved the lack of clip on the HDS.
 

archimedes

Flashaholic
Joined
Nov 12, 2010
Messages
15,780
Location
CONUS, top left
What a wonderful post, many thanks ... :clap:

I hope you won't mind if I move your excellent thread over to "Flashlight Collecting"
 

badtziscool

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Oct 13, 2006
Messages
1,722
Epic post!! Like a stroll down memory lane for me. I especially love the contrast of the Ti TnC host with the patina of the copper adapter.
 

bykfixer

Flashaholic
Joined
Aug 9, 2015
Messages
20,348
Location
Dust in the Wind
Great thread. Nice selection.

My collection began in the dinosaur era of lighting tools. Any post covering the entire time frame would be ridiculously long so....
IMG-20181224-122543.jpg

Starts around 1912 (when the pistol light came out)

IMG_20180126_173913.jpg

And ends in 2018 when the EDCL2 arrived.

And a lot of spaces in between.

I sought to acquire at least 2 from every decade lights have been made. Reluctant to pay $5k for some of the earliest of the early (circa 1910 when they were cardboard tubes that are nearly all gone) it began in the first decade some two years later.

The ARC was perhaps the greatest leap forward in flashlight tech since battery sizes were standarized by Charles Burgess in about 1917.
 
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fyrstormer

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Jul 24, 2009
Messages
6,617
Location
Maryland, Near DC, USA
Beautiful collection, thanks for bringing us along on your journey!

The patina on the Macs is really nice and I still love how you solved the lack of clip on the HDS.
Thanks! The patina on the Mac Tri-EDC was actually manufactured using a Brass Blackener solution. I washed the light, soaked it in the blackener, washed it again, soaked it again, washed it a third time, then very lightly scuffed the light with Scotch-Brite to give it sort of a brushed look. Then I let it sit on a shelf until the exposed copper browned a bit.
 

fyrstormer

Banned
Joined
Jul 24, 2009
Messages
6,617
Location
Maryland, Near DC, USA
Great thread. Nice selection.

My collection began in the dinosaur era of lighting tools. Any post covering the entire time frame would be ridiculously long so....
IMG-20181224-122543.jpg

Starts around 1912 (when the pistol light came out)
LOL, the pistol light, aka "How to get shot by mistake in 2018".

I sought to acquire at least 2 from every decade lights have been made. Reluctant to pay $5k for some of the earliest of the early (circa 1910 when they were cardboard tubes that are nearly all gone) it began in the first decade some two years later.
Yeah, that's just a teensy bit expensive for a flashlight made from stamped tin and cardboard.

The ARC was perhaps the greatest leap forward in flashlight tech since battery sizes were standarized by Charles Burgess in about 1917.
Wartime is good for a couple things. Putting pressure on equipment manufacturers to cooperate for the benefit of the war effort is one of them.

As for Arc Flashlight: All the pieces had existed for years to build power-regulated LED flashlights, but it took someone to actually do it, and the rest is history. I keep my original Arc AAA as a way to remember that turning-point. I wanted an Arc LS, but I couldn't afford one at the time, and by the time I could afford to buy one secondhand, technology had moved too far ahead and the Arc LS was obviously obsolete. It would've been awesome to have had an Arc LS in my pocket in college, but I can salve my disappointment with all the cool lights I've had the opportunity to own and use since then.
 

Vemice

Enlightened
Joined
Jun 18, 2017
Messages
526
+1 on the Sapphires (25 and High CRI) and ARC.
Great post. Thank you.
URL=http://imgur.com/NxyQGiX]
NxyQGiX.jpg
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magellan

Honorary Aussie
Joined
Feb 3, 2014
Messages
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Location
USA
Wow. I just want to echo the other comments here about what a great post, and what a great collection. Truly awesome work!
 

nbp

Flashaholic
Joined
Dec 16, 2007
Messages
10,970
Location
Wisconsin
Why can't we see the MP anymore? I thought it was going to stay Read-only. So much history and CPF culture MIA.
 

luxlunatic

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Feb 1, 2006
Messages
1,240
Location
SoCal
Awesome thread!!
Been wanting to do something similar for a while but just haven't had the time...
I have a decent collection at this time but there are many that I have parted with that I miss, but I do have lots of photos of the lights I no longer have (a few I sold and later bought back!), and there have been a bunch in my (nearly) 13 years here at CPF!
One of my most prized pieces, a McGizmo LS27, was going to be sent to you for your Centuri mod, but once again, did not get around to it...How has it been that many years?!?!?!
Looking forward to more additions to this thread, fyrstormer!
 

LiftdT4R

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Jan 8, 2017
Messages
1,273
Location
NJ / PA
Very cool and very interesting to see the evolution of your lights. I always enjoy seeing what light folks on here carried before they realized they were a flashaholic.
 
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