Longbow First impression, all comments welcome

Would Like to hear from all Longbow owners,
Comments, Eg runtime, battery life, Build ect
any beam shots welcome.

Torch , I've purchased two micra o.d. twisties for tool-bag lights for personal vehicles. Added cheap mini tripod stands for changing tires,etc. The anodizing is uniform and well...beautiful on both. Both are extremely white, with very little blue tint. Excellent throw. The machining is top notch. No idea on run-time, as back-up lights, hopefully I may never find out. Looking forward to the 3 watt capsule. At the current price and quality they are a steal as well as upgradable and moddable for future improvements. Just my two cents.

Agreed. Excellent light at a good price.

Fit finish is top notch. Beam is good, and relatively white.

Ergonomics are great.

Very attractive design.

Can't say enough good things about the Longbow Micra twist Olive Drab.

Have to agree with the first replies. Fit and Finish are imcomparable. My Micra is very white, but it does have an off-center hotspot. Their modular approach allows for future upgrades. Really can't say anything bad about the light.

The Micra is definately worth the money. I plan on picking up another sometime soon.

Ditto w/ illmatic414.

I agree with the above comments. The only thing I don't like are those four deep groves at the end of the twisty. They hurt my fingers when I use it to twist the tailcap but it works when you have gloves on. Maybe they didn't need to mak it so pronounced.

~Stephen

I've been using one hand to turn mine on- I grip the tailcap with my ring and pinky finger and turn the head with mt index finger and thumb. works better for me. One other thing I found, I picked up an O-ring at Sears hardware that slips over the head and pops down into the slot behind the head. It sticks out enough to be able to comfortably use a Rogers/Surefire grip on the flashlight, and by turning the tailcap just past the point that it turns off, I'm able to turn it on by pulling it back into the web of my hand. Works out nicely when you just need a short burst of light!

Fitz:

I just used a thick rubber band which works too. It also gives it that rugged, spontaneous, "use what you have" laying around kind of look that we all strive to achieve with our $80 flashlights(!) /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

The Micra is a great light and probably one of the best bang-for-the-bucks out there.

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nightshade said:
Looking forward to the 3 watt capsule.

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I haven't heard of those! Any information anywhere? I would love to see that happening!

I have nothing bad to say about my micra so far. Great light, bright and white.

I'm very pleased with my Micra (w/ clickie) I made it even better by adding a UCL lens from Bugoutgear/Flashlightlens.com
made a substantial difference... was quite surprised. It's quite bright and very usable--- If they built in a 2 level power switch (high/low) They would rule--- the packaging is impressive, the build quality satisfying, nothing but good news here... I would buy another model without hesitation.

Micra+UCL+McCapsule= /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif
Here are some beamshots .

Micra/Mini/Eco + UCL + McCapsule + PR Head + Hi/Lo tailcap = /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/buttrock.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/buttrock.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/buttrock.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/buttrock.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/clap.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/clap.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/clap.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/clap.gif

Fitx could you possible post or send me some pictures showing this? Thanks!
Aten

[ QUOTE ]
Fitz said:
I've been using one hand to turn mine on- I grip the tailcap with my ring and pinky finger and turn the head with mt index finger and thumb. works better for me. One other thing I found, I picked up an O-ring at Sears hardware that slips over the head and pops down into the slot behind the head. It sticks out enough to be able to comfortably use a Rogers/Surefire grip on the flashlight, and by turning the tailcap just past the point that it turns off, I'm able to turn it on by pulling it back into the web of my hand. Works out nicely when you just need a short burst of light!

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I've got the Longbow Micra. I also have a SureFire E1e and Arc4+. I use my lights mostly for work. I'm an electrical engineer and do tons of reverse engineering and failure analysis. So I use a portable microscope--the light is used for illumination of the subject. I also do lots of camping and backpacking so my lights get pressed into double duty.
So here's how they stack up:

SureFire E1e - Old technology but... Great size and feel in the hand. It's... sort of... inexpensive. It's got good throw and weak spill. It's about the right intensity for 30X magnification, six inches from the target. Summary, so so in the woods, good in the lab.

Arc4+ - Good throw, bright spill. About a 60 degree spill beam. Super with the microscope especially at lower brightness settings. Very versatile. Can get within 5 inches of the target without getting de-focused(donut pattern). In the woods and around camp, the 60 degrees of spill leaves your peripheral vision in the dark. But it has great throw and bright spill. If you need to light anything up to 50 or 60 feet away, it's great. Summary--fantastic in the lab and pretty good in the woods.

Longbow Micra - Pretty bright. Sometimes too bright for close work with my pocket microscope. In the woods however... While not as bright as the Arc4 (high setting), it's close. But the beam... WOW!!! In the woods and around camp, that beam is fantastic. Much better than the KL1 with its NX05 optic (threw the KL1 in from left field but didn't evaluate it here, sorry). And I don't mean lumen wise, I mean the LongBow with the Carclo optics is just a great beam! It's got maybe 170 degrees of spill that gets smoothly brighter till you get to the spot beam. It's perfect for walking around and getting super peripheral vision.
Summary--In the lab, so so. In the woods, fantastic!

Executive Summary:

In the lab, Arc4 wins
In the woods, Longbow wins
In the pocket, SureFire wins

All around, Jack of all trades... Arc4+, but for the money, the Longbow has to be the best value out there today!

[ QUOTE ]
Photonian said:...I mean the LongBow with the Carclo optics is just a great beam! It's got maybe 170 degrees of spill that gets smoothly brighter till you get to the spot beam. It's perfect for walking around and getting super peripheral vision.
Summary--In the lab, so so. In the woods, fantastic!...

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I use my lights mainly in the woods. It's interesting that you reached same conclusion I did about optics in the woods. The bright spot with gradual rolloff is (as you put it) fantastic. No sudden brightness changes as you pan around like you get with a reflector. I don't have Carclo yet, but I've been using the Fraen LP. I'm looking forward to trying the Carclo. From beamshots I've seen ,it seems like it has a bit more punch. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif

Anyone knows about that 3 watt capsule that Nightshade has mentionned above? Did I miss something?

I'm not sure if Nightshade is referring to something else, but it might be the McCapsule (Luxeon III TX1J with BB700) that Don (McGizmo) is coming up with.

Hi Scuba /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink2.gif

Here's a thread from the Homemade and Modified Forum about them:

McCapsule

If you do a search for "McCapsule" on H&M you'll find other references to it.

As nice as my McLux PR equipped LB Micra is, the McCapsule is going to make it even better.

Britt

Link corrected above. Corrected link deleted in this post to reduce bandwidth.