LED Colored Head Options for the L1 & L2

Bear with me fellas. I'm new to the CPF. I recently heard from Dan at Tactical Warehouse that Surefire has plans to offer colored LED head options for the L1 & L2. Does anyone have any info on this or a time table? I'm trying to come up with a viable option for night navigation. The F05 Red filter on the L4 is just barely adequate and will eat you alive on batteries if you are out all night. It also filters out so much light that it is working at cross-purposes. I think that I might need an UN-filtered red LED for lumen output with good side spill, but have not yet had the chance to get my hands on the L1-HA-RD. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/help.gif

Welcome to CPF!

SureFire have already offered L1's in white (WH), red (RD), blue (BL) and green (GN).

If you look around there may be an L1-HA-RD somebody is willing to part with here (try the B/S/T) or a Dealer may have one left.

As for the L2 being in colours... We'll have to see what the future holds.

Depending on what sort of night navigation you are doing, there are different red light LED flashlights to choose from.
You may get more replies if you start a new thread asking for red LED flashlights.

Al

Thanks for the reply. I already have an L1-HA-RD on order but am standing in line with everybody else. My hope is that if you can get rid of that lumen robbing F05 filter and go to a pure unfiltered red LED head, you might get enough lumens out there to do the job. I also heard that the first batch of L1 heads were poor bin quality and wondered if they changed anything with the upcoming new run. Some people seemed to knock the beam quality and others said that it was good. Oh well - THIS is why research can be expensive.

Are you still referring to L1 whites because there have been many batches of L1 whites.
As to coloured L1 LEDs - I have no experience.

Al

I THINK I'm referring to the batch of L1-WHs. I don't remember if any of the gripes about beam quality referred to the other colors.

Flashdark,

Welcome to CPF!
I see you have a KL1. The L1 will have the same beam pattern as the KL1 if the emitters are the same.

From your sig line it looks like you need a A2 and M4 /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinser2.gif

The A2 with red LEDs might be another option, but the L1-RD would be brighter on high and dimmer on low. The LEDs in the A2 have a wider beam than the L1.

Thanks Hoghead,
I tried the A2-RD and it didn't even come close to the lumen output or side spill required for the job. Good to here that the L1 will have the same excellent side spill of the KL1. I've learned the hard way that you need it in brush country. It's now a question of whether or not the L1-RD will have the horsepower or do I have to wait for an L2-RD. Thanks. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

I've got 2 L1's, both RED. I'm very happy with them, and better still, I don't think that they are all that rare. One I picked up in SoCal at the South Coast Mall, Plaza Cutlery was the name I think. It was my very first Surefire! They had a decent amount of Surefires in stock, including some I hadn't yet seen, like the L7. The other was purchased from a CPF dealer who was closing out their Surefire stock.

Like I said, I'm quite happy with them. Beam quality seems to me to be quite good with very few artificacts. Color of course is no problem. . .they're definitely RED! A bit long for a single 123 cell, but the 2 stage output is nice. . . I've had some of my friends in the USCG remark that the high setting was too bright for the bridge at night, even in red. The low setting is just right, I think, though still pretty bright.

Flashdark,

There's no such thing as a red 5 watt Luxeon (for the L2), there aren't any red Luxeon IIIs either.
All of the red Luxeons are 1 watt, but there are high and low dome red 1 watt Luxeons. As far as I know the L1-RD uses a low dome.

Check here in BST Someone is selling a red and a R/O w/mcflood. I belive this R/O is the same one I saw on here a while back that was really on the orange side, quite unique , but it may be a different one.

Hope that helps!

If the (K)L1 uses a LD red then it will have less lumens than a HD red, unless you're talking about the new part# LD reds that use the same improved die as the HD's, which I doubt SF is using.

Check the lumileds .pdf for more info. I would post #'s but I'm on a work machine and cant access it.

I think the HD red's put out 40-50lumens, and the LD 20-30? I can't remember... But either way it should be plenty.

Perhaps they aren't using Lumileds for the high output coloured LEDs?

[ QUOTE ]
Size15s said:
Perhaps they aren't using Lumileds for the high output coloured LEDs?

[/ QUOTE ]

They Who? Surefire? The L1-RD I have is definitely using a LD Lumileds Luxeon.

I meant for the L2...

Ah... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/popcorn.gif

Aloft,
That's good to here. Thanks

Re: LED Colored Head Options for the L1 & L2

Hoghead,
I know that there are no 5 Watt Luxeon heads in RD/BL/GR yet for the L2, but Dan at Tactical Warehouse postulated that there would be in the future. Maybe just wishfull thinking? Thanks

As of the year 2006, all L1 Lumamax flashlights use the Luxeon III emitters, which means they are only available in white. The L1 now uses a collimator instead of the reflector. Also look out because in 2007 (around late June to early August) the L1 is going to get a new LED. The new LED is a CREE-XRE LED and the new outputs for the L1 will be 10lm 65/lm. I do believe that Surefire still has a large quantity of the colored 1 watt LED L1s left over from the original release of the L1. All of the original L1s use reflectors and have fairly low outputs.

I don't see why you needed to dig this thread up from the grave...

Lightingguy321 said:

All of the original L1s use reflectors and have fairly low outputs.

Click to expand...

Please show me an L1 SureFire released with a reflector.

Try the surefire website, if you buy any Colored LED L1, it will still be a reflector type bezel instead of the TIR.