Surefire L1

Hello everyone,

I've just purchased a Surefire L1. It seems to be a GREAT little light. Construction and design are excellent. It's longish for a single 123 cell. Also the output of the LED isn't as uniform as my LSH-P but still good. I really like the idea of 2 output levels. I have a couple of questions regarding this light:

1. Will the newly designed L1, 3 watt LED, reduce runtime for this light? What is the benefit of a 3 vs 1 watt LED? Doesn't the 1 watt LS has a longer life span than the 3 watt?

2. I've read many reviews of this light from other sites and the only one that even touched on the water resist / proof testing was from Craig at the LED Museum. What are Surefire water ratings - in particular for the L1? The SF web-site says weather proof (basically says that on all their line of lights). I am not interested in quotes from the MFR but real life experiences and tests. The reason I ask is because the light will be used in a marine / ship environment and has the possibility of becoming a human survivability issue. Not talking diving, I have other lights for that. In viewing the construction and O rings the light appears at least submersible to a couple of feet. This is one of the subjects that has puzzled me about SF; why they don't list or give more information on the subject of water capability?

3. Are any aftermarket tailcaps available without the rubber boot? IE twisty to low level and turn further to high output? The boot looks like the weak sister if it was ever punctured / damaged. A twisty design may reduce the length of this light.

Let me know what you think.

Thanks

For the waterproffness (If thats a word) I've had mine out in rain and snow and dunked in a tube and rinsed off mulitple times, with no problems. The salt might be a problem though.

I don't think there is anybody on CPF who can answer question No.1 because no reviewer has a new L1 yet that I'm aware of.

With regards to water-resistance - why don't you try it and see? Even if the L1 was rated, it's how your specific L1 performs that matters.

i believe the weak link for the L1 would be the lens gasket. sometimes the lens cap isn't screwed down tight enough, such that water can leak past the gasket. u can easily remedy this by breaking the loctite seal, and tightening the lens cap down as tight as possible. that's how i fixed a leaking KL1, which uses the same type of lens gasket as the L1.

I feel like my L1 is pretty waterproof and don't hesitate to use it in wet situations. Typically when I get it wet in salt water, I rinse it in fresh water when I get home.

-john

I believe that surefire states "up to 32 feet". I seem to remember reading that somewhere.

No, not for the L1 and the majority of SureFires.

The 2004 catalog states something very similar to: all surefire lights are watertight to 1 atmosphere, or about 33 feet. Do a search in Adobe Reader to find the specific reference.

Ah - here it is - page 42:

"SureFire flashlights are waterproof. Drop a
SureFire in a puddle, immerse it in a stream, go
to India for the monsoons— your trusty flashlight
will emerge dripping, but working.We
thumb our nose at rain for we are O-ring
sealed, we are water-tight.
But "waterproof" does not mean you can
join the crew of the Calypso. Scuba diving
below 33 feet— one atmosphere of pressure—
can cause some models to leak."

I've never tended to pay too much attention to the catalogs. Too many inaccuracies I've found.
I understand that the majority of SureFires are designed to be waterproof (including the L1) and indeed, many are, but my opinion is that until you have tried it with the flashlight you have you can not be certain it is.

Al

I side with Al on the waterproofness and further suggest that if the light isn't up to the pressure, it is often due to owner error and not design flaw or component failure. With every battery change, a primary seal is breached as well as exposed to possible contamination. When was the last time you removed all O-rings, cleand them and their sealing surfaces with a lint free cloth, looked for nicks and abrasions in them as well as scars in the sealing surfaces, re lubricated the O-rings and removed excess lube and then re assembled in a clean and lint free environment? I don't think I have ever done this with one of my SF lights! Well, once or twice..... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/nana.gif

[ QUOTE ]
Foss said:
3. Are any aftermarket tailcaps available without the rubber boot? IE twisty to low level and turn further to high output? The boot looks like the weak sister if it was ever punctured / damaged. A twisty design may reduce the length of this light.

[/ QUOTE ]

Check out McGizmo's Aleph tailcap HERE . It has 2 stages, and twists onto low and then to high. Although it has a rubber boot for low and high, the boot is VERY well protected by the rim, and I would have little concern about it getting worn or punctured. If you were really worried about wear, you could pick up a few spare boots and replace yourself as necessary. The switch is self-servicable and easy to build yourself (takes 2 minutes) with just a pair of pliers.

Hope that helps.

GOOD PURCHASE. I love the light and it is worth every cent.

-tom

Thanks for all the responses. I received some great information...

If you're interested CM did a mod to the L1 I've got and I think it improves an already cool light by quite a bit. He put a good high dome and a Fraen LP in it. Now it's really great. Just a thought. -LT

[ QUOTE ]
Size15s said:
I've never tended to pay too much attention to the catalogs. Too many inaccuracies I've found.
I understand that the majority of SureFires are designed to be waterproof (including the L1) and indeed, many are, but my opinion is that until you have tried it with the flashlight you have you can not be certain it is.

Al

[/ QUOTE ]

Hey - all I know is that publishing something like that is way too specific in the details to be a minor inaccuracy. Four sentences specifically about how waterproof the lights are? This isn't a one word typo, for crying out loud. I'm putting in all my new reviews that they are advertised waterproof to 33 feet and the catalog is my source for that information.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it (and I have published documents from the manufacturer to back it up until they publish something otherwise). /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/nana.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Fair enough. They wrote it after all.

[ QUOTE ]
Quickbeam said:
The 2004 catalog states something very similar to: all surefire lights are watertight to 1 atmosphere, or about 33 feet. Do a search in Adobe Reader to find the specific reference.

Ah - here it is - page 42:

"SureFire flashlights are waterproof. Drop a
SureFire in a puddle, immerse it in a stream, go
to India for the monsoons— your trusty flashlight
will emerge dripping, but working.We
thumb our nose at rain for we are O-ring
sealed, we are water-tight.
But "waterproof" does not mean you can
join the crew of the Calypso. Scuba diving
below 33 feet— one atmosphere of pressure—
can cause some models to leak."

[/ QUOTE ]

Digging back in my memory I recall the G2 tailcap wasn't designed to be water resistaint at all. Is my recollection broken, or? Yes, I supposed I could try to dig up the post, but I'm lazy! You got a problem with that?!

[Edit: I tried to find it, and couldn't. I recall this came up in a thread titled something like "waterproofing a scorpion" or such. Can't find it. Do the archives not go back all the way?]

-john

Well, I had a nice story cooked up about a "waterproof" matchsafe I tested awhile back (it wasn't), but suffice it to say that I've found the term to be generally relative and not absolute.

If I am not mistaken, Nadar took care of "waterproof" watches and shortly after that they were tagged as water resistant. Now, they just have a metric depth rating, typically. If I recall correctly, for a watch to be water proof, it was required to function properly even if the seal was compromised and the watch flooded with water. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif

I can't comment on the waterproofness, but I have worked on a few L1's.

1W and Lux III's are almost the same flavor luxeon. The key benefit to getting a Lux III is that they tend to have better color. I haven't seen any really purple or greenie Lux III's. In the L1, you really won't see any practical gain in performance unless Surefire ramps up the current to the LED. In fact (let the flaming begin), I really don't think that a Lux III running at it spec of 700mA is a whole lot brighter than a nice R bin 1W overdriven to 700mA. The big improvement was in the color tint of the light.

What is probably causing that ugly beam that you are seeing is the combination of a low dome 1W luxeon in combination with an NX05 optic, but you don't have to live with this.

Although you really can't do anything about driving more current into the luxeon (not without a very invasive mod), you can swap the luxeon for a nicely binned Lux III and add a 17mm IMS reflector. You'd be surprised at the amount of light this combination will give you.

Then again, as you said, it's a bit big for a single cell light. Personally, I would have gone for a KL1 on an E1e body with one of McGizmo's tail switches.