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Produced by Quarton USA, the Beamshot TD3 tactical light looks and functions about like most other tac lights flooding the market these days: it is small and black. It can be fixed to most mounting systems. It's got a crenelated tailcap switch with momentary on and constant on, but no lock-off feature so it's a bad idea to simply drop it in a pack.
The batteries can be expected to hold out for 1 1/2 hours at full brightness and give an additional 2 hours of "useful output" (a term which is undefined in the company's literature). TD3's three-watt Luxeon LED is focused by a reflector lens. While it's difficult to assess such things in the well-lit SHOT Show environment, the beam appears narrow, with a very bright and centered hot spot, so you could expect a good throw. The product literature claims a reach of 50 yards.
Among the accessories available for the TD3 are diffuser filters in white, red, and blue, so even though you cannot step down the light output itself you can spread it out a bit and change its color. To get your good-throwing coherent beam back, all you need to do is flip the filter out of the way.
The pictures show a TD3 equipped with a white diffuser filter, purchased separately. The lanyard and rubber grip ring shown are both detachable, and are included in the purchase price.
TD3 is double O-ring sealed and waterproof to 20 meters.
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At the Coast booth, they were showing the Revolution headlamp, which uses the same 1.25 W Luxeon LED and reflector system as most of Coast's other headlamps. What's unique about Revolution is that it has a dimmer switch on the rear battery pack. Rather than flipping through multiple brightness levels on a single switch, the dimmer function allows the user to set a desired level of brightness with the rear switch and then have a simple on/off with the front switch. The big advantage of this is that you don't risk temporarily blinding yourself by accidentally turning the light on brighter than you want, and that you don't have to scroll through unused options in order to turn the light back off again. The downside is that reaching back to dim or brighten is kind of a pain.
Revolution can be pivoted downward so you don't strain your neck putting the light where you want it. It doesn't have an overhead strap, but it does have an unwieldy 3-AAA battery pack at the rear. While AAA alkaline batteries are easy to find in the store, they are somewhat bulky and heavy. The result of opting for purchasing convenience over compact power is that the designers are pretty well forced into using battery packs, and the buyer is left trying to figure out whether he'd rather wear his battery-heavy light, or keep the rain off his head by putting a hat on.
Those who are looking for a truly compact alkaline-powered headlamp from Coast might be better off looking at the Micro Headlamp, which was so new that it hadn't yet been named when we reviewed it last year. Although Micro also carries its power in the rear, it runs on a single AAA battery inside a horizontal battery case which doesn't get in the way of your baseball cap.
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Five white LEDs surround a single green or red LED in Coast's Dual Color Headlamp. Both battery life and night vision are saved by using the central, colored LED, while the white LEDs encircling it put out some 30 lumens of find-your-socks light.
The Dual Color Headlamp has two switches, one which activates the white LEDs and the other which runs the colored LED. The switch which activates the white LEDs is black, lightly textured, and positioned at the top of the lightweight lamp body. The other switch matches the color of the central LED, is smooth to the touch, and is located underneath the lamp body. The texture is so mild that unless you know it is there you might miss it, but if you rub it with a fingernail you can easily tell the difference between a textured or a smooth switch. Because of the tactile, visual, and location differences, there's little chance of ruining your night vision by choosing the wrong switch.
Like Coast's other headlamp offerings, the Dual Color Headlamp has a battery box at the rear, with a power cord running to the front. It also features a top strap to keep the 240g/7.2oz headlamp from slithering down off your forehead. The lamp body is hinged and pivots downward as much as 90 degrees, so you can position the light where you want it.
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Coast's Convertible LED TacTorch is small, black, and bright enough to momentarily blind an opponent. It can be attached to any existing tape switch for use with a long gun, and accepts any standard 1-inch mounting system. Unlike most other lights in the tac light genre, it runs on AAA alkaline batteries.
Like most of Coast's other lights, it'll come on every time you bump it and there's no way to lock the switch off. This might be a worthwhile feature for those who go into harm's way and don't want to risk having to unscrew a tailcap under fire. But the rest of us will probably want to take the batteries out before dropping it into pocket or pack.
The protrusive rear switch is smooth and very responsive. A light touch activates momentary-on, while a firmer push gives constant-on. The click point between the two is barely audible and not aggressive, so there is the chance of accidentally switching into constant-on when you only meant to flick the light on for a brief moment. That could be a very nasty surprise at just the wrong moment.
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Coast's two new dive light offerings, the Micro Triplex Dive Torch and Micro Powerchip Dive Torch, are closely-related cousins. Both lights have the same overall appearance, dimensions, and weight. Both are tested waterproof to 60 meters. Both feature bodies made of blink-your-eyes bright yellow polymer, with bezels made of stainless steel. The brightly-colored bodies mean that despite their handy size, there should be no trouble finding one of these flashlights when you're rummaging through the tent looking for a light source in the pre-dawn hours, while the stainless bezels provide a good heat sink with excellent underwater durability.
What's different? Triplex, the more affordable cousin, runs three white LEDs, all 1/3-watt Nichias, set in a cloverleaf pattern. Coast's cloverleaf reflector system gives a decently bright, wide beam for the modest 25-lumen output.
Powerchip Dive Torch provides a lot more light, some 45 lumens, using a 1.25-watt Luxeon LumiLED focused through a prism reflector. Cost is roughly twice that of the Triplex, but you get nearly twice the light as well.
These are affordable but well-made lights, a little large for every day pocket carry, but decent enough for dropping into a day pack or boating kit. Worth a look if you need a submersible light.
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Cyclops' Orion is a different take on the hat-clip LED light. Rather than featuring the typical quarter-sized single spotlight, Orion provides a flood effect by spreading three LEDs across the brim of a baseball cap.
The switch is a simple on/off clicky, mounted on the top of the body.
The lightweight body, shaped to fit the curve of a ballcap brim and powered by coin-cell batteries, feels tough for its size. Though made of plastic (errr, "polymer") rather than metal, its fastener clips don't have any moving parts and fit quite securely on the brim of the demo cap. Orion doesn't have a tilt feature, and in the brightly-lit SHOT Show environment, it is hard to tell how much spread the LEDs are giving so no way to assess whether that's critical or not.
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EGear, claiming to be makers of the world's smallest headlamp, the tiny EQ (which we reviewed last year), were showing several new products this year.
First, Safe-Light, a squarish little light, includes a removable belt clip with a magnet on the back side. Powered by a single 9-volt alkaline battery with a projected runtime of 20 hours on high, the beam is wide-angle and fairly diffuse -- making this a pretty good reading under the covers light. If you recall the PAL lights, this is a similar concept.
The light cycles up through three modes: low, high, and blink. There's also an extremely dim "always on" feature which allows the light to be found on a dark night. "Always on" uses so little power that it will run for up to two years.
Changing the batteries requires a screwdriver or at least a quarter. Good thing you won't have to get into the battery pack that often.
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Snake Light powers a one-watt Luxeon LED with a single lithium CR123A battery. If it didn't have the integral foot-long flex cable, the body of the light would look and feel like a typical tactical light, with a tailcap on/off switch and a sturdy pocket clip. With the cable, it can be worn draped around the neck like a doctor's stethoscope, or flexed to put the light where you need it if you're working in a confined space.
The head throws the light through a reflector system, and gives a bright beam with some side spill.
Overall, the light's construction feels solid and as though it would hold up to some abuse.
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EGear's version of the 1-Watt Dive Light, waterproof to 100 feet, features a selector switch enabling the user to turn the light on and lock it on -- or turn it off and lock it off. It's got three brightness settings, at 30, 15, and 8 lumen respectively, and a blink mode. When first turned on, the light is at full brightness. You must cycle past bright, medium, and low settings to turn the light back off again. For blink, hold the switch down for a few seconds.
Construction feels sturdy enough, though even with good materials it seems possible that the lockout switch could get snagged on things and perhaps broken, because as you can see from the pictures, it protrudes noticeably from the light body.
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EGear's PDL series of tactical lights feature deeply crenelated bodies, scalloped bezels, and rubberized tailcap switches. Mini-PDL sports a tailcap switch which protrudes noticeably, while PDL's switch is nearly flush with the tail end. Other than that minor difference, the lights' external styling approaches the identical.
Mini-PDL, powered by a single CR123A lithium battery, drives a 3 watt Luxeon LED at a very bright 80 lumens over a 2-hour burn time. At 3.75 inches long, it fits across the palm of an average-sized hand. Because it is so tiny, its defense-styled scalloped bezel really can't be considered terrifically useful as a strike surface, but it does look cool.
PDL, longer, but not thicker than its little brother, runs the same 3 watt Luxeon LED at the same 80 lumens, but because it uses two CR123A lithium batteries to do it, the runtime becomes three hours rather than two.
Both lights use an aluminum faceted reflector, and produce a smooth white beam through a polycarbonate lens. They are water-resistant, but not waterproof. Like many tactical lights, PDL series lights have no provision for locking the light off; if you drop them into your pack, you can expect them to get bumped on and run the batteries down.
| SHOT Show 2006 Report - LED Flashlights (click to continue to next page) |
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 | SELECT AND USE OUTDOORS AND SURVIVAL EQUIPMENT, SUPPLIES AND TECHNIQUES AT YOUR OWN RISK. Please review the full WARNING & DISCLAIMER about information on this site. |
Contributing Editor: Kathy Jackson
Email: Kathy Jackson
Publisher and Editor: Doug Ritter
Email: Doug Ritter
URL:
http://www.equipped.org/shot_show_2006_LED_flashlights-1.htm
First Published: February 26, 2006
Email to: info@pulvertech.com
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