Would you buy a FW3A AR Coated lens ?

You can see the archived poll results on the Wayback Machine:

https://web.archive.org/web/20221220093741/https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/72858

I hope I’m posting this in the right sub. I received my FW3A with the plastic TIR and would like to replace it with a Carclo one + Ar coated lens. However, I didn’t find anyone making an AR Coated lens (Neals sells uncoated sapphire ones). I asked this seller on Aliexpress and he can make custom ones 23*1.5mm if we order quite a few of them : https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32844811460.html?spm=a2g0s.9042311.0.0.75f24c4dkbEfru

AFAIK, this would be the only way to get an AR Coated lens for the FW3A.
Please vote in the poll and I’ll see with the seller if we can make this possible and what would the price be

The seller just responded and told me he would need 500 pieces ordered. That’s way too many sadly.

http://flashlightlens.com/ makes very good lenses. Likely better than stock, so a few users might be willing to buy them as an upgrade. But shipping outside of US is extremely expensive.
Schott Conturan is great sheet glass that you can take to a local glass processing company. A single sheet is way more than 500 lenses but PolarLi got a distributor to cut a single lens for him. I failed to do a similar feat with my distributor but you may have more luck.

Thanks for the recommendations ! I just wish there was a way to get an AR coated lens for around 5 euros. Oh well I guess I’ll have to get the Sapphire one with worst light transmittance then.
The only other way is to ask Simon if he still sells S12A lenses because they should fit in the FW3A. He doesn’t sell any on his Aliexpress shop though.

Also try contacting Neal. He may be able to sell you some real FW3A lenses.
And there’s one more thing you can do - buy a slightly larger lens and file it to size.

Mmm i may have missed something because i was offline for a few monthes and didn't catch up all the post in the FW3A thread when i came back but i ordered a second FW3A from nealsgadget a few days ago and the description still says :

Optic: Standard TIR optics

Lens: Glass with anti-reflective coating

Isn't that true ?

My first FW3A was from the groupbuy and as far as i can see it has the carclo TIR with glass lens

I got mine from Lumintop on Amazon
EDIT: Neals still has original lenses in stock so I’ll be ordering one from him along with a Carclo and other stuff (gotta make the international shipping cost worth it haha)

For a while Lumintop switched a lens manufacturer, but they went back to Carclo.

Ok i missed that one !

Thank you very much !

They do not list the proper size, if they did I would be in for a few of the UCL.

I bought original glass from the Lumintop: abbie@lumintop.com

2*O-rings, 1*glass, total US$4 with the shipping cost

Ask local prescription glasses maker. He can make glass for your torch too.
Mike

Have you tried that? What was the cost?

Yeah, but the OP suggested a group buy. They might be willing to make a run that’s smaller than 500 lenses.

10$

Not bad! Could you write some more? Dimensions? Substrate? Coating?

I just asked for glass with AR coating for TK35 back in a day. No idea what was a size, this light is long gone.
Mike

I see.
In general opticians that make eye glasses have access to very good AR coatings. It should be possible to match UCL2 performance while getting olephobic coating - and it seems that the price may be lower as well (due to expensive shipping of UCL2 to Europe).
I’m going to try this route the next time I need a top notch lens. :slight_smile: