Hello all, today I received my Trusfire F20 from DealExtreme. Just wanted to mention my experience... I was pretty irritated at first when I popped in the battery and found that it was flickering and changing modes by itself all the time. Totally useless. I suspected the worst, and was thinking about tossing it, but I decided to give a cleaning first just in case. Good thing I did. I just unscrewed it, and swabbed down all the surfaces I could reach with a cotton swab and toilet paper, no alcohol or cleaning fluid of any sort. And that was all, I put the battery back and haven't seen a flicker or an unwanted mode change yet. It didn't even look all that dirty, but that was the trick.
The light does NOT have mode memory. Worse yet, it always starts in the next mode. The low mode seems quite low. The beam is beautiful. It is very bright. And they just dropped the price to $13.06, after I bought it of course. I'll do a full review next week.
Thanks for the tip, I remember reading that, but I think I left it off for a at least a minute, but no luck. I'm quite thrilled that my cleaning worked though, I can't believe that was so simple.
Cool cant wait for the review buddy. Hows the build quality of the light, i also hate that flickering issue. You should make it a point to clean the light right out of the package.
Just to let you know even lights that cost an arm and a leg need to be cleaned right out of the package.....Dont know if you recall about the Nitecore D10 issues with the switch ring and piston getting stuck because of that sucky blue lube that they used. When i finally got mine i spent some time cleaning it before i devirginized it with a nimh cell...lol.
Huh is that right? It's funny, this light didn't even look dirty. But the difference is just like night and day. If that's all it takes, I can handle it.
Sometimes bits of machining spurs gets in the threads and can cause issues. I make it a point to tighten the switch retaining ring, make sure that the pill is clean and tightened, and clean all the threads with alcohol and relube. I dont care how much the light cost me its just good practice.
Yes, you're right. The problem with the design of the Trustfire F20 / Akoray K-106 / Uniquefire AA-S1 is that it unscrews at the head, not at the tail. So it's hard to get in there with tweezers.
I'm quite happy with it now, thanks for asking. Quite a nice tool for the current price of $13.06. Definitely worth adding to your list. I'll try to review this on Monday.
Something else I just learned, this light model does unscrew at the tail, I can't believe I never noticed until now. The seam is at the very tip of the tail right around the edge. It's actually sort of a pain to unscrew because the clip wants to turn. I'd still recommend to just change the battery by unscrewing the head.
Cool just make sure that the switch is tight and that the inside of the switch boot is clean. Now how about them rechargeables, you must be going through alkies left and right lol.
Sorry man...i'll stop harrassing you about the batts. I like to use the low mode as night lights for the kitchen and the living room.....so when the power goes out im not left in the dark.
Hmmm, it is starting to change modes on me again, it has to do with vibrations. A vigorous shake makes it change modes, or sometimes rotating it makes it change modes. Any ideas if I can salvage this somehow?
I checked it the retaining ring, it feels tight, but it doesn't seem adjustable or lose. It's not a traditional tailcap, it's very thin. The LED module was loose in the head, and I do need to tighten it better into the head, but I don't have any tools fine enough to get into the dimple. But when I shake the light I don't feel the LED module rattle now. I tightened everything and wiped it down again, and it seems good again, but it has me wondering now...
I'll do a full review next week.
But yes, I really should get some rechargeables...