[PART 1] Official BLF GT Group Buy thread. Group buy officially closed! Lights shipping.

:smiley: …. That’s good! … :+1:

I’m glad you’re rolling with the punches Jerommel. You obviously have much goodness to contribute here and I applaud you for plugging on. 5ar stepped in and blew us all out of the water with his renderings but you persevere. Bravo!

If there is any place where “amazing” isn’t accepted as a good enough, it is this wonderful forum. :student:

BLF is the place where all flashlight dreams (and questions) have a voice. :+1:

There are a whole lot of Philistines GT enthusiasts that want to see what you have to say. :beer:

Can I be a Philistine and still like ice cream on my apple pie?

Yep, but only if it is vanilla.
That is rule #17 in the handbook, Things I Need to Know to Be a Philistine

:wink:

Well, DUH! I’m a Texan, that means Homestyle Vanilla with Vanilla Bean from Blue Bell, the best ice cream in the world. :stuck_out_tongue: (only right now I am told I cannot have the ice cream, or cheese, or even chew a Tums for this heartburn, as I’m on antibiotics for an ear infection that would bind to the calcium and not be efficient for my system. EGAD!)

So I’m a practicing Cushian at the moment. Horrendous, I know.

There is a certain glee in shining a 7000 lumen TM16 out in the field and showing my 4 yr old 100 lb Labrador where the Jack Rabbits are. He races out after them like he fully believes he can catch them, and is not the least bit despondent to return empty handed. He loves the chase! Tonigh he was completely oblivious to the fox trotting off away from him at some 40 yds while he tried to figure out how to get under a tight barbed wire fence after the Jack Rabbit that got away. Crazy dog.

Your interest is much appreciated. I've got long term plans for various parts of it as I'm quite attached to it for various reasons. It's not really viable in it's current design. It's so crazy front heavy that it would take a real hoss to yield for any length of time. Plus, what emitter and current can really fully utilize 3" of LED Shelf that is 5" in diameter. I really have no idea what I was thinking at the time.

OP updated
and PMMING 5ar with:

OK 5ar, lots of input:

5ar could you make one with the more and thinner fins? (As I so crudely drawn see below, for fins, height, size and general idea pics from several GT posts)

Now there are 8 anti roll cutouts, please widen them but make it 7 (yes uneven for alignment reasons so not 6)

Then while your are at it, get rid if the ledge Thijsco speaks of.

Finally make transition from the widest part to narrow smooth (see my crude insult of a drawing :wink: )

I strongly think it will all come together and by smoothen the anti roll section also much closer to Jerommels design. All happy and even better cooling, can’t have enough of that.
Also design less L6 or TN42 so more own, important down the road

Please indulge me :wink:

Just a quick question on the side:
If Acebeam K70 has no “magic touch” on the led and driver, what theoretical output in lumen and candela could that flashlight have made??

Maybe a new led perhaps, dedoming, and tweaked up the amp’s would really make that flashlight to “shine”…I belive.
Or not??
(It has already 427.5kcd and a reach of 1300 meters…)

Made an design myself, based on the original render of 5ar but cleaner and more fins.
Has only 6 cut outs on the head. fins are 3mm thick, 4 deep and 2mm apart.

Nice work.

A little plain for my tastes but I could live with it if I had to.

I do much prefer the shape of the GT head. The strong taper to the handle isn’t doing it for me. It just seems like it needs something in all that empty space, all I can think when looking at it is, “something is missing” but I can’t quite put my finger on what it is…

Could just be me though.

One thing that is “missing” is the lanyard/strap attachment point.

Other than that it is nice and clean.
Not sure how I feel about it yet, still sipping coffee as I think about it; but nice work ‘thijsco19’. :+1:

The TN31 used to be the throw king when fully modded, highest throw about 590 kcd, maybe 610 kcd, and it has a 79 mm head diam, but that was with a dedomed XM-L2 U2. The K70VN did 570 kcd max, though bigger head diam at 88 mm, but only using the stock XHP35 HI LED. I did some searching and can't find any mods to the K70 to really push it's limits - maybe it's not an easy light to fully mod, like the TN31 was, or maybe the reflector design is not the best for max throw - dunno.

The Fenix TK61 when fully modded gets up there, as high as 770 kcd, here: http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?417181-TK61vn-NOW-AND-THEN, but with vinh, he cherry picks LED's and we modders really don't know all that much about what he is doing. I don't think anyone else achieved those results, or even close with a TK61. The TK61 has a 96 mm head diam, close to the TN42 @100 mm.

Of course today, the TN42 is "the" thrower to use as a mod platform to experiment with because of it's size (head diam), but we don't really know how it will perform with a dedomed XPL for example.

Yeah, I caught that, I figured he just have not got around to that yet.

Still, it is too much flat empty space, my brain says something should be there.

People do not experiment with the TN42 because it is too expensive. First of all not many pieces are sold, and people that have dedicated 200$ for a light don’t really want to gamble on ruining it. That is why we need a good host with a decent size reflector. Like this BLF project. If TN42 was sold as a host it should cost 35-45$ and you would have seen much better projects with XPL dedome, and ultimately with XPG2 dedomed and a MNT 5.5A driver. But at 200$… Not so much.

If we succeed in this project the mods will be a lot more numerous, I assure you. :wink:

Thanks for the answer Tom E! Much Appreciated :smiley:

Indeed, havent got around to make it. Also, there is no bezel on it now, haven’t made it yet.

I agree, it’s very clean and smooth. It looks like it missing something. Though, I really wouldn’t know what you can add in between. Maybe when tweaking the dimensions/proportions it will look better.

Just don’t understand…IMHO :wink:

Is the 5ar/first design so crappy that some of us want to sit hours in front of a pc and work with a completely “new” design, that still needs much more input than the first/original design??
I don’t get it……

Most of us (as I can see it) think that just tiny-tiny changes on 5ar’s first render is what we want/need…and our work really needs to be done on other things. (Reflector/manufacturer)

By all means, it’s awsome to see other peoples design skills/propositions, but then we have to go to post #4, to have a closer look.
Bechause what is wrong with that render (except for small changes that is mentioned in post #1307)?? :slight_smile:

What is not to get about folks wanting a product to look good?
Also, the topic title at the moment indicates it is now about just that.
So frankly, what i don’t get is why people seem to want to stick to 5ar’s design, which i.m.o. should be considered preliminary as well.
There are definitely some design (aesthetic) issues between the battery tube and the bezel in 5ar’s design, so we try to solve this.
Either by proposing new looks or adapted looks.
I think that’s a good thing.
It’s how cars, furniture, you name it, are produced too.
You make some designs that look good, and then you figure out how to manufacture it and / or adapt it to specific needs.

5ar’s renders on left, both top & bottom photos… thijsco19’s on the right.
I thought it would be easier to compare if they were side by side. It is for me anyway. :wink:


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Take a new look at post #1307 !
seem to be a forgotten post…….