After looking at it more closely, it seemed that the middle of the button was bulging up a bit. I nipped maybe a 1mm from the boot post that contacts the button and everything is laying flat now. This seemed to fix the problem as I can't recreate the slant anymore. Thanks for the tips!
By the way, the actual button looked to be centered just fine.
akovia, good news! Thanks.
JIGHEADWORM big fan of this tint as well.
I don’t have real bright 219C lights to compare, all my high cri lights are not very bright.
Who has button top batteries in stock in the US? I usually buy from liionwholesale but they are out of stock on a bunch of them. Not sure who else to trust for authentic cells.
In the manual, whats the difference between #1 Locator led and #3 Indicator led and what does battery level Indicator do?
- Locator led works when the light is off, to locator the switch button in the night.
- Battery level indicator works with 3 clicks and indicates the voltage of the batteries with flashes of the XP-L leds or switch leds when the battery indicator is on. Example: flash 3 times and then 6 times to indicate 3.6V.
- Indicator led option is for turn on previous actions for the switch leds or turn off completely so the switch it never lights up.
My Q8 came yesterday (from the second batch). This thing is smaller than I expected. The battery tube is about the same diameter as my Meteor M43. The ramping UI might be my favorite flashlight UI I’ve used. One thing that really impressed me is the throw. It’s noticeably farther than the Meteor’s, which is nice because I often find myself having to run back to the house to grab a thrower if I need to scare off coyotes that are just out of reach of the meteor.
Just as an update, the package was never delivered to me though, the tracking number said ‘delivered’. I’ve just messaged banggood hoping for the best, but assume this will end up as a dispute. 
{Shipping address is to a freight forwarder. Banggood left out my box number and printed the street part of the address twice. The freight forwarder didn’t receive the light, and have checked multiple times over the last two weeks. ). After a over a year of waiting, this happens. Grrrr…
Nasty eebowler, hope you sort it out
This is actually very interesting with so many orders we get a good idea how things are going.
How much would have been arrived by now? First lost package if I’m not mistaken.
[quote=patmurris]
The only visible imperfection that someone pointed out earlier are some machining marks in the bezel gaps. You really have to look for them.
I now have all three of my Q8’s. Last two are perfect! I quoted the above, as I had not read it previously, but how is this for an insane coincidence:
My first Q8, if you really squint & look has a single machine mark on the bezel “valleys”. My second Q8 has two faint machining marks and Q8 #3? Three machining marks. This inadvertent barely visible Mark gave me an easy way to distinguish and tell them apart(important as I begin modding them. I have brass screws on order to replace in light 1, wire and new Springs from Mtn Electric to solve the “bump” disconnect in all three, and 1/4” D ring attachments for Lanyard use. My gratitude to the entire team for a job well done! Having been involved in projects that are done by volunteers, I think the “Talent pool” for the Q8 has done an incredibly professional job. The minor items that have been reported all seem to result from parts that were different than those originally specified or by changes made that were not approved or expected by the team. And yet I truly believe by the time the next 1500 lights have been delivered , those with issues will be significantly an inconsequential number(to those who have had problems please understand I do not mean to say your issues don’t matter-I am well aware of the disappointment when waiting a long time for a product you spent your hard earned money for and it does not perform as expected), I am saying I think the numbers will be relatively small.
I have participated in a number of BLF designed purchases, but this is my most loved to date. The NarsilM is by far my favorite UI to date( I have an Emisar D1, D4 and D4VN on order as it too uses NarsilM. I would love to give a shout out to each and every person involved, but because I would probably miss someone and inadvertently offend them instead I say “Thank You” for a job well done. To The Miller, I do wish to single you out because it takes someone with the patience of Job, the wisdom of Solomon and then some to work with the team on one hand, the customer base on another and the ability to read thousands of posts and getting all the right info to the right people, soothe the unhappy, accept those who are happy and yet you never complained. And we all still have Giggles and other lights still in the pipeline…all of the above could have been said with two words “THANK YOU!”
I received my Q8 yesterday. I haven’t bought any high drain cells for it. I’m not even sure that I will. I had some Samsung laptop pulls charged up and they work well enough for me. I don’t have a light box, and it’s not a thrower, so absolute brightness just doesn’t matter to me. 
I gave the Q8 a quick glance over, but didn’t dig too much or take anything apart. My switch LEDs seem to be working fine. I’ll check again in a while and let you know if that changes. They are equal in brightness, and the green glow is very pretty. My reflector is well centered, and everything looks quite clean. I do have machining marks in all three grooves of the bezel. I may try to file and polish them out some time, but for now, I’m not worried. If all my attempts to grind/polish the grooves eventually fail, I’ll just grind the whole thing down to a FOY bezel. 
I do have an older SRK to test against. It was a modded 3-LED version with a Mountain Electronics AMC7135-based driver and always-on blue side switch LED. I won it from a CRX giveaway. He’s the one that made all the modifications. It has genuine XML emitters. The finish is glossier than the Q8. I like the look and feel of the Q8 anodizing better. The Q8 is a tiny bit shorter in length. The reflector of the modded 3X looks cloudy compared to the Q8 reflector, although it had always looked shiny enough to me before! The modded one has the battery tube with lanyard slots/holes on all four sides. I never noticed that being uncomfortable to me, until I held it in one hand with the Q8 in the other. My wife held them both as well, and she’s actually the one who mentioned that difference. She’s also the one who noticed the Q8 is a bit heavier. The rubber switch boot on the Q8 is a lot easier to find by feel and to use than the flush, smooth, hard button cap on the modded 3X. And, finally, the output of the Q8 completely blows away what this conservatively regulated SRK driver in the 3X can deliver.
Overall, I’m very happy with the Q8. I’m surprised at how much more I like it than the SRK. CRX is a master flashlight modder and builder. He made this SRK much, much better than it ever would have been. I appreciate all the work he put into it. But, the BLF Q8 is a huge upgrade, thanks to Thorfire and the Q8 Team. Thanks again guys!
P.S. Checking again just now: The switch LEDs are still looking good. I opened up the battery tube and the tail cap, and all the screws are pan head Phillips. I don’t see any flaws in the anodizing. It looks really good. The bottom of the tripod mount hole looks like it might have a tiny bit of swarf left in it, or the thread wasn’t cut clean at the very end/bottom. Whatever it is, it’s been anodized. It doesn’t look like it will ever be a problem, anyway. The battery tube doesn’t index with the head. But, I’d probably not have noticed that if it hadn’t already been brought up a couple times here. As far as I can tell, it’s a very well made light. :partying_face:
An upgrade to the old bedside light
So the D4Vn uses NarsilM? And not the D4 UI v2? Does he flash it onto the Vn versions?
I am sorry, but the Emisar Lamps don’t use NarsilM.
- There are no normal MODES
- Tom derived the UI from an older version of Narsil and Toykeeper added things later
FYI the Samsung 30Qs are back in stock at Liion.
Mine came today finally. This thing is a beast. Biggest light I own sadly but more than Ill ever actually need.
Thing is rediculously bright too.
No quality issues have been noticed yet.
Noticed yhe tripod mount hole on the bottom, Ill find a use for that :p. Think I have a handlebar mount for my bikes that can hold it!
Nice work to the team that made this light happen, hats off for the incredible efforts put in!
FedEx has decided that my 1st Q8 needed a sleepover in Sweetwater, TX. Perhaps this will guarantee me a smooth mellow beam. Who knows?
The Emisar lights use a UI called RampingIOS.
For the seriously anal retentive (I am not at liberty to disclose my source) you may want to take out the rear end board (oops, sort of back part) and use a little very fine emery paper on the drilled/threaded holes. There are little bitty pieces of metal sticking up from the threading process. A very short burnishing removes them. Theoretically that could maybe possibly improve current flow.
I have the same marks on the bezel as mentioned above. It rather looks like maybe a programmer started the retraction of the machining blade a bit too soon. It looks sort of like a wave function from something oscillating (stepping up). I don't really care.
My approach to simple tuning is probably going to be something like this. Clean any trash (there is very little) out of the grooves with my wife's toothbrush (that is confidential information). Remove the rear PCB, hone the tops of the threaded holes a bit, and apply Stabilant to all the conducting surfaces. I am thinking I might just add a bit of solder to the base of the springs before I apply the Stabilent. On top, the surfaces are in excellent condition and clean. Same approach as the rear. Catch the toothbrush when she is not using it and clean the threads. Knock off any irregularities on the top edge of the tube with the aforementioned very fine paper. Lubricant as yet not selected. Tungsten Disulfide in the Buckyball form is my lubricant of choice; but it is so messy. Clean and treat the contact surfaces on the tube and PCB with Stabilant. From what I can tell that should double the output.