what does impact rating mean?

i know its how far of a drop it can handle! but on what surface?

It doesn’t mean anything. If you care then you need to buy a quality light.

on concrete, minimum 1 Meter increasing in 1 Meter increments, each light dropped 6 times from the specified height in different orientations. I think multiple (3?) lights are supposed to be tested. Each light is off with batteries and accessories installed when dropped - light(s) must function after drop with no cracks.

manufacturers who list ANSI impact ratings of 1.5 M are fake (should be in 1 M increments).

Concrete, according to ANSI FL1.

I think there should be a laundry rating;-) Multiple Thrunites have passed that rating for me. Granted the Ti3s don’t have much mass for the impact part… Still can’t believe that I heard my TH20 banging around in the dryer and didn’t realize what all the racket was :wink: All that banging and the heat yet I still don’t see any affect on the LADA and the light functions perfectly. Lots of nicks etc but IIRC few to none from the dryer incident. Only rated to a meter but from my experience far more robust than that.

Seems like an interesting problem to me. How do you maintain impact resistance while providing a solid thermal path to the metal that is impacted?

It’s mostly about the glass and bezel.

The battery is a killer. A good spring will take a lot of energy when the light falls onto the bezel.

“Impact Rating” is how high a light can drop onto a fluffy pillow and not take any damage. :stuck_out_tongue:

… at least that’s how I think manufacturers test their lights. If they test them at all.

In general, the answer would be “absolutely nothing”.

Depends on where it hits (top, side, corner, etc.), and a brazillion other factors, as well as pure luck.

I had a TK4A go boom just tipping over onto a laptop, ie, not even “falling” anywhere. But I’ve also had cheapcrap lights fall off the patio onto concrete and still work fine.

people interested in High Impact rating look for Potted Lights such as Malkoff and HDS. And generally other lights sold for mounting on a gun tend to be potted, to cope with the recoil better.

the Fenix E01, and some colors of the Sofirn C01 are also potted…

I believe Zebras are also potted.

I do not know if the Emissar lights are potted… my guess is no.

ty everyone as a i age i drop stuff more often as a young man i never ever droped anything. they say my nitecore has a 2 meter drop rating i just wish it thru further but it puts out 4400 lumens