5C Defiant XM-L 625 Lumens at Home Depot

Yeah, I just got one. First impressions are that it is not very mod friendly, I can easily access the LED, reflector, and lens, but so far I have been unsuccesful in getting to the driver.

scaru, can you confirm any Lego-ability between this and the ST?

No legoability what so ever, and this one is a PIA to get apart, f*cking thread locker!

Bummer on the legolessness. Thank you very much scaru for taking the risk to purchase and then reporting back to us.

So if you torched or baked to cause the plastic in the thread lock to melt, would the ano likely change color? I havenā€™t tried to open a thread lock light yet.

:frowning:
I was hoping ST reflector would fit. Well, at least this ought to throw with an XP-G2 on copper.

No, not even close (I'll grab a picture comparing the two and post it later tonight)

You don't need to heat it up, you just need use a lot of force, I put it in a clamp and then used vice grips on the other part (which I clamped a 2 foot steel bar to for extra leverage).

iā€™d like to see someone try acetone

I reckon bathing it in acetone may cause a plastic melt down. The head assembly is glued on there with the best of them. This torch is led swappable and thatā€™s about it.

I bought one of these today. Over the past few weeks, I have acquired the 3C 490 lumen Defiant Super Thrower as well as the ArmorMax 3D 590 lumen Defiant light.

The new 625 lumen 5C Tactical Defiant light clearly outclassed the other two in a brightness test on my ceiling, and has only a little less throw than either of them.

Surprisingly, the 590 lumen ArmorMax has the greatest throw out of the three, leaving the Super Thrower in second place (very close) and the new 5C a close third. But in brightness and output power, the new 5C tactical rules here, leaving the 3D ArmorMax in second and the Super Thrower last in brightness.

I am extremely impressed by the Defiant line and exceptionally blown away by this new supremely powerful 5C monster. I have been collecting LED lights for 5 years and it is by far the brightest, highest-output flashlight of any sort that I have found at a retail market offline (spotlights donā€™t count). My favorite choice for a belt-holster EDC.

Pictures of these lights to come within the next two days. I willl be posting a comparison of the three Defiant big guns shortly. Just wanted to tell about my experience and impressions of this light since it is so new and untested, as well as how it compares to the others.

Welcome to BLF! Thanks for your impressions although I can't see either of the other two beating the super thrower.

-Garry

Thanks for your input UltimateLED and welcome to the forum.

Have you gone through the lights and fixed the potential high resistance points. I only have experience with the DST out of the 3 you reference. It makes sense that the ceiling bounce would be less. Throwers donā€™t do well in that test. I would expect the DST to out throw the other 2 lights by a decent margin though. It could be that your DST has a high resistance point or two. There are a lot of connection points for electricity to cross in that light.

ā€¦ā€¦

itā€™s possible especially if worn alkaline cells were used in the DST during a comparison. They have a long taper in voltage unlike NiMH cells, whose voltage falls off a cliff after dropping below 1.1V.

Defiant 5C (top) and 3C (bottom)

You can see the length difference.

Reflector is plastic.

Head apart.

Retainer ring holds reflector in.

As best as I can see, the hunk of aluminum the emitter sits on looks pretty substantial (I canā€™t be certain without taking it apart).

Unlike other unfortunate BLF members, the head was incredibly easy to unscrew from the battery tube, as there was a minimal amount of loctite.
I took it apart by hand with almost no effort. There was a bit of a grayish substance that sort of looked liked melted plastic on the threads, which Iā€™m guessing is their version of loctite.

Top of battery tube.

Inside battery tube.

The 5th battery sticks out a bit when you put them all in the tube.

Top of spring sits below the threads.

Height comparison.

This should gives you an idea how far the spring sits inside the tailcap.

When I put it back together, I noticed the retaining ring wasnā€™t quite pressed into the slot cut inside the body of the battery tube.
A little push with a screwdriver fixed it in seconds, you might want to double check it if you can get the head off (this picture is after I fixed it).

The lights were sitting in a display in the front of the store, in the big aisle that runs in front of the cash registers. I practically had to call in Indiana Jones to dig up a Defiant 3C, so Iā€™m betting the 5C is supposed to be on display in all the stores now.

Nice report Strict9. Thank you. Have you used it outside yet? If yes, how would you compare it to a stock DST?

Not yetā€¦

Well this is interesting. I thought it was flickering a bit earlier.
I turn it on after itā€™s been sitting a bit. It is flickering.
Turn it on off a couple times andā€¦ no flickering.

I have a Sunwayman that does the same thing (M40C) when in medium brightness mode. It will flicker for a few seconds until it warms up a bit, and then stabilize, and stop flickering.
I had returned that light for a replacement; only to find the 2nd light does the exact same thing.

Okay. Leave the 5C sitting a few minutes, turn it onā€¦ it flickers. Immediately turn it off/on again, and the flickering stops.
Iā€™ll experiment some more, it seems somewhat random.

I picked up a 2nd one, that I was going to offer to any BLF members that live overseas and really wanted one.
Iā€™m going to try that one, and report back whether or not it has the same habit.
I think this one is going back to Home Depot tomorrow.

reminds me of the solarforce gladiator a bit

No flickering on the 2nd light :slight_smile:
I returned the faulty one at a different Home Depot (there are two locally, and I was closer to the the 2nd store); that store also had the lights on display in the front of the store.

I need to find a split-ring pliers big enough to get the reflector off (my Harbor Freight pliers wonā€™t open wide enough), and make a pilgrimage to Surplus Shed next weekend to see what kind of lens options we can play with.

Did I just happen to get unlucky? Or is the 5C not as bright as the 3C?

Regardless, one thing I have to say about ALL of these Defiant lights is that the tint is pretty good. They all seem to be a nice neutral white without any of that infamous ā€˜XM-L Greenā€™ that seems to plague SO many XM-L lights (including MANY that cost LOTS more than these Defiants).

Here is my review of the Defiant big guns as promised. As stated in my first post, the 3D 590 lumen ArmorMax is the best thrower, leaving the Super Thrower a close second and then the 625 lumen 5C Tactical in third/last, but not by a large margin. As far as output/overall brightness goes, the new 5C Tactical rules, with the ArmorMax 3D coming in at second place, and the Super Thrower third.

The 5C is undeniably the brightest and most powerful out of these in all around performance and the current king of all high output super flashlights available at offline stores. I have been collecting LED and HID lights for years and know just about all of the high output lights out there that can be found at regular retail markets such as hardware, sporting goods, etc. stores.

The ArmorMax 3D is the best tubular flashlight style thrower out of them all, and the DST is a really cool light to show off with because it has such a narrow laser-esque beam and looks like it could melt lead in the air. It certainly has the tightest and most narrow beam of the three due to its huge reflector, but the 3D ArmorMax is nearly on par in focus and its greater output allows it to generate more lux and throw even still.

The 5C really shows these two up though as it does outclass them in brightness and is supremely powerful. My humble opinion, of course, that the 5C is the better of these three lights due to being brighter.

Once again just so there are no misunderstandings:

*THROW: 590 lumen ArmorMax 3D > Defiant 490 lumen 3C Super Thrower > New 5C Tactical 625 lumen
*
*OUTPUT: 5C 625 lumen > 3D ArmorMax > Super Thrower
*
Now time for the pics and proof. Iā€™ll just post links to these due to their size as they would skew the display of this page if they were inserted.

The lights (Right to left: 625L 5C, 3D ArmorMax, DST)

http://imageshack.us/a/img515/3451/cam00410.jpg

The reflectors:

http://imageshack.us/a/img248/1346/cam00412.jpg

Defiant Super Thrower:

http://imageshack.us/a/img16/7519/cam00413.jpg

ArmorMax 3D:

http://imageshack.us/a/img835/3923/cam00415.jpg

Tactical 5C 625 Lumen

http://imageshack.us/a/img209/7956/cam00416.jpg

Hope you enjoy the photos and can make a good decision on which one to buy now if you are looking to get a high output LED light. The ArmorMax 3D clearly has a larger yet still brighter hotspot than the DST. The 5C is simply the brightest of the three with a very uniform beam and clearly larger beam divergence than its two counterparts. All three had fresh Energizer alkalines.