The Manker MK35 has very little actual knurling, but the light is very grippy due to sharp edged deep cut outs on the battery tube and widely spaced cooling fins near the switch. The only light that has ever slipped out of my hand was an Eagtac. Luckily it landed safely on a grassy surface without a scratch. If my MX30L4Cvn and 6XPvn were not such special performers the lack of “grippiness”, much less (eagle)TACTICAL grippiness, would make them undesirable to me.
Interesting, that is exactly the configuration a saw in a photo years ago that made me want to build a 2-cell L2X with a different head and tail. For a long time I tried unsuccessfully to find an A001 head and finally gave up looking.
I’ll bet that Lux-RC 334 light engine was expensive, Lux-RC flashlights are “Sci-fi” looking, I guess they’re custom “one-off” pieces, all sold though!
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Originally I was thinking of putting a triple in mine too, one of the Sportac’s. Now I’m considering one of these XP-L2 Drop-in:
Here is a good idea what an original looks like, click the alternative view picture below and then go up to check the magnified picture to see if yours looks like it…
Yeah mine looks exactly like that, inside and out. Will a standard P60 LED drop-in fit? (I actually don’t have one to try, this is my only P60 type body)
OK thanks, that’s good news I’ll give it a try first.
I’ve also inquired at Solarforce-sales about buying just the L2T head (they used to sell it separately there) I can’t seem to find one anywhere without buying a whole light.
Speaking of aggressive knurling check out Bushnell Pro Series lights. All models from 50 lumen up to current 1500 lumen models. Some serious knurling. But only drawback is that can only be dropped by 1 meter. No typical 2 meter fall.
Yeah those are VERY aggressive! I have a Bushnell pro 350. I posted about it earlier in this thread (posts #7 & #15)
I bought it some time ago (at least a year or two) at a Walmart on a whim, because I liked the look of it and to try it as a host, but I never opened the package until I started this thread and remembered I had it!…. but for a host it’s a no-go, unless you have a lathe to make new internal parts and completely re-work it somehow, internally it isn’t constructed anything like what we’re used to seeing. The tint is horribly cold and bluish but I didn’t plan on using the stock emitter anyhow. They have a real neat mechanical “lock out” feature on the tail, but I didn’t see the need for that on a clicky tail switch light anyway.
Bushnell has since revamped their flashlight line, mostly called “Rubicon” now with smooth bodies. That whole “Pro” series line with the aggressive knurling is discontinued / no longer produced, there’s still a lot of them available on ebay, and a few on Amazon and there’s still a good many in some of the Walmart stores. The 1500lm is harder to find, I think there’s one on ebay. Adventure Sport reviewed the 1300lm, the battery on that one is built in/sealed (non-removable). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kplnVzIQwZQ
Yes there are some 1500 lumen, 800 lumen, and 400 lumen currently still on the market, as well as many of the ones you say are long gone, but all of them are technically discontinued. All of the “Pro” series with that aggressive knurling are out or print/production, they are no longer part of Bushnell’s current lighting line.
Several of the ones you say are long gone are actually still available, including at some Walmart stores. For instance at one Walmart store I was in last week they had at least 5 of the 350lm, and several of the smaller ones including the 50lm. There’s still a few available on Amazon and there’s also plenty of them on ebay, including many of the 50lm, 100lm, 225lm, and 350lm:
Years back when I got mine those were available from many of the usual online sources, I got it for around $20 from an online shop called “TomTop” (tomtop.com) but it’s no longer listed there.
Unlike my clone the Solarforce uses a regular P60 Drop-in, so you can easily swap out the LED/driver with the many different versions that are widely available.