My buddy has a real SRK and the UV-S5 as well as the fast tech SRK, both his S5 and f/t SRK are modded and better than the original SRK, in light output terms, I know this is missing the point, just saying all is not lost with these lights if as standard the clones are not as good.
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Can you post the mods please?
>>>>> buy one black SRK from FFL and gold from Hkequipment, and you
>>>>>>will have good ones to compare and understand what is good
>>>>>> and what is bad. price is good
Many thanks to member Stan Marsh. I ordered from hkequipment and got what is NO DOUBT a REAL SRK. SOOPER fast shipping also. Got here in one week!!! Came in a great box with cut foam. Sky ray king sticker on the outside. Tightly woven lanyard, not the bigger knitted one. REAL logo. Directions included in Chinese. Extra o ring.
I have another srk bought on ebay 3-4 months ago that works fine, but I think it is a fake. It is a couple mm taller than the HKequipment SRK (being taller is described on BLF as being in the first round of “fakes”) and has some VERY sharp cooling fins and a couple dicey areas of anodizing. Also it does NOT heat up. The new one heats up VERY quickly, as described in many posts. It is slightly brighter than the “fake” (whatever a fake is) and has a much-more pronounced spot. The fake is all flood, no spot.
REAL CNQG-style logo. Fake is much smaller and is already wearing off. (I’m using the word “fake” here to decsribe the “other” SRK. In reality, it works just fine. Has a few idiosyncracies (sp), but I was very happy with it. The real SRK is slightly better though, I think.)
There are also subtle differences. The reflector in the real one has a larger ridge around the edge. The button is raised more and feels more substantial (still rattles though). Color is very slightly different. Bezel may be very very very slightly magnetic. No magnet attraction on the fake.
So Stan Marsh is right: Want a real one, go to hkequipment. And as another member pointed out and I agree, the first versions of ANY Chinese light seem to be the best. Soon after I got my HD2010 (one of the first), more BLFers started reporting discrepencies. So I could be completely utterly wrong …. But when hkequipment is sold out of this batch, will there be no more real ones? I have been watching the various BLF SRK threads for months and have not seen any chatter on a reliable source for real SRKs besides HKequipment.
The only downside is that I CANNOT get the tailcap off the real SRK. It ain’t budging. Any ideas for a tool to get it off? Already tried a cap twister and it almost broke the cap twister. Not a big deal I suppose. No reason to go under that back cap, but it would be nice to get it off.
I received the skyray from FancyFlashlights today... still at work so haven't fired it up.
Two major difference do stand out immediately... the finish on the skyray from FT is more glossy, and the bezel appears to be aluminium.
On the one from FF the bezel appears to be stainless steel. The anodize finish is more flat/matte.
Another difference is that the LEDs on the one from Ric are perfectly centered. I mean exactly, precisely, perfect. There might be a .2mm shift on one LED, but the centering is superior to what I have seen versus just about any light of any price. - It's really rather impressive to me :p
The machining seems to be the same, although it's possible the edges on the FT one are a little sharper, I'll compare tonight.
Of the three I own, a gold one from manafont, a black from FT, and a black from FF, the gold one from manafont is the lowest in terms of quality.
The differences between the FT one and the one from Ric, are fairly minor imo. I have two more from fasttech coming right now... I think for the price you do get a fantastic light.
>>>>>Another difference is that the LEDs on the one from Ric are perfectly centered.
Yeah they are also perfectly centered on the “real” SRK. The clone, not so centered. Not bad, but not perfect, just like you decscribe.
My black SRK from Fasttech died today. It’s only been used for around 20 minutes in total, never left the house, and after 5 mins on low today it flickered a few times and then died, never to work again.
Time to RMA it….
That suxxx. Was going to get a black one from FT to compliment my super nice bright Fandyfire I got from them…but not now. Quality is suspect.
So from what I’ve been reading, FastTech’s UV-S5 is a rebranded SRK and the SRKs that they carry are just copies?
I’ve read good things about the Fandyfire UV-S5. I’ve told them I want one as a replacement for the faulty SRK.
ALL of them are copies, or copies of other copies. The 'genuine' one isn't called Sky Ray anything, it's called a Nitecore TM-11 and you can get 3-4-5 of the copied versions for the cost of one real original genuine one.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending Nitecore - especially after the recent dust-up over their price fixing manipulation - all these copies and demand for the cheaper knock-offs should give Nitecore a blatant in-your-face sign that their prices are too high, no matter how nice or fancy their original version is.
If given the choice, would you take a genuine Nitecore TM-11 'Basic' version, without the bling like the lighted switch battery indicator, locator beacon, and switch-operated lockout mode and all the rest, and pay $70-80 for it, versus $50 for a copy-of-a-copy-of-a-copy made by nobody knows who? I probably would. But I just ordered a gold UV-S5 from FastTech (the $45 version - there are even two different versions of just the UV-S5!), because the option of an affordable model that does only the things I need isn't available from the folks who originally designed the dang thing.
And a lot of all this copying mess can be put at the feet of the formerly-U.S. based manufacturing companies, as well. Chasing the last dollar they ship their factories off overseas, then in the middle of the night some dude walks out the back door with all their engineering documents and sells them to somebody who plans to churn out boatloads of cheap copies with virtually zero accountability or responsibility as to the quality. They did it to themselves, I don't feel one bit sorry for them getting hammered by these cheap knockoffs.
I remember an old story about Henry Ford and Walter Reuther (union organizer) walking through one of Ford's factories... Henry says "One day, Walter, all this will be replaced by machines." Walter says "Yes Henry, but then who will buy your cars?"
I have been using both my fandyfire UV-S5 and the SRK both from fasttech to light my sitting room, both have been used till the batteries have cut out, or gone flat, I fall asleep with them on low.
Not a hint of trouble from either one, they have each been used on HIGH maybe 8-10 times now for 45 minutes or so, again no trouble at all.
I did notice that when charged with my new Ultrafire WF128 charger again from fasttech that the lights seem brighter than the other chargers, WF129, and another brand.
I wouldn’t hesitate to buy either light again, depending on what tint color you prefer, I’m getting to really like the cooler tint of the SRK now, hated it at first!!
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Just thought I’d share this for those who have a SRK with low output and don’t end up sending it back-
Last night I re-wired from the driver to the lights using a heavier guage wire (the stuff mine came with was as thin as a hair), plus added a copper plate to the end of the battery holder between the springs and circuit board, it now measures 7.8amps at the tailcap (previously just over 4), and also now gets damm hot after 20mins! 8)
No changes other than attention to detail on the contact points and wire gauge? Wow!
That plate with the springs is down in the bottom of the battery holder, right? (I haven't seen one in person, mine's not here yet)
No other changes (apart from a spacer to raise the driver board as it wasn’t making proper contact with the battery tube), was plesantly surprised myself with the jump in brightness. I really only tried it as I had nothing to lose if I mucked it up as the output originally was terrible.
Yes the plate with springs is at the bottom of battery holder, if you screw off the very end cap of the holder there are just four screws holding it in.
Excellent Mod!
Those springs are just screaming at me to be braided. 
You should add copper braid to those springs to see if it gets an additional boost.
Thanks relic38, what do most people use for copper braid- or where to get some?
I did consider doing what you suggest using some Goot desoldering braid, but it didn’t seem very conductive when I prodded it with the multimeter.
I use desoldering braid, and it makes a big improvement. To test it, you may need to solder it to something. There is a thin rosin coating on it that can interfere with probe measurement. That, or Goot is using something other than copper in their braid.
I clipped on to mine (Chemtronics Soder-Wick, 2.0mm wide) and putting 3 Amps through 5” of it yields 17mV. Basically a dead short.
You can also use plain wire, if it's flexible enough. Run it down thru the middle of the spring, and solder it to the top & bottom coil. When the spring compresses the wire will just go slack and scrunch down a little.
Solder braid has to have the flux washed out first. And maybe everybody knows this already, but if not, the braid is actually a round tube that's squashed flat. Open it up with a sharp scribe at the clean-cut end and it'll expand out so it can be fed onto the coils of the spring.
Well, I took the new HKequipment “real” SRK and the 4-month old ebay SRK “clone” out for an extended comparison tonight and found them to be almost equal performance wise. (I desribed the new “real” SRK more fully earlier in this thread.)
Besides some VERY minor cosmetic diffs (clone is a couple mm taller; few dicey spots of annodizing, sharpish cooling fins, slightly different logo), both seemed to be almost completely equal in brightness. MAYBE the clone is a hair floodier, but it also may be a hair brighter. The “real” srk gets hotter, which isn’t exactly a plus since the clone seems to pack the same brightness.
After all the pros and cons I read of fakes vs real, I expected to be blown into the stratosphere by increased performance in the “real” SRK. Didn’t happen.
If I had to choose between the two, I would take the “real” one. But I would be completely happy with the clone. In fact, if I had known how the two are nearly identical in performance and quality, I would have not bought the “real” SRK.
I know that others have had some real clone performance probs, but I guess that I have lucked out, ending up with TWO great SRKs.
chop some coaxial cable :D