http://flashlight-forums.com/index.php?topic=13795.225
Last time lips posted there was one left in his current stock. Mine may be in the mail tomorrow. I have a FF3 and it is an amazing light, but it gets hot, then kicks into 24W mode after 10 to 15 min. This light handles the heat at 40W much better. You have to know, though, that the 60W is for 3 min burst and to show off the capability. No light comes close to this much power in such a small package.
These 60W runtime is timed (protection to not overheat)?
HID lamps do not damage with heat, right? So I can return in 60W mode after 3 min pass?
I tried to find full specs of this amazing light, but didn’t found
Thanks Tatasal 
The problem though is more the ballast and from a safety aspect, the lithium cells. Also, heat exposure to your cells will shorten their life. But batteries are really pretty cheap. 40W mode is where it’s at, you’re looking at something like 4700 lumens being produced at the capsule on medium. Plus, this isn’t like a multiLED light producing 150k lux, this is more like 450k lux. So you’ll be able to see way further out. Additionally, the color temp is awesome for outdoors and trees look their true color vs cool temp top bin LED lights.
This point of battery its a really problem, but the light reaches whats temperature at medium?
4700lm at 450k lux its a cool enough, great ligh
How convert lux in meters of throw?
Thanks Lawallac
As I mentioned before in one of my earlier posts, you have to own and use one to really know and appreciate what it is capable of. The feared UI is exagerrated and is not as issue for me, the tint is glorious, the brightness, well, if you want something really bright and throws really far, this is it! (this statement is from an owner of a TK70, which is no slouch either)
ANSI calculates beam distance by defining it to the point where peak beam intensity is down to 0.25 lux. To calculate beam distance is pretty simple.
sq rt (peak beam intensity/ 0.25 lux)= max beam distance (m)
so, in this case:
sq rt (450,000lux/ 0.25lux)=Max Beam Distance (m)
sq rt (180,000)= Max Beam Distance (m)
Max Beam Distance= 1341.64 meters
I will be charging my Panasonic NCR-B 3400mah unpro these coming days to be compared to the NCR-PD high-drains which I use now. Based from disharge tests in my hobby charger the high-drains does not sag as much as shown in the digital display of my iCharger and in the laptop graph display when viewed via Logview.
OMG, it’s OVER 1km 
:weary:
So, the info of throw in one site which i viewed was true
But remember seeing something lit up at .25 lux at 1.3km isn’t going to happen without some pretty good optics. But what makes it so awesome is the sheer output capability of the light. I think at the 60W setting it might be in the 6 to 7000 lumen range at the bulb. Even with reflector and lens losses you are still going to be putting around 5000 lumens OTF. It’s unheard of to have that much sheer power in something this size. This is on a very short list of the best flashlights ever.
I gotta remember that formula, thanks
I remember the hotwire days of spending allot of time trying to get those bulbs perfectly centered and aligned. Very hard to get the FF3 bulb exactly perfect the way it’s designed. I imagine they use a jig of some sort at the factory. Some variation exist between lights so some will max out on lux and some will not. It would take some engineering but a focus system could be done on these as all it would take is a very small movement forward or backwards of bulb to give perfect focus and some flood if needed. Maybe down the road!
Looks like price is rising on the FF4 on the www…
I didn’t get the FF4 today, oh well it’ll be here soon enough. I don’t know how useful that little amont of light is at that distance, but that’s what the standard is so we can use it for comparison.
Hey Guys
Some help needed here…
Last night I took my new FF4 out along with my OSTS Modded TN31 (246kcd), first run XM-L version.
I purchased it from flashlight-torch.com.
Trouble is, my FF4 DOES NOT out-throw my TN31? It’s more or less about the same throw as the TN31, it lights up so much more in general, but it does not out-throw it.
I am running Panasonic NCR18650PD’s, fully charged. I made damn sure that I was using the 60W setting, I am using the UI correctly.
It’s just that I have seen pictures of light meter readings for the FF4 showing that it has around 4 times the lux of the Olight X6, so I was expecting it to have more than 246kcd which my TN31 has.
When shining the FF4 around on a target at about 350m (huge tree line on edge of forest) it does not seem to have a defined hot-spot as such, more or less just one huge, and I mean really really huge! wall of light. So to sum up what I’m seeing with my unit - around 240kcd but rather than a ‘hot spot’ like my TN31, it just lights up a stupidly large area, but does not actually out throw the TN31.
The bulb on mine is slightly not straight could this be the trouble? Any ideas ?
Do you have a way of measuring, such as using a lux meter?
Since the FF4’s hotspot is so large, it might not look as throwy when compared to the OSTS TN31.
If you have a smarphone, check out this thread:
Yes I do have a light meter but a friend is borrowing it at the moment, I will have to wait a little then I will post my measurements.
Yeah, sorry for the lack of response.
I’m sure you’re very anxious to get things straight, and we’ll try our best to see what’s going on once you post the readings, cheers!
Great, thanks for that.
I will say that the output is simply incredible. Where the osts tn31 picks out a small defined area, the ff4 illuminates the entire scene from your toes all the way to the target. I’ve never seen anything quite like it
doingoutdoor.com (bill.qiao@163.com) has a new, simplified pre-order scheme on the FF4:
Regular price: $260, shipped.
Pre-order price: $240, shipped. This batch of 20pcs. tentatively expected to be shipped to him July 4, 2013.
http://www.doingoutdoor.com/firefoxes-ff4-hid-flashlight-p-344.html?zenid=7ggjrsjoi01ndiffjipjc5jsl5
I just tried getting the Panasonic NCR-PD cells in my FF4 down to 3.58V each and still can do the 60W mode.
Ok,
received my FF4 from Lips today. I did some measurements using my cheap Lux meter. I am going to have to get something more accurate, but nonetheless it is very constant. Precision but not accuracy. So here goes and remember the FF3 is pretty well accepted to be 220-225k lux. These were taken at 5 meters in the lower level. I hope these do not fall too far out of line.
table(table#posts).
|||24W|40W|60W|
|FF3|||217K LUX||
|FF4||173K LUX|329K LUX|428K LUX|
|OMG MODDED DEFT|230K LUX||||
|VARAPOWERTURBO3 SBT90|298K LUX||||
table(table#posts).
|VPT3 DEDOMED 4K SST90 LOP|135K LUX||||
|VPT 5.7K SST90|115K LUX||||
|VPT2 XML|168K LUX||||
|VPT2 XPG2 INTACT|229K LUX||||
|VPT2 XPG2 INTACT ASPHERIC|310K LUX||||
First impression is that it certainly has a much more defined hotspot area, and is a much cooler tint on 24W mode than on 40W were it is only slightly cooler than the FF3. Much more noticeable difference between 24W and 40W than 40W and 60W. I think if you have very small hands that you will get away with holding the handle portion, but most guys will grip the base of the heatsink area and it balances it out better anyway. It’s very bright and one very nice light with the mode switching. But FF3 certainly is more ergonomic.
I added a Deft moddel that recently received from Saab calibrated at 230K lux and based FF3 and FF4 off the correction err for that light.
So, 1.3km throw to 0.25 lux as they are typically measured. I should note too that this gets brighter with runtime until it peaks unlike LED lights that get dimmer, do to droop caused by heat. Should be fun to see what this really does when it gets dark.
lawallac:
Thanks for taking the time to post those numbers.
I don’t have any measuring instrument whatsoever, just my TK70 compared to the FF4 visually, but I can see the intensity difference as to justify that meter reading of yours.
I am just amazed how can a light throw at such distance and at the same time achieve high lumens at such a distance.