I had the same problem. My springs got smashed and did not rebound. Had to use a screwdriver to pop them back out. I was using protected Nitecore nl189. I know now that they are too long:) The instructions that came with the light said on one page that unprotected cells were required, and on another page, recommended. Maybe the battery section on page one of the forum could bold the battery part on length and protection. Thanks. New battery on order…
I’ve never owned or seen a light this cool. I keep putting an 18650 into it and testing it around the house. Then I pull the battery and tuck the light back into its factory box. I’ll do this again a few times over the course of the evening. I don’t know why. I guess I’m not sure what to do with it. I have many flashlights that will produce light equal to what the FW3A will. None of them look as good as this tool. I know it was designed to be an ultimate EDC but it’ll be awhile before I put this light in harm’s way. Silly? Maybe, but I sure like looking at it just the way it is. The BLF folks and Lumintop sure did an amazing job with this flashlight. I’m proud to own one. 
Got mine. 7A, labeled WW for Warm white.
No politics found in the box. Very nice.
Box cover brown cardboard was shrinkwrap tight, had to tear it apart to get at the actual box.
Dark brown (not almost invisible) sticker covering negative end of included battery.
Driver retaining ring was slightly loose. Generally behaves as documented.
Defective instruction sheet — the Muggle Mode entry has a big white space after the words
“… It has a red”
A red what? Where?
And someplace I’ve already forgotten, a genuine typo has “form” where it should read “from”
That’s one of the main reasons I customized Anduril for me (and why I’ll have to for this light as well). The default timings feel like centuries to me. I guess the average person is just much slower doing double clicks. (Whenever I use a windows computer that’s not mine and I try to rename a file by clicking on it twice I always end up opening it accidentally because it registers as a double click lol). Same with the time it takes to start ramping lol. Don’t want my light to take its sweet time when my brain and my fingers are always in “turbo mode” xD
I'll go with redUCED OUTPUT.
For typos I've also seen something strange along "N clicks per second" but I can't find it back right now.
Not drivel.
Just somebody letting off a bit of frustration is all.
We finally put the idiots in their place.
You never done that??.
Back to the FW3A …
I just took my 3D unit out for poop duty with my dog, in pitch blackness.
I have an acre out back and she lit up like noon day… this tiny light is awesome.
. Congratulations Macka17! Glad your FW3A arrived safely to OZ.
Time to celebrate the long awaited arrival mate…. 
. . 
I hope you enjoy it for years to come…
. I am loving my FW3A… hard to put it down. I don’t think I would change one thing about it!! 
.
Do three, or four; wrongs make a right?? … Nope, not according to sb56637.
Hi, I am indeed monitoring this thread. Please limit this topic to polite discussions about the FW3A, and please strictly avoid anything and everything political and/or controversial.
No, sorry. I don’t have another system set up.
These things are more complicated than they might seem at first. It is unfortunate, but sometimes people use fake donations to hurt others (language warning), and most of the more convenient systems like Paypal are vulnerable to that sort of thing. It might seem like that would never happen here since BLF is so friendly, but I’ve had two people on BLF explode at me in just the past week… and it’s not uncommon to have issues like just a few posts ago where sb needed to step in to calm things down. So I have to take these things seriously.
I went with Patreon because it provides a shield against all that. It’s a way to accept thanks without putting myself at risk. It’s unfortunate that they don’t have a one-time tip jar function, but I haven’t found a system which offers that without additional risk or expense.
Anyway, there’s nothing wrong with just saying thanks-as-in-words. It doesn’t have to be thanks-as-in-dollars. It’s okay, really.
But for those who want to do more and don’t mind the system I picked, there’s a link in my signature. Absolutely no obligation though. I’m hesitant to even mention it, except that it was already being discussed. Mostly, we should get back to smiles and pictures of shiny things.
That’s really funny. I wonder how that got past review. 
FWIW, the last draft I saw said:
I probably won't be using Muggle Mode, but isn't 240 lumens a bit too conservative?
I mean, would the flashlight overheat with even double the lumens?
(Just a thought, and I'm sure that my FW3A will be totally awesome once I receive it.) 
Is the text of the user manual available online somewhere?
I’ve developed a proofreader’s itch to see it.
I downloaded a copy from Neal’s website.
Maybe, maybe not. A couple days ago maukka tested it at the top of muggle mode, and the outside of the light got up to 43 C before it stepped down (with the limit set to 45 C).
It’d be worse if wrapped in a dark blanket or something. And, given the nature of muggle mode, that sort of thing might actually happen. So it has a panic response.
But with the amount of issues people reported about muggle mode being too cautious, I wonder if it should just not have any thermal response at all.
Received my FW3A yesterday. The warm white tint is simply amazing, and the settings on the UI are perfect. Thank you to all involved in this project!
One concern. Where does one get a spare switch in case of a switch failure? I can see my FW3A being used A LOT in the future.
Hello again. General status update: (is also in the OP)
Current status (2019-05-19): Neal reports that all orders have shipped, except for a couple orders with address problems. He’s contacting people individually about that. There is no news about SST-20 yet, but Neal will make sure people know about it when it’s ready.
- TK