If one is made, I’d suggest waiting on details before ordering. Some of the designs so far have kinda missed the mark in ways which seem sloppy. Like, the FW21 uses the exact same optic as the FW3A, and simply has a thicker bezel to make up for the difference in size. It would be a much nicer light if it had a bigger optic to go with the bigger head. Also, on mine, unprotected 21700 cells don’t work because they are too small. I have to put a spacer on the end before it can contact both springs at the same time. And the clip is too short, so it lands at the wrong part of the body. It doesn’t seem like much thought went into the design.
Also, with the FW1A, it took quite a bit of effort on bmengineer’s part to get Lumintop to use a proper reflector. The original design completely missed the point and would be no better than a FW3A with two of the LEDs burned out:
So… a single-LED version might be nice, but make sure the design is coherent first.
Yup, a 21700 quad would have been nice, not just a bigger and heavier FW3A. If they make a 21700 single, it should have a proper full size reflector. If it does not… no point. If proper, it would be a great light!
I asked Neal a couple weeks ago if there would be a titanium FW1A, and his response was, “Sure!”. Hopefully, that means there will be. We’ll see, I guess.
I asked the same question and Neal responded “Soon”. That could mean in the next month or early next year, I guess we’ll just have to wait and find out. :weary:
Is the SST-20 in the FW1A directly driven through the FET on max the same way as the XP-L is, or is the current restricted in the driver to avoid DDing the SST-20?
I am running the full power FW3A firmware on my FW1A. I have not cooked it yet, but I am not sure if the stock firmware throttled it down or not on the top end.
I did it with both, but did stick with the LH351D. I gave the SST-20 time to settle in and time for me to decide I did not like it. But the first thing I did was put the latest firmware on it along with slight mod. I almost always disassemble any new hot rod light and check things like wires, solder blobs and heat paste and update firmware at the get go.
I am also running a fet driver with the SST-20 in a C8, no bypasses.
Thanks for reading! I don’t, but thankfully zeroair has also got his hands on the XP-L Hi version - his review measurements state 661 lumens and 358 m of throw, measured at 30 seconds as per the FL1 standard.
No numbers from me, but visually I can tell you the FW1A throws further than an S2+, and a lot further than an FW3A.
standards are kind of pointless for these FET lights since they all throttle before 30 seconds is up. If you want max lumen numbers just look at an Emisar D1 review it will be more or less the same for XP-L HI version.
I disagree completely. I think lights that throttle drastically like this are exactly why the standard of measuring at 30 seconds exist. If I’m trying to see something 300 meters away, I probably need more than two seconds to find it and get an idea of what it is.
I guess if you just want a high performance light so you can tell everyone you measured it right when you turned it on with a fresh cell and the right ambient conditions and your measurements say it did a great job, that’s one thing, but if you’re actually trying to illuminate something 30 seconds is the bare minimum for any sort of reasonable use.
Edit: If you are curious, zeroair measured 31958cd at 30 seconds and 661 lumens, so about 48 cd/lum. Scaling with the max output at turn on in the runtime graphs of around 1400 lumens gives around 67687cd or a bit over 500 m of throw… for a few seconds at least.
