I love my Roche F6, but it’s heavily customized and I don’t know what I’d think of a stock model. It’s a great mod host though. Mine has a 219B triple and comfychair’s custom driver with firmware I wrote. It’ll do up to 1825 lumens of high-CRI neutral white light, and ramps smoothly down to about half a lumen. Plus, it shows the battery state in real time with a red/yellow/green light on the side. It’s too bad they’re not produced this way by default.
However, I still like my brass light better for regular use. It’s smaller, prettier, has a wider variety of modes, has more stable output, and the only thing I had to do to it was reflash the firmware.
Here’s the Roche F6 next to the brass light and a Nitecore HC50, for size reference:
The brass beauty takes 17mm drivers right? I have one on the way (someday it will arrive) and don’t flash my own drivers so was going to buy some 17mm ones to replace it.
Yes, but you may need a single-sided driver or at least one with only thin components on the back side (and nothing near the edge where the retaining ring will be). Space is very tight in this light. And you may have to file down the outer edges of the driver to make it fit.
That’s actually Helios~~’s custom driver! IIRC comfychair spearheaded the efforts to get something done about it. (Comfychair was also probably the first to assemble one, Helios~~ wasn’t that interested in building one IIRC. I can identify. )
Oops! I made a mistake earlier when I said F6. I was actually thinking of the F12 (which I personally find to be much more attractive looking). I’ve corrected my earlier post.
If only the brass beauty were the “aluminum beauty” I’d get one right away.
I’m not a fan of brass. Poor heat conduction compared to aluminum. Even worse, it’s a lot heavier than aluminum. When I buy a small pocket EDC I want it to vanish in my pocket. This is barely possible with a 40g Zebralight SC62w … not so much with a much heavier 75g brass light.
C20C is a nice light. I own two of them: One modded into a triple XPG2 and the other modded to a single MTG2.
If you’re looking for small size, a Zebralight SC62w is a LOT smaller though. And compared to an unmodded C20C, the SC62w has a better UI, is much brighter, and has a much better tint.
Yes, the shape isn’t for everyone. Personally, I’d prefer it if they changed the ribbed body tube to full knurling and used a slip on removable clip like the old Zebralight SC80.
However, despite the unique look the SC62w is in my opinion a far better light than the C20C.
That’s the problem with Zebralight. They have the brightest output and longest runtimes of any stock light, not to mention the best moon modes too, usually in the smallest or near-smallest body, with one of the most versatile UIs, and they’re tough as nails even compared to other “HA type III” anodized lights. So far so good. But they’re so ugly! Definitely a very military look, due to the extra-hard natural anodized finish. Also, the prices tend to be pretty high and they’re the least moddable lights I’ve ever seen.
Can’t argue with the awesome specs though… and they tend to actually live up to their specs.
I got the Sunwayman C20C specifically to use the e-switch and small form factor for one of led4power’s LD-1 drivers. It was a chore to do, but I like it quite a lot. The stock UI was good enough that it bugged me some to tear it out, but…
The ribbed tube of the Zebralight looks awesome and has made me want one since I first saw it in manxbuggy1’s line-up some time ago. But the price! Maybe someday…
I want a ArmyTek of some kind too, for the finish and durability. Again though, the price. They have the small new ones that look kinda neat if not too utilitarian.
A few good samples as follows but there are lots more. A few C8’s, zoomies and compact 18650 lights. I picked up a few. You may want some before newyear madness begins and shipping suffers.
Sunwayman S10A Little White Shark 1*Cree XM-L2 360LM Rugged EDC Flashlight
black / 1*14500 / 1*AA $26.80
At a guess, probably not. My Roche F6 won’t fit a cell that long, and the F6 seems to be a clone of the C20C.
In general, especially for small lights, the cell should be as close as possible to its spec — 18 mm x 65.0 mm (which is why it’s called an 18650 cell). That cell is shown as 18.4 mm x 69.3 mm.
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