Astrolux ft03s (sbt90.2)
Could pick one up for about $100 on sale.
Gets hot but they’re powerhouses for the price.
Looks like Fin17 just released his current deals, it’s selling for $93. That’s a hell of a deal, I wouldn’t even sell mine for that price…
My FT03S group buy deal is still valid. Do request from us if you are interested. 
Yes, Freeme has helped me with MANY deals and his deals are always great! I did not realize he had a deal for this light still.
I dont own the catapult V6, but my buddy does and he showed me it once. I was not impressed with it in comparison to the FT03s. The catapult V6 i feel falls short of the sst40 version of the FT03.
There is good spill, if that is what you are asking. It is a characteristic of the size of the sbt90.2 LED (large 9mm x 9mm) i believe.
The reviews are all over the palce for the FT03s (SBT90.2). I have 2 of these lights in this emitter and i love them. If you use it inside your house (no judgement, but i don’t see why you would) you will see rings on the outside of the beam. when you use this light outdoors the outer rings on mine are not bad, and the same as any other thrower of mine.
Also, many people talk about the quick stepdown. well, yes it does stepdown in under a minute. But you are accessing 4500 lumens and 1300 meter+ of throw, in a handheld light roughly the size of the V6 catapult. It is not going to handle the heat for too long no matter what. The SBT90 LED is a monster LED and to properly dissipate all of that heat you really need a host twice this size.
As a side note - there just as many people who rave about another popular light whose host is half the size of the FT03s with the SBT90 in it, talking about how wonderful it is. well, none of those people talk about how ridiculously hot that light likely gets in seconds. All i am saying is, take the negative comments with a grain of salt. When the FT03s came out there were some issues with the reflector that really angered BLF’ers, and i am pretty sure those issues have been addressed by Astrolux. but the negative comments never go away.
A lot of peoples negative comments and reviews on this light scared me away for awhile, and now that i own it (6 months now) i DO NOT regret it. it is one of my most used outdoor search lights for spotting animals. it is fantastic IMO.
NOTE - i have no association with any of the deals offered or Astrolux. I am just a fan of their lights and especially the FT03s. All of my thoguths here are just that, my thoughts and opinions.
Sorry, i edited my comment because i wanted to answer the questions you asked. Sorry about the long post. It’s just i have never understood all of the negativity with this light (ft03s) with the sbt90.2. I believe most of the negativity is not justified. That is just me though.
Has the 20 second stepdown issue on the FT03S been fixed?
I just went outside and timed mine. I just setup my temp settings and thermal limit at 60 degrees Celsius.
I ran my ft03s for 1:20 seconds NO step down. Now, I don’t have any testing equipment. I basically go to top of ramp then double click and start the timer. At 45 seconds and 1:20 I double clicked to see if it “went back to turbo” and it didn’t, it stepped down to top of ramp. This tells me it was still at turbo when I double clicked it at 45 seconds and 1:20, or at least close to it. I didn’t see any drop down in lumens visually in the entire 1:20.
That is the only way I have to test step down. So it passed that “test” and it would’ve kept going I just didn’t see the point to keep going. The light was hot, not scorching like my X9L though lol.
Before I setup the thermal tonight, I ran it on turbo with the “stock” temp configuration, and it stepped down in 32 seconds.
Point is, set the thermal comfiguration I guess.
What cell are you using? I was using a 40T and it stepped down in 20 seconds. Once the cell dropped to a lower voltage and the output dropped to about 80% it would no longer stepdown prematurely. Also happened with the shockli 5500. I think it was an issue with the driver. I bought mine when it was first released so maybe they’ve fixed it now.
I saw that new release, very tempting. I wanted the original really bad until I saw my friends in action, just not enough lumens for the price. The ft03 sst40 version was a little better performer at half the price.
I am definitely considering the new one you just bought though!
I’m using a 40t also. Maybe they did update or change the driver? Like I said though, the light could be dropping 20% and I wouldn’t even know. I need to buy a LUxmeter , so I can test this stuff. It visually doesn’t step down for the minute 20 seconds, but I guess it could still be stepping down, either way it still has great brightness for me, as it is still brighter then top of ramp. I like the light and find myself defending it, but I also realize some people had really negative experiences with this light before I was on the forum. Speaking of which, I am still meaning to swap the reflector with My xhp50 version to see if it improves anything. But need that light meter lux meter first.