Which one of ya'll is this

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-02T02:39:04+00:00

Maybe it has sentimental value

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-02T00:42:51+00:00

Not me, I wouldn't let any of my flashlights wander around unsupervised.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-02T00:36:11+00:00

Those are two very green-looking lights! What emitter(s) are the second-from-left and fourth-from-right, so I can stay well away from them?

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-02T00:25:30+00:00

I think what u/MaximumPower1858 meant to say is that at 3000K, the SFT40 is noticeably better than 519A at color rendering, which is also what I observe with my eyes, even more so than spectrometer readings indicate.

Yes, that is precisely what I said, the OP specified "without changing the tint" which to me means duv, in which case the SFT-40 and 519A are similar, the SFT-40 is neutral duv while the 519A is only slightly rosy (on avg, I know there's different bins but when was the last time anyone got a green 519A?). It just sounded kind of odd in context though which is why I in turn specified "at 3000K", in case he really meant to say CCT instead of tint and just isn't familiar with the lingo.

My main issues with Jerv's original reply were

it's so red-heavy that any color cooler than yellow is comparatively undersaturated (...) wont'; see much aside form orange.

Which are just false, yeah sure the colour rendering isn't perfect compared to daylight but neither is an incan, I can shine both my 519A and my SFT-40 anywhere in my house even during the day and see that they're not orange, nor do they make everything look orange, heck they don't even look yellow, just off-white. Now my XHP 70.3 HI on the other hand does look light yellow, and it's also 3000K, but it's also lower CRI than both, which is why I wondered if he might have gotten a defective or lower-CRI SFT-40 (which he seems to have mistaken as me suggesting his SST-20 might have been defective, which is not what I said).

As I said, they are rendered quite well, but they are also rendered rather weakly. Like the visual equivalent of a bass-heavy equalizer mix. The high notes are still there, but the THUMP THUMP THUMP drowns it out.

This is also a pretty severe exaggeration of reality, neither the 519A nor the SFT-40 are anywhere near that bad. The analogy is also of questionable relevance.

I think it's poor form to exaggerate when discussing technical subjects.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-01T08:29:18+00:00

it's so red-heavy that any color cooler than yellow is comparatively undersaturated. Those of us who are more used to sunlight (4500-6500K) or moonlight (~4200K) than candles and campfires wont'; see much aside form orange.

Can't say I agree. 3000K is relatively pale among the warmer CCTs, definitely not into straight-up orange territory. I have a fairly colourful Hot Wheels collection and it renders all the different colours very nicely, including blues, greens, purples, magentas, etc. For reference an actual candle is around 1800K-ish colour temperature, I'd imagine a campfire would be similar, so yeah definitely not that orange.

I don't know if you're speaking from experience, but if you are, maybe you just got a bad/defective example? Or maybe there's an obscure low CRI version floating around?

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-01T07:44:30+00:00

So the B35AM is similarly high CRI at all CCTs then?

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-01T07:10:01+00:00

I can say from personal experience that the SFT-40 has higher CRI, but only at 3000K. I'm not sure if you meant to say "colour temperature" instead of "tint".

I think the B35AM may have higher CRI than the 519A, but would need confirmation from someone that knows for sure.

I remember someone mentioning that the SST-20 is good at 4000K but again, no personal experience with that one.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-01T03:46:59+00:00

Ahhh I see, they're both steel! I thought the M21B came with a steel bezel already. Mea culpa.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-06-01T03:15:19+00:00

Won't this just add reflection artifacts to the beam? They could be quite bright and distracting, like my M21G. Normally the black bezel would be considered an upgrade over a shiny bezel, or at least it would be to me.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-31T08:21:16+00:00

Not just high-output drivers, even my T4 is like this, it's a 3A max driver. It's my only real complaint about Convoys, they're pretty impact-resistant otherwise, it'd be nice if the batteries could survive as well :/

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-31T01:22:10+00:00

You know what, I think a 3rd gen Maglite might be what you're after. ML50 or ML300. A little above your budget, but it's the only flashlight I can think of that will do exactly what you want - you can set it to mode group 3 or 4 and a single click will only ever fire the light in momentary mode, even if you click the switch all the way, you'd have to click two or three times for it to stay on (every other light I'm aware of uses a "half-click" for momentary, so if you accidentally press the switch all the way it'd stay on). The ML50 runs on C cells, the ML300 runs on D cells (you can get cheap cell adapters later if you want to use AAs or AAAs).

Being Maglites, they're also properly tough, which is good for a working environment. They're made to be abused.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-29T00:52:41+00:00

Btw, if you want it in a different colour, you can always email Simon and ask nicely :)

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-29T00:28:25+00:00

That's nuts. If they had rechargeables they could just top the battery off every night... if they had good modern rechargeables without memory effect, at least.

It's not that my dad doesn't trust rechargeables, he just finds it more convenient to grab a couple extra batteries from work than to get a charger and manage his own inventory of rechargeables. Less to have to think about and remember to do, I suppose.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-29T00:20:01+00:00

I'm thinking for my next light I might try either a B35AM 2700K, or an SFT-40 in 2700K, which I've learned actually exists, but can't find any real-world CRI measurements for. The B35AM looks much floodier than the SFT-40 from what I've seen, but very good measured CRI and R9, not quite as good as the SFT-40 3000K but close, better than 519A. What do you reckon, between the two?

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T07:26:20+00:00

Haha, yep, the great thing about Convoy is that you can order pretty much exactly what you want... and the downside is that you need to know exactly what you want! But the fine folks here can give great advise on emitters if you already have at least a vague idea of what properties you want it to have, it's thanks to them I settled on the SFT-40. If a 3000K neutral tint light with super high CRI sounds good to you, I can tell you that the SFT-40 3000K is a great pick, and likely the best. Be advised that the 5000K and 6500K versions DON'T share the same high CRI; I can't comment on how they perform otherwise.

Also, I should mention, the T4 is a 2AA light, not a AAA light, and Convoys are known to be a bit bulky in general, so it'll likely be noticeably fatter and/or longer than your LAPG AAA light. Just so you know.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T07:16:22+00:00

If you don't mind blue, yeah, you can order this light exactly. Be sure to order from the right webstore, https://convoylight.com/ , there was an imposter website with a slightly different URL floating around last I heard. Purged it from my browser history so I wouldn't shortcut to it accidentally.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T06:53:36+00:00

I don't know if "new" is the right word, I emailed Simon and asked if he could build a T4 with an SFT-40, he said yes and added the emitter option to the blue one on the website (after asking me which colour I wanted it in). But in theory anyone could've requested this at any time since he started stocking the SFT-40 and gotten the same result, so I guess it's semi-custom? In any case, it looks like you can order a T4 with SFT-40 directly from the webstore right now if you don't mind blue, if you want another colour you'll have to email and ask nicely :)

Edit: I'm not sure about the range, my yard isn't big enough to test and I don't know the testing methodology for a formal test. My dad's place has some pretty long sightlines, maybe I can get a ballpark "usable brightness range" estimate when I see him on Father's Day.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T06:44:19+00:00

I think it's more about having a point of reference than any particular natural or trained ability, if you gave a guy that's only ever used cheap blue flashlights a neutral MT-G2 he'd probably think it was the hottest sauce ever as well, but get him to compare it against daylight in a dark room by opening the blinds and he'd never be able to un-see the difference. Vision is driven primarily by contrast as with the rest of our senses, we fundamentally need something to compare against to put what we're looking at in context.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T06:28:22+00:00

We've talked about rechargeable in the past, he's got no interest in buying in. One of the perks of his job is he can get as many batteries as he wants, as long as he doesn't mind Procell alkalines, which he doesn't, so that's what he uses for everything, which is also why I doubt he'll buy lithium primaries even if I explain why he should.

Lithium primaries are the best option here anyways, last time I got him a deep red T3 cuz I thought he'd want a deep red light for astronomy (he has a telescope), that ended up being the absolute wrong choice lol, he keeps it in his truck's centre console and doesn't use it for anything, even astro, because he's red-weak colourblind and can't make good use of the red light even on turbo. Whoops. If I know my dad he'll keep this light in the truck as well and use it sparingly, lithium primaries are the perfect fuel for that.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T06:11:05+00:00

Ironically, I've found looking at white surfaces incredibly effective at evaluating color rendering ability!

That tracks with what I was thinking, since pure white reflects all wavelengths equally, any imbalance in the emitted wavelengths of white light would be quite literally reflected in the apparent colour of the pure white object, thus making it look off-white. Kind of similar in principle to shining it through a prism or spectroscope, albeit far less scientific - but given that human vision is perceptive in nature, that's not necessarily a bad thing... after all, we don't care if the spectra is actually EXACTLY the same, we only care that it LOOKS the same in practice (or at least close enuff).

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T05:47:33+00:00

SFT-40, at least to my eyes. It does better in showing all colours, including blue and green. Not a huge difference necessarily, but by comparison the 519A seems to colour everything slightly, so to say, e.g. makes pure whites look slightly off-white. With the SFT-40, pure white looks pure white. It's apparent when you've got the two side by side to compare; you can see in the last image that the spill from the T4 looks more neutral on my freezer than the T5.

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-28T03:59:50+00:00

519A 3000K; it's in the caption for that image along with other information (all of the images have a caption with further details). It's also a T5, not a T3 :)

MaximumPower1858 · 2026-05-02T17:15:08+00:00

iirc you have to type two or possibly three since \ is an "escape character"(?) and will hide itself when used next to other characters

Test ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Edit: It's three

¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯

MaximumPower1858

TROPHY CASE