I picked this up a while ago from REC and have used it a ton. Dedicated get-me-to-the-car light that lives on my bag. I've had no issues with it and it's nice that it doubles as a fidget toy too. I agree the clip is surprisingly good.
Very nice review as usual, Nick! Not too sure about the light though. Feels like an interesting new concept that just hasn't been refined enough yet. I don't think I'll get one for myself as there are certainly better options out there, but I can absolutely see this as a gift. Anyways, thanks for bringing this very interesting light to my attention!
I loved the look of this light and bought one on Amazon. I’ve carried it for approximately 6 hours and it’s going right back. The fatal flaw is that the clip is NOT good. There is so little clip area contacting your pants fabric that it’s extremely easy to have the light fall out of your pants when you take your hand out of your pocket. This happened to me twice, and if a nice lady at the supermarket didn’t tell me I’d dropped it, I’d have lost it on day 1.
I’ll add my own experience under Nick’s review here. I personally hate this light, and here’s why: No offense to Nick but I keep wondering if any of the people who have reviewed this light ever actually carried it and used it at work for at least a couple of days. I’ve tried using it for a couple weeks myself, and I’ve found some problems. The biggest one is that the half-click mode switch system has a tendency of engaging itself as you move throughout your day. Sit down, kneel, crouch, have your hand or something you’re carrying brush the tailswitch…almost anything that causes the lightest contact on the switch will make it change modes from whatever you last used. So in my experience, it’s basically never in the mode that I expect it to be in when I pull it out to use it. Really annoying in the daytime when you turn it on and it’s on the lowest setting: it’s so dim that you don’t even know it’s on, so you might briefly think “oh no, did I forget to charge the battery? Is it dead?” I mean, the user interface is just clunky and annoying anyway. The fact that it changes modes if you turn the light on and off quickly means that you have to think about how long you’re waiting until you turn the light back on. Like if you turn it off and then realize you need it back on, you have to remind yourself to wait a second, or else you’re going to have to cycle through them all again to get back. IMO it’s the worst interface I’ve ever used on a flashlight. I don’t understand why Acebeam couldn’t have put a more standard type of programming on here rather than this gimmicky, cumbersome, and very limited click-through system. Of course the clip also becomes an issue, as it’s just too bulky. It is far more prone than any knife clip to scraping and snagging on things as you work. Plus your hand will keep hitting it as your arm swings while walking, and it’s just never pleasant. The fidget factor of the slider is not really what I thought it would be, either. The clicky sounds are satisfying enough, but it’s kinda awkward to cycle through the “bolt action” because your thumb has to go all the way down to the bottom of the clip to push it back up. Sometimes I feel like I might as well use two hands if I’m gonna do it. It’s just not a natural movement, nowhere near as fidgety as something like a bolt action pen. The beam from the 219F isn’t bad, but I wish that Acebeam would take a cut from companies like Convoy, Wurkkos, etc and offer some different options. I and many others are just not fans of the cold white 5000K light. I’d much prefer this light in 3000-3500K. I’d probably still find myself using it on occasion, despite all the things I dislike about it.
It looks not unlike a lightsaber hilt, so...Yeah. It's cool. PS: I was expecting more for the price, TBH. I mean, there are a ton of Olights and other tacticool lights that are about 70-100 these days, and they're not really any better than this one.
@@ianmaw66 thank you Ian. I already have tons of different flashlights. Most of them are Hank lights and Raylights or Workkos... I just found a few matchiing points with a similar clip, the blue ano and the Bugout(blue) comes in stonewashed blade
Nick HELP! I'm a big fan and trying to decide for a final knife to end my addiction... I have mostly spydercos and love them all, I'm deciding on pulling the trigger on a spyderco paysan or a crk inkosi plain titanium drop point... I would love to hear your opinion if you could only have 1? Both about 500, knifecenter has the paysan on a black Friday special for 520 in backorder. Inkosi vs paysan?
Owned one for about 2 weeks before returning it. Beam tint wasn’t very appealing(kind of green), because of 2 barrel design was annoyingly wide for such a small power source and didn’t care for the UI.
To each their own. You like it, you like it. It's not for me though. That clip is like 80's Soviet Surplus. I can't enjoy the rest of the look with that 2x4 nailed to the side. ps: doesn't matter if you are milspec or car camper, to many lumins reflecting off of leaves kills your visuals while you are waving it around, and leaves you without night sight. And running around with a search light pisses off the other campers.
I pointed out to ACEBEAM that their clip on this light is dangerous. It can effectively snag in the reverse direction (like on a seatbelt or webbing) while trying to exit a car and trap you. Now, this style clip has been done on other lights before, however, in most other lights with a clip like that the clip is held on through tension or a partial C-clip style mechanism. This clip is bolted to the light meaning it wont just fall off in the event it gets snagged in both directions at the same time. Someone on Acebeam's Social Team laughed me off saying that it has to be safe because it has won "design awards" Whatever the f*ck that means. I would never buy this particular flashlight for this one reason. And before someone thinks I'm just an Acebeam hater, I have other Acebeam lights and I like and carry them all the time.
I think, realistically, if you were in that deep, the clip would bend. I'm not interested in testing my theory... however... I will agree that the clip is the reason I passed on this light.