Reviewer Note: As of April 2005, NightCutter no longer provides flashlights to the retail market. We at The Martialist are sorry to see them go. Lightship Enterprises, LLC, continues to serve industrial clients.
WARNING! NightCutter and Lightship Enterprises do not market their lights as weapons and neither condone nor encourage their use as such. The Martialist does not recommend you buy tactical lights for this purpose. A utility light is just that – a light, designed primarily to provide illumination.
The official tactical lights of The Martialist are provided by NightCutter. The 5- and 3- series LED lights are aluminum-bodied torches that produce bright, relatively “cool-burning” illumination from multiple lifetime diodes. The 5C, 3C, and 3CC are light-duty utility lights, while the 5P and 5PC are intended as tactical torches. The official tactical lights of The Martialist could also double as expedient striking implements, making them ideal daily carry items.
Light Emitted
To be perfectly honest, the mathematics and terminology behind the various flashlight fora out there are really beyond me. All of the lights we offer produce useful illumination that is extremely unpleasant to the naked eye. In low light conditions, a flash from the 5P or 5PC is fairly disorienting and would likely give the well-prepared martialist an advantage in dealing with an assailant (though of course no one can make guarantees of this kind). Everyone to whom I’ve shown my daily carry 5PC has remarked on how bright it is. I’ve had to warn people repeatedly not to stare into the LEDs the first time they handle the light and trigger it. The NightCutter lights produce, according to their product documentation, light levels as follows:
- 5 LED series: 50,000 millicandelas
- 3 LED series: 30,000 millicandelas
- 3 LED charts: 15,000 millicandelas
The LEDs are rated for 100,000 hours of use, meaning you’d have to use them two hours a day for something like 137 years to burn them out. This makes them, effectively, lifetime bulbs – the biggest advantage of LED lights over their brighter Xenon siblings and lesser conventional counterparts. The Martialist’s tactical lights use the same CR123A lithium batteries commonly used in other tactical torches on the market.
The 5 LED lights produce about 48 hours of continuous-on light from two batteries, while the 3 LED lights produce even more useful on-time. As with any LED light, brightness declines when the batteries get run down, so the intensity of the illumination drops off with time.
The 5P and 5PC have tailcap switches. With the tailcap twisted to the always-on position, the light stays on by itself. Back the switch off to within one quarter turn of full, and pressing the tailcap depresses the entire tail of the light slightly to produce momentary “tactical” illumination. Back the switch off past one quarter turn and the light is in always-off mode for safe storage. The switch is very subtle. Some users may find it a little too subtle, but I like how it operates. It is essentially silent.
The 5C, 3C, and 3CC lights have twist-activation heads. They’re not intended to provide momentary illumination and they’re more compact as utility lights. (The 5P series is 4.75 inches long, while the C-series sport lights are only 3.8 inches long.) I did find in testing, however, that I could squeeze the head and barrel as if holding a cigar and produce momentary-on lighting that way if the heads are turned down far enough.
All the NightCutter lights are made of anodized aluminum with light knurling for decent traction. Product literature claims the lights will withstand fairly impressive crushing forces. The 5P and 5PC have an anti-roll head that provides a nasty striking surface. It’s essentially a raised metal cylinder and it hurts like hell.
Against the Competition: the 5P Series vs. the Inova X5
The 5P series compares favorably to the popular Inova X5. The tactical torches of The Martialist are the same size as the Inova and provide illumination that is as good or better. While both lights could be used as pocket stick striking implements, the anti-roll head of the 5P makes it much better than the Inova for this purpose. (It also doesn’t roll across the table while you’re trying to take photos of it, the way my Inova did.)
While the Inova has a more sophisticated finish, the 5P provides better traction in the hand. Both lights have lanyard holes and could fit in the same holsters. The 5PC has a pocket clip, which the Inova lacks. The clip positions the light in the pocket LEDs-up.
Why LEDs over Xenon or Conventional Lights?
There are three basic types of flashlights: conventional, Xenon-bulb, and LED. The Xenons are the brightest, producing floodlight illumination that burns hot. I’ve burned myself while sitting on a belt holster for a Xenon-bulb light that activated while I was driving. Xenon-bulb lights produce relatively short durations of lighting on one set of batteries and the bulbs burn out periodically. By comparison, while they are not as bright, LED lights burn cooler and the diodes never need replacing.
Conventional lights don’t even begin to compare to their brighter LED counterparts. I used to use the AA Mini Maglite as the standard by which I judged all flashlights. I accumulated quite a few of them over the years. I also went through countless bulbs for them, as any extended use of such torches seems to burn out bulbs like they’re going out of style. While a Martialist 5P light costs two to three times as much as a Mini Maglite, its bulbs will never burn out and its illumination is much better.
I’m basically a cheap person. I like my tools to be durable and useful but not too expensive, because I don’t want to go home and cry myself to sleep if I lose a knife or a flashlight and have to replace it. The NightCutter lights are extremely handy tactical torches that carry very affordable price tags. The people behind the company are also very nice and were willing to work with The Martialist to bring you, our readers, these officially licensed lights. We’re a growing operation, but we’re not huge, so any company willing to work with us on these issues is one in whom we’re proud to place our support.
Regardless of your needs – utility or self-defense – there’s a light in the NightCutter product line that will meet them. I carry a 5PC in my pocket all the time now.
You should too.
