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Copyright © Phil Elmore, all rights
reserved.
NightCutter 5PC, 5P, 5C, 3C, 3CC
A Review by Phil Elmore
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.
Light emitted by the tactical lights of The
Martialist, head to head.
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.
Depressing the tail of the light provides momentary
“on.”
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.
The read 3CC (left) is intended for reading maps and
charts, while the other C-series lights are compact
utility torches that I’ve found extremely handy.
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.
Anti-roll head prevents lights without clips from
rolling across the table and makes for a nasty
striking surface when the light is wielded.
A mild strike from the 5PC produced a
welt that took half an hour to fade.
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.)
The 5P series compares favorably to the X5.
Lighting produced by the 5P is a good or slightly
better than my X5.
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.
Mini Maglite (left) and Martialist 5PC.
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.
The conventional light cannot begin to compare to the
LED light.
Mini Maglite (left) and Martialist 5PC.
Inexpensive Preparation
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.
