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Manufacturer: SureFire
Length: 7 inches (17.78 cm)
Weight Unloaded: 0.5125 lb (232g)
Diameter: Body: 1.10 inches (2.8 cm) Bezel: 1.5 inches (3.81cm)
Light Output: 110 lumens
Runtime: 50 minutes
Battery Type: Proprietary B90 Ni-Cad re-chargeable
SureFire is the leading company when it comes to producing high tech, highly dependable, and extremely bright tactical flashlights. They make a huge variety of models ranging from small pocket lights to large lights built into the handguards of various automatic rifles. The range of selection is staggering, and so is the quality of their lights. The 8NX Commander flashlight is a low-priced tactical flashlight, one of the newest in their line up.
The 8NX Commander has a number of features that are similar to other SureFire lights. The light has a rubber, textured button on the end of the shaft, opposite the light bulb end. This is a momentary on/off switch that allows the light to be properly carried for a shooting stance when using both a pistol and a hand-held light. The bezel can also be twisted to make the light constantly on. Also, twisting the bezel controls how 'stiff' the momentary on/off switch button is.
The light assembly of the flashlight is made up of the high pressure Xenon/Halogen bulb, and an aircraft-grade aluminum reflector. The reflector appears to be finely textured. This texturizing is actually done at the factory in order to focus the beam of light to within 1/5000th of an inch! This makes the beam of the 8NX commander flawless - there is an extremely bright center spotlight, with a wide, dimmer circular pattern of light for peripheral viewing. The one downside to pre-focusing the beam is that it is impossible to adjust the beam, as can be done with a MagLight. However, the beam is almost perfectly suited for nearly any task.
The major difference between the 8NX Commander and most other SureFire lights is that the Commander is made out of a new polymer plastic that SureFire calls "Nitrolon." Most SureFire lights are made of hard anodized aluminum. The Nitrolon is a very durable plastic, resistant to dents and cracking, and is much less expensive than anodized aluminum.
The 8NX Commander runs off of a re-chargeable battery, and is usually shipped with two of them. Each battery provides about 50 minutes of continuous run-time. The batteries can be re-charged in about two hours. Many people think that 50 minutes is a relatively short amount of time for a flashlight to run. For a normal flashlight, yes, it is. However, the 8NX commander will be generally used in conjunction with a pistol in a tactical situation. In this case, the flashlight will normally only be turned on for a few seconds, allowing the operator to check his surroundings, and then quickly extinguished. Thus, the 50 minutes turns into a lifetime of use.
One of the most frequent questions received when asking about SureFire lights is, "What the heck is a lumen? How can I use this to compare to another flashlight?" This is what the SureFire web page has to say on the subject:
"Lumens is what is used to specify the total amount of light coming from any light producing device, and candlepower refers to the highest value of the light intensity to be found anywhere in the lights "beam".
Lumens tell you how "powerful" the light-producing device is, be it a light bulb of any type, a flashlight, or a car headlight. Candlepower tells you how tightly focused the beam is, assuming the light source has a lens or reflector to focus the light into a beam.
Lumens can be measured quite accurately, using an instrument called an integrating sphere, and identical lights would all have similar lumen values. It is an important quantity to know when comparing different lighting products, as it tells you how much light each one produces.
Candlepower can also be measured accurately, using a light intensity meter to measure luminous intensity, and then by applying the appropriate formula, which takes into account how far, the meter is from the light source. The problem is that the value measured depends on where in the beam you take the measurement (the highest value found is what is normally used), and on how well the beam is focused. It is not unusual for candlepower values to vary greatly from unit to unit on otherwise identical lights due to small differences in focusing or reflector tolerances.
Candlepower specifications (if accurate) are really only useful in comparing lights if the lumen values are also provided. If two lights had similar lumen values and one had a higher candlepower value, what it would mean is that light had a more tightly focused beam. This may or may not be an advantage depending on what the light is to be used for. Using candlepower values alone to compare the "power" of different lights, particularly those from different manufacturers, is likely to be at best misleading, particularly since there is a history of overstating actual candlepower values in the flashlight industry. For this reason Sure-Fire does not use candlepower to specify the performance of its lights, but instead uses accurately measured lumen values exclusively."
This can be translated into saying that if we were measuring a light's performance like we measured a student's performance in high school, a lumen would be the equivalent to the report card, while a candlepower would be the score of a single test. A lumen is the overall brightness of the light, while a candlepower only measures the brightest spot. Despite the difficulties in translating between candlepower and lumens however, a 4 D-cell MagLight (like the big ones that policement often carry) has been measured at 65 lumens. Thus, this Surefire that is about a quarter of the size of the Maglight is almost twice as bright!
So just how bright is a SureFire light? These pictures might help illustrate:
 The Surefire lights up the front door of my home from 20 feet. |
 A 2AA cell Mini Maglight lighting up the front door of my home from 20 feet. |
 Looking at the Surefire from the front door. |
 Looking at the Mini Maglight from the front door. |
Please note that in these pictures, the camera simply couldn't really capture the intensity of the Surefire. In the upper left picture, although the room looks dark yellow, the entire front of the home was bathed in bright white light. Looking into the Surefire, even from 20 feet, was a painful experience for my pupils. However, even though the camera wasn't up to the task of catching just how bright the Surefire is, it certainly gives a good comparison against the Maglight. The Maglight was pitifully dim in comparison, even with a fresh set of batteries.
