Review - Standard Gear M910 Tactical Illuminator

[Mr Jon]

Welcome to another edition of Mr Jon’s un-necessarily long airsoft reviews. Today I will be reviewing the Standard Gear M910 Tactical Illuminator.

I for one love SureFire lights, I own both their Centurion C3 and an L4 Digital Lumamax torches. It was only a dream for me to get my hands on a real SureFire M910 as the retail value of those is several hundred dollars. More than I was willing to spend at the moment. Months ago I was browsing Airsoft News Europe when Standard Gear announced a production run of these M910 replicas I knew I had to buy one. Just recently I had the chance to purchase one from http://www.dragonredairsoft.com. At a cost $130.00 shipped directly from China I couldn’t pass the offer up. And now about a week later its in my hands!

Opening The Box



As usual the most exciting part is initially opening the package. The M910 “Tactiacl” illuminator arrives in a thin cardboard box with a picture of it on the outside and a product description complete with misspelling. Upon opening the box you’ll find 3 Panasonic CR123 batteries and the M910 in a plastic bag laying on top of a piece of packing foam. No manuals or additional items are included in the package.



Build Quality and Construction

The build quality of this M910 replica is extremely solid. The body is made up of what appears to be a very tough nylon fiber finished in flat black. The lamp housing is made of metal with the lens made up of what might be plastic, but I honestly can’t tell. The housing appears to be finished in what I believe is an attempt to replicate the SureFire HAIII finish, it’s a bit uneven but it still looks good. All the components inside the light are held together with a metal frame. This is really what gives it the nice heft and solidity. While it’s not SF quality it is definitely well made and doesn’t feel cheap even at the price you will have paid for it!



The materials chosen are very good, now the problem here is massive finishing flaws. Upon opening the battery cap I noticed there was quite an accumulation of metal swarf all around the threading. I spent about 10 minutes brushing the metal flakes out of the battery well and the cap and making sure it was clear (you’ll find similar issues when you unscrew the lamp assembly). But hey at least the battery cap screwed in smoothly now. Other various issues other than rough seem lines is bits and edges of the plastic are still furled about and require a fine hobby knife to scrape away some of the access. After you get that all out of the way its ready to rock.



Function and Usage

First thing is to load up the 3 included batteries into the grip. To do this you’ll have to press and hold a plastic tab that locks into the notches of the cap and unscrew. Pop in 3 batteries with the positive side facing up and screw the cap back in making sure to line up that tab in one of the notches of the cap.



There are 3 switches on this grip that can activate the lamp. On both the right and left side you will find a typical pressure pad which activates the main lamp assembly temporarily. On the rear of the grip is a clickie thumb switch that activates 2 high powered LED lamps for navigation or for low light illumination purposes. The 4th switch is a dial that can be used for constant on of the main lamp. You can use both the navigation lights and main lamp at the same time. The nav lights are great for signaling purposes or finding your way around without giving your position away.



Mounting is the easy part, you’ll find on the top of the grip is an all metal ARMS mount knockoff. All you need to do is push the switch all the way to the right to release, lever the light onto the rail and lock it into place by pushing the switch to the left. And that’s it, when ever you need to take off the light just flip the switch the other way and it pops right off. This is great and all but there is an issue. I have both a VFC HK416 and a CA36 with a Knights Armament rail system on it. This light as well as other ARMS related products I’ve used is wobbly as hell. Mounted on my CA rail system it’s a bit more solid, but I would need to put a pad of tape or something on it in order for the light to fully lock on without movement. Kind of disappointing really, but I kind of expected that from past experiences. It will fit other rails perfectly and others not so well.



Now as per the light aspect of it all. Well it works, and works pretty well actually. The beam is well focused just like my SureFire with no dark spots or light rings and has good throw to it. However the lamp appears to give off a warm yellow glow rather than the pure bright white that my SureFire does. It is advertised at 200 lumens, I don’t find this to be the case. My SureFire Centurion C3 is running a 100 lumen P90 lamp assembly which gives off a brighter and more pure light. The beauty of the SG M910 replica here is that both SureFire and G&P 9v lamp assemblies pop right in! I quickly dropped in my SF P90 lamp assembly and now have a lovely torch for indoor CQB. I’ll save the one that came with this as a backup. 500 Lumen heads will be available from Dragon Red shortly which will turn this into a high powered search light! 100 Lumens is enough to temporarily disorient a person with night adapted vision… never mind 500 lumens blasting into your face.




Conclusion

Standard Gear produced an excellent replica of SureFires M910 tactical light. Finishing is a bit rough but it was only a minor inconvenience for me. It’s no SureFire but at $130.00 CAD I cannot complain. Only cons is that this lamp doesn’t have a lockout tail cap like the real ones do to prevent accidental activation of the lamp assembly during transit. I recommend this to anybody who enjoys the look of the M910 or just wants something more than just a boring tactical light. Visit http://www.dragonredairsoft.com for ordering details.

[BloodSport]

Damn nice one man, now when you going to send me a MSN to buy it off you. You know you want to, your always MSN me to buy your new toys. $$$ heh heh :P

[huang]

To all other M910 customers except Mr Jon:

You may be surprised that Mr Jon's package came with three batteries. The reason is Mr Jon kindly send $3 extra more than we asked for. That's why we put in three extra batteries.

We treat all our customers equally but surely we don't want to take advantage either.

Thank you for your understanding.

P.S. If you also paid $130 but not getting batteries, I appologize and please contact me.

Huang

P.S. Great review and very nice photos!!

[Slick]

Thanks for the review Jon. I was wondering about the lamps quality so you answered that for me thanks. You said G&P 9V lamps work but what about the SureFire lamps. I was on the surefire website and couldnt find the lamps for the M910. Do you know the model number for the lamp I need.

[Valcrow]

Slick, if you want to put a Surefire bulb in, you'll have to get the P90 or P91 to fit. These do not use the same lamp assemblies as the surefire M900 Series. The bezel is completely different than that of the real Surefire M900.

[Mr Jon]

Slick I am currently using a SureFire P90 lamp assembly in my SG M910, works great!

[Slick]

Oh okay thats good to know. Thanks for the info guys.

So I guess Im limited to 200 lumens? At least untill the 500 lumen lamp comes out. But Im not sure Id believe that its really 500 if your saying the one that came with the light wasnt what it said it was.

[huang]

Use good batteries will make the light brighter. Those batteries we sent to Mr Jon is kind of weak. $1 per one, you can't expect too much from it.