Armytek Barracuda Pro Max Review – Durable Tactical / Duty Thrower

1. Pricing & Availability
2. What comes in the box?
3. Design & Construction
4. Size & Measurements
5. User Interface
6. Emitter & Beam
7. Mode Chart
8. Runtime
9. Driver & Regulation
10. Batteries & Charging
11. Switch
12. Carry & Ergonomics
13. Competition
14. Conclusion

Pricing & Availability

Armytek sent me this light in exchange for an honest review. Here is the official product page where you can see current pricing. At the time of writing it’s $140 USD.

What comes in the box?

The box is a hard plastic case with a custom foam insert inside to hold the light and accessories. It’s not as thick and strong as something like a Pelican case, but it will do a great job protecting the light during shipping and transport. Inside is:

• The light itself
• Battery (inside the light)
• User manual
• Magnetic USB charging cable
• Wrist lanyard
• Belt holster
• Spare O-rings
• 18650/CR123A battery adapter
• Pocket clip
• Silicone grip ring

Design & Construction

Barracuda Pro Max has a fairly traditional flare-head single-cell thrower shape. However, instead of milling texture into the body tube for grip, Armytek left it smooth and finished the whole light in their grippy chalkboard anodizing. The bezel and switch retaining ring are blackened steel. I think it looks smart.

Build quality is great. It feels dense and solid, but not especially heavy. It’s rated great too, with an IP68 25m for 5 hours water resistance and 25m drop resistance. For context, virtually every light I review has a 1.5m 30 Minute water resistance rating and 1-2m drop resistance. My only gripe is there are no flat spots so it can roll off a table by accident.

Size & Measurements

Convoy 3X21D | Armytek Barracuda Pro Max | Nitecore EDC37 | Mini Maglite | Surefire G2X Pro

Measurement	Measured (mm)
Bezel Diameter	63.9
Length	183
Tail Switch Diameter	13
Side Switch Diameter	13
Lens Thickness	Inaccessible
Lens Diameter	Inaccessible
Reflector Hole Diameter	Inaccessible
Reflector Diameter	Inaccessible
Reflector Height	Inaccessible
MCPCB Size	Inaccessible
LED Footprint	5050
Body Tube Diameter	25.3
Pocket Clip Slot Width	5
Pocket Clip Slot Diameter	24.8
Tailcap Diameter	29.2
Tailcap Length	41.8
Included Battery Length	71.0
Weight with included battery (g)	334

User Interface

This UI is simple and straightforward but still has a couple of nice shortcuts and configuration options. While it works, I would have preferred an independent switch UI.

How it works:

• Tailswitch: Half-press and hold for momentary on. Release to turn off. Full-press to “latch” it on/off. Double-tap for Strobe (if enabled). It always starts in High mode by default, but you can turn on mode memory if you like.
• Side switch: When the light is on, click to cycle high-low-med-high. It doesn’t do anything when the tailswitch isn’t pressed.
• Ultralow: Press the tail switch while holding the side switch to activate ultralow mode.
• Settings: You can disable/enable Strobe by holding the side switch for 5 seconds and waiting for a single blink while the light is on. You can enable/disable mode memory by holding the side switch for 10 seconds and waiting for a double blink while the light is on.

What I like:

• Shortcuts: There are shortcuts to High, Ultralow, and Strobe mode. I appreciate the shortcuts to High and Ultralow. Those are both modes I want to be able to access quickly. The Strobe shortcut can be disabled if you don’t want it!
• Not too many modes: It’s easy for a UI to become cluttered with too many brightness levels. This one has four and that works well.
• Mode memory can be enabled or disabled as you please. That’s nice. Ultralow is never memorized.

What I don’t like:

• No ultralow-low shortcut. While in Ultralow mode, clicking the side switch will jump to High mode, which is jarring. Even if you have Low mode memorized. Jumping to Low mode would be much better.
• Dependent switches. Some competitors are moving to an independent dual-switch UI, where the side switch can turn the light on/off and change modes without needing the tailswitch. The tailswitch is reserved for tactical/duty shortcuts like Turbo and Strobe. I wish this light had an independent dual switch UI like that instead of the old-school tail for on/off and side for mode changes UI.
• High shortcut: I wish that when you disable Strobe, it would be replaced with High mode so that a double-tap would jump to High.

Emitter & Beam

This light uses a Luminus SFT70 cool white LED. I like SFT70 because it’s bright, throws well, and necessitates a boost driver with a single cell. Most SFT70 lights have good drivers for that reason. The LED sits at the bottom of a deep, smooth reflector.

The beam is narrow and throwy. The LED Is well centered and focused. The spill is plenty bright and perfectly circular with a hard cutoff. It’s a classic reflector thrower beam shape, but isn’t a pencil beam.

In the beamshots below, camera settings are fixed and the wall is 2.8M away.

In the beamshots below, camera settings are as similar as possible, the basketball goal to the right of the hotspot is 39M away, and the power pole in the center is 185M away.

Mode Chart

Disclaimer: All of my measurements are taken at turn-on. Lumen measurements were taken on a Texas Ace 3.5″ Lumen Tube. A candela measurement was taken at 10 meters with an Opple Light Master III on the highest brightness, and other candela figures were calculated relative to that. CRI, CCT, & DUV data were taken for each mode from a few feet away at the center of the hotspot with the Opple Light Master and Waveform DUV Calculator. Runtime tests were performed with the Ceilingbounce app on my smartphone. These tests were performed with a fully charged included battery unless otherwise specified. I cannot measure moonlight directly, so moonlight readings are calculated based on the brightness relative to the next-lowest mode. None of this is professional equipment, so take these measurements with a grain of salt.

The official specs are above, followed by my own measurements below.

Level	Lumens	Candela	Throw (Meters)	CRI (Ra)	Color Temp. (K)	DUV (Tint)
High	2500	280000	1100	70	6670	0.0049
Medium	570	64000	500	68	6170	0.0097
Low	200	22000	300	66	5860	0.0118
Moonlight	5	560	47	67	5730	0.0141

Runtime

Performance is great. Two minutes of Turbo Time is respectable. Over 1000lm sustained is great, and about what I expected. Total runtime is also good, and I’m pleased with how flat the runtimes are.

Thermal regulation: My Turbo and Turbo Cooled tests are very close (within the margin of error for my testing equipment). I don’t see any active thermal regulation here, just timed stepdowns. That means performance will be consistent, but not optimized for ambient temperature.

LVP (Low Voltage Protection) is present and works well. It doesn’t rely on the battery having a protection circuit. The light will shut off when the battery is practically empty, but it can be temporarily re-activated in an emergency.

Driver & Regulation

The driver must be a boost circuit since it’s driving a multi-die LED off a single cell. That’s good news because boost drivers are usually efficient and well-regulated.

Regulation performance is exactly what I like to see. It’s perfectly regulated down to ~25% charge, which shows the components are high quality and they’re being pushed hard for great performance.

PWM: My Opple did not detect any flickering on any mode.

Parasitic Drain: I couldn’t get a parasitic drain measurement, probably because of the fancy electronic tail. Mechanical lockout (loosening the tailcap a bit) works great to eliminate any drain.

Batteries & Charging

The battery included is an Armytek-branded, unprotected, flat-topped, 5000mAh, 21700 cell. Protected 21700s fit and work fine, as do two CR123AS, or a single protected/unprotected 18650. There’s a spacer included for using CR123As or 18650s. If you use CR123As, they cannot be recharged.

Charging is facilitated by a proprietary magnetic charging cable and some mating contacts on the tailcap. As far as I can tell, this system is unique to this light and isn’t compatible with other models from Armytek or other brands with magnetic charging. You do not have to loosen the tailcap for charging.

Magnetic charging systems like this are convenient for people who charge their light every night in the same place or need excellent water resistance. It’s inconvenient for people who work around metal shavings or prefer to have one standard charging cable for all their devices.

Charging takes ~2.5 hours and it will work while charging. Sometimes it turns off momentarily when you plug it in, but it turns itself back on. There is no battery indicator, which is a shame.

Switch

This is a traditional dual-switch model with the tail switch controlling on/off and the side switch controlling mode changes.

The tail switch is technically a two stage electronic switch, but it functions just like a forward clicky mechanical switch. It’s just a bit quieter.

The side switch is a standard e-switch under a rubber boot and it’s easy enough to find in the dark.

Carry & Ergonomics

Ergonomics are good. I dislike the chalkboard anodizing but I think that’s just me. It works well in a reverse, forward, cigar, or neck grip but I can’t reach both buttons with one hand in any grip. I have to use my other hand or change grip to get to both buttons.

Magnet: The tailcap is magnetic to facilitate charging but it is not useful for sticking the light to things. The magnet isn’t nearly strong enough to hold up the light. Since it’s not flat, it can’t tailstand either.

Competition

Here are some lights in the same class and how they compare.

Convoy L21B SFT70: budget Alternative

• around 1/4 the price
• theorerically similar brightness and runtime
• theoretically more throw
• traditional tailswitch only
• programmable UI
• battery, charger, and holster not included
• must be ordered from China
• less durable and waterproof

Acebeam L19 V2: independent switch USB-C alternative

• a bit less expensive
• TIR optic and SFT40 LED instead of reflector and SFT70 LED
• independent switches (side does everything, tail just does Turbo, works better overall)
• less brightness and throw
• USB-C charging
• hard case not included
• less durable and waterproof

This section is not comprehensive. If I didn’t include a particular light here, it doesn’t mean it’s bad or doesn’t deserve to be here. I simply cannot list every possible competitor.

Conclusion

This is a great light if you need something extremely rugged and throwy. The performance, built quality, driver, water resistance, durability, and beam are all excellent. The UI, switches, and included accessories are good. The price seems reasonable to me. My only complaint is the magnetic charging instead of USB-C, but that may be a plus for some users.

Thanks to Armytek for sending me this light for review!