Oveready Tritium Bezel Clone?

Matt7337

Enlightened
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Nov 5, 2008
Messages
361
Location
Northern Ireland
Since OR have stopped production of their tritium crenelated Surefire bezels, I was thinking of asking a local machine shop if they could mill the same slots in some Xeno bezels for the same effect. Has anyone ever tried this?

I've just put together a 6P with OR/Torchlab V5 dropin, clip and clicky upgrade and have Xeno bezels in the post for this and some of my other SF lights, but I'm desperate to add tritium to this and my new C2.
 

DrafterDan

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Jul 28, 2013
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Phoenix, AZ
There's a reason why, it's not so common. It's a high risk machining operation, with little room for profit. Think about setup time, the fact that machining a 1.5mm wide slot will result in a number of broken bits, overhead for the shop, etc. If you wanted them to do a run of maybe a thousand or more, it would be worth their time. Not saying that it's impossible, as each shop sets their own rules.
Reach out to some shops in your area, no harm in asking. But you might consider doing a run of maybe 15 units, and expecting that a number of the bezels will be trashed during the process.
Which bezel are you thinking of using? Looks like the ST03 will have enough 'meat' to support slots cut in.
 

Matt7337

Enlightened
Joined
Nov 5, 2008
Messages
361
Location
Northern Ireland
I understand that the machining operation is very complicated/risky and probably not very profitable. I used to work for a local engineering company who have some extremely talented machinists and specialize in one-off and low volume operations, and their machine shop is equipped with modern 5 axis CNC lathe centres, so I am confident that they will be able to achieve this. I have ordered a number of each colour that Xeno offer the ST03 bezel in. I'll probably hold off on ordering vials and adhesive until I have a couple of bezels machined and know that it's going to work.
 

DrafterDan

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Jul 28, 2013
Messages
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Well, then, having connections certainly streamline the process!
Good to hear you have some folks with high-dollar CNC's ready to enhance our favorite torches.
If you are in Ireland, I'd suggest looking to B@rt on the non-light sales pages here. He's in the Netherlands, so it would reach you faster than the roughly 10 days it takes for his trit vials to reach us here in the states
 
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