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optic and white-light gear notes

Discussions and source episodes
DiscussionEpisodes and transcripts
Mediator XL reticle system impressions
Kill flash and dawn-dusk visibility
White-light reticle and target visibility
Night fire basics with white light
Echelon light controls and battery checks

Published by We Like Shooting. Updated .

Double Tap 483 – In His Culture (2026-10-13) · We Like Shooting 682 – Bonecast (2026-09-29)

Mediator XL reticle system impressions

“Gideon Optics Mediator XL had me thinking that I shot mine a bit over the weekend. And I got to say, I fucking love this thing. So it's got a multi-reticle system, two different reticles.”

Read the supporting passages
Gideon

Double Tap 483 – In His Culture — 00:34:02 · Cite this passage

Optics Mediator XL had me thinking that I shot mine a bit over the weekend. And I got to say, I fucking love this thing. So it's got a multi-reticle system, two different reticles.

Double Tap 483 – In His Culture — 00:34:03 · Cite this passage

Kill flash and dawn-dusk visibility

“Now, generally, maybe with a piece of glass this big, it's a pretty good idea. But I feel like it limits light input on the other side. And sometimes when I'm shooting at dawn or dusk, it makes it a little bit difficult to kind of see through the kill flash on everything that uses them, not just this.”

Read the supporting passages
Now, generally, maybe with a piece of glass this big, it's a pretty good idea. But I feel like it limits light input on the other side. And sometimes when I'm shooting at dawn or dusk, it makes it a little bit difficult to kind of see through the kill flash on everything that uses them, not just this.

Double Tap 483 – In His Culture — 00:35:27 · Cite this passage

White-light reticle and target visibility

“So, that's a lot of words, right? Mm-hmm. So, it's a 700 lumen, 20,000 candela connected by Light Fight, which is a Bluetooth link between the light and six hours new X-Ray 5 Red Dot. So, when the light is switched on, the x-ray 5 reticle brightness goes up immediately.”

Read the supporting passages
So, that's a lot of words, right? Mm-hmm. So, it's a 700 lumen, 20,000 candela connected by Light Fight, which is a Bluetooth link between the light and six hours new X-Ray 5 Red Dot. So, when the light is switched on, the x-ray 5 reticle brightness goes up immediately.
  1. Double Tap 483 – In His Culture — source turn 1 at 01:02:52 · Cite this passage (turn 1)
  2. Double Tap 483 – In His Culture — source turn 2 at 01:02:53 · Cite this passage (turn 2)
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“The idea is simple. A bright beam on a target can wash out a reticle, so the dot is boosted at the same moment the light comes on and stays visible while the shooter illuminates the target. What is the difference between that and an auto-adjust red dot? That is... Or is that what this is?”

Read the supporting passages
The idea is simple. A bright beam on a target can wash out a reticle, so the dot is boosted at the same moment the light comes on and stays visible while the shooter illuminates the target. What is the difference between that and an auto-adjust red dot? That is... Or is that what this is?
  1. Double Tap 483 – In His Culture — source turn 1 at 01:03:08 · Cite this passage (turn 1)
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“Uh, Nick, please narrate for a moment. Okay. He is grabbing a rifle off the wall. he's bringing it around okay oh look at that he's back yeah here i am okay so i have two rifle slash carbines set up for night vision and just to only take one ammo i basically took my mp5 and i wanted to talk about the setup that i have on this as well so this is my ptr mp5 i have the midwest industries suppressor hand guard on it which is just absolutely the best thing that i've ever put on this on this gun i absolutely love it it gives me all the rail space that i need for all the different things that i have and i'm just very happy with it overall so i have the surefire scout light this is a white light and ir I replaced the Enforce lights that I had previously with this and this one the white light did perfect I could see the targets I could identify the targets and it just it did great it was bright enough it did exactly what I needed in both white light and IR and I'm very happy with it on the other side I have the tape switch that basically activates the light and then a laser Now on the top of this, I have a D-ball L2, which is IR and visible laser.”

Read the supporting passages
Uh, Nick, please narrate for a moment. Okay. He is grabbing a rifle off the wall. he's bringing it around okay oh look at that he's back yeah here i am okay so i have two rifle slash carbines set up for night vision and just to only take one ammo i basically took my mp5 and i wanted to talk about the setup that i have on this as well so this is my ptr mp5 i have the midwest industries suppressor hand guard on it which is just absolutely the best thing that i've ever put on this on this gun i absolutely love it it gives me all the rail space that i need for all the different things that i have and i'm just very happy with it overall so i have the surefire scout light this is a white light and ir I replaced the Enforce lights that I had previously with this and this one the white light did perfect I could see the targets I could identify the targets and it just it did great it was bright enough it did exactly what I needed in both white light and IR and I'm very happy with it on the other side I have the tape switch that basically activates the light and then a laser Now on the top of this, I have a D-ball L2, which is IR and visible laser.
  1. We Like Shooting 682 – Bonecast — source turn 1 at 00:42:15 · Cite this passage (turn 1)
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Night fire basics with white light

“So there's a couple of different things that I want to do. Number one, I want to quickly talk about the class, what I got out of it, what I thought of it overall. Number two, I want to talk about the gear that I used, compare and contrast it to the gear that I used in the last time that I shot a night fire class, tell you what worked, what didn't work and what improved.”

Read the supporting passages
So there's a couple of different things that I want to do. Number one, I want to quickly talk about the class, what I got out of it, what I thought of it overall. Number two, I want to talk about the gear that I used, compare and contrast it to the gear that I used in the last time that I shot a night fire class, tell you what worked, what didn't work and what

We Like Shooting 682 – Bonecast — 00:32:39 · Cite this passage

improved.

We Like Shooting 682 – Bonecast — 00:33:09 · Cite this passage

“So it is very much a basics class, but it's a lot of times the first time that people are getting out and shooting uh some of their some of their stuff with lights and just really shaking out all of the gear all of the equipment figuring out how much more difficult it is to reload when you can't when it's dark out um how how it adding different tasks such as using your light you know stack on each other and eventually you'd like get to your failure point where you're just kind of messing up. The class was great. It taught the basic skills that you need to employ a white light in a, in a defensive situation.”

Read the supporting passages
So it is very much a basics class, but it's a lot of times the first time that people are getting out and shooting uh some of their some of their stuff with lights and just really shaking out all of the gear all of the equipment figuring out how much more difficult it is to reload when you can't when it's dark out um how how it adding different tasks such as using your light you know stack on each other and eventually you'd like get to your failure point where you're just kind of messing up. The class was great. It taught the basic skills that you need to employ a white light in a, in a defensive situation.
  1. We Like Shooting 682 – Bonecast — source turn 1 at 00:33:38 · Cite this passage (turn 1)
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Echelon light controls and battery checks

“Oh, geez. Sorry, Nick, making you the center of attention here. So I took my Springfield echelon. Uh, I took the mischief machine frame off of it and put the standard echelon frame back on and the reason i did that is the mischief machine pick rail i have a very early version that has been fixed in the later versions but the pick rail doesn't fit lights they're like very bouncy bouncy and loose uh so i took that off put the original echelon frame back on which i just absolutely love the echelon and on this one i have a surefire x300 turbo light so it is a really good light it was a little cold we got a lot of rain uh there was like 30 minutes where it just absolutely poured and there was lightning and so it a little bit chilly and i will say that for some reason shooting with this light activating the light was like hurting the shit out of my thumb so i think i'm going to put a different uh control thing maybe the one from this emissary development i have to see if they make one for the surefire x300 turbo but i'm going to replace the activation controls on this specific light previously one of the big problems was that um none of the lights were bright enough i couldn't see the targets i couldn't identify the targets and like everyone else is shining these fucking the harnessing the power of the sun and my lights just weren't bright enough this x 300 turbo absolutely bright enough on this echelon it came this way from springfield i have the rmr and i had to take the rmr off and replace the battery because somehow it died in the last year even though i've i mean i guess i've shot this gun quite a bit but rmr battery was gone dead goodbye surefire did great very happy with it the echelon did great i had that in a close quarters carry blow in the dark holster because you know it's a nightfire class i thought that would be cool and i like the holster it's very cool uh we got the opportunity to shoot multiple guns so i have a couple go ahead nick i was just gonna say good news sean they do have emissary does have an x300 okay good uh paddle shifter so that'll be something that i order like literally tomorrow uh next i took three handguns just in case one failed i didn't want to miss out on the class so next i took a staccato p And this also has an RMR, and you'll never fucking guess what I had to do before the class.”

Read the supporting passages
Oh, geez. Sorry, Nick, making you the center of attention here. So I took my Springfield echelon. Uh, I took the mischief machine frame off of it and put the standard echelon frame back on and the reason i did that is the mischief machine pick rail i have a very early version that has been fixed in the later versions but the pick rail doesn't fit lights they're like very bouncy bouncy and loose uh so i took that off put the original echelon frame back on which i just absolutely love the echelon and on this one i have a surefire x300 turbo light so it is a really good light it was a little cold we got a lot of rain uh there was like 30 minutes where it just absolutely poured and there was lightning and so it a little bit chilly and i will say that for some reason shooting with this light activating the light was like hurting the shit out of my thumb so i think i'm going to put a different uh control thing maybe the one from this emissary development i have to see if they make one for the surefire x300 turbo but i'm going to replace the activation controls on this specific light previously one of the big problems was that um none of the lights were bright enough i couldn't see the targets i couldn't identify the targets and like everyone else is shining these fucking the harnessing the power of the sun and my lights just weren't bright enough this x 300 turbo absolutely bright enough on this echelon it came this way from springfield i have the rmr and i had to take the rmr off and replace the battery because somehow it died in the last year even though i've i mean i guess i've shot this gun quite a bit but rmr battery was gone dead goodbye surefire did great very happy with it the echelon did great i had that in a close quarters carry blow in the dark holster because you know it's a nightfire class i thought that would be cool and i like the holster it's very cool uh we got the opportunity to shoot multiple guns so i have a couple go ahead nick i was just gonna say good news sean they do have emissary does have an x300 okay good uh paddle shifter so that'll be something that i order like literally tomorrow uh next i took three handguns just in case one failed i didn't want to miss out on the class so next i took a staccato p And this also has an RMR, and you'll never fucking guess what I had to do before the class.
  1. We Like Shooting 682 – Bonecast — source turn 1 at 00:37:11 · Cite this passage (turn 1)
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