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Whelen Talon opinions

Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 7:29 pm
by PriorityOne
The Whelen Talon is by far the best, brightest, most wide-angle LED dash light I've seen yet. I want to know if this light is as popular everywhere else as it is around here. I've seen them as low as $120 single, and $220 dual in any color, which is also a BIG plus if you need to use blue, cause other manufacturers are charging 50-100% more for blue. I've heard Whelen's getting a little greedy also, and raising the pricing this month. The thing that bugs me is this is a simple idea of reflecting and spreading the LED light with optics and reflectors, and nobody is doing it except them. I'm tempted to fabricate one myself!

Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 7:43 pm
by jim
The Tomar TLED series is a little brighter and has MUCH wider light dispersion at extreme angles compared to the Talon. Even the Whelen rep at the Lancaster show admit it! We sat the Tomar on top of the Talon and walked away at an angle and the Tomar was still bright as hell after the Talon dies off. From straight ahead, they are comparable.

The price is the same for any color with them also.

Both are good lights and are the only LEDs to consider, although I'd take the Tomar....but everybody already knew I would.

Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 8:44 pm
by nmfire10
I've put talons in a few vehicles for people in our dept and they certainly do kick ass. They are making a lot of their regular lightheads with the linear LED's now too. The PD here just got an expedition that has 500 Series linear LED's behind the grill and they are awsome. Of course, it also has like 16 of them on the roof for the lightbar :)

Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2003 5:12 pm
by KitN1MCC
Kicks ass kicks ass kicks ass

Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2003 5:57 pm
by Pj
As with any dash/deck lights, they are designed to be DIRECTIONAL. With lenses and optics they try to get some wide angles out of them, but by no means are they to be used for intersections etc unless pointed for that purpose. They are made to move traffic in front of them and to alert traffic behind them.

That's why they invented lightbars, corner strobes and body mounted lights.

With that being said I saw the Talons and I think they work pretty well for the application they are to be used in, especially for the price.

LEDs!!

Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2003 6:41 pm
by jedi_saber
Here's to the Whelen Talons! We started putting these in our suburbans at work in the windows(front, sides, rear), and they are quite nice...they chew through the tint with more effectiveness than anything else we previously used to have in the motorpool (dual whelen strobes, Slimlighters etc).
I ended up with dual Talon's in my vehicle as well, as I love all the flashpatterns it has and the distinct, dual head look to them.
However I was also considering the Tomar, as it was also a little cheaper than the Whelen. Although I always liked Tomar products I went with the Talon for these reasons: Work already had a boat load of these, so I have actually seen them in use and liked it (to date, still havent seen the tomar LED in person/in action), Talon looks more slim and low profile when mounted close to the headliner and it has a distinct two lense, dual light look to it.
Although I have used the Tomar Police light II dual strobe before and liked it, I can't speak for the T-LED, since I yet have to see one of them in action! As for the Whelen Talon, go for it, you'll like it!

Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2003 7:19 pm
by jim
The Talon is definitely thinner and will be easier to mount in an area such as above the rearview mirror.

For deck, grille or rear SUV window lights, I'd go Tomar- especially since they make a waterproof version.

talon

Posted: Sun Dec 14, 2003 8:34 am
by firemedic4
anyone have a good/cheap place on the net to get one ??? thanks bob

Posted: Mon Dec 15, 2003 8:43 pm
by PriorityOne
lshlights.net or southwestpublicsafety.com

Posted: Mon Dec 15, 2003 8:53 pm
by nmfire10