Paul,
1. No, I have not tried any any other models. I decided to purchase a Bosch GLM 250VF since it advertised 250m range compared to 200m of the Leica Disto D5 and also cost about 60% of the D5's price.
2. I would normally use my bike for measuring offsets from fixed references - much quicker and sufficiently accurate. However when I arrived at the Llandudno 24 hr 1.0267km loop before the race last Thursday, the race director asked me to mark every 25 metres around the loop so they could determine the distances covered on the final lap when the race ended. The loop is around a central reservation of a straight divided road, so consists of two perfect straights with semi-circle turns at the ends. At the time before the road was closed to set up the race there was too much traffic to ride, so I decided to use the laser. I put my small wooden box carrying 4 8cm x 12cm retro-reflectors on the kerb of the central reservation at the start line, and carried my tripod with the laser and set it down at approximately 25m, checked the distance, and chalked the kerb close to 25m. I repeated out to 150m and then decided that the there could be a risk of shining the laser into the eyes of on-coming cars while setting up if I continued to 250 metres, so I moved the retro-reflectors up to the marked 150m point and continued. It took quite a time, but certainly not any more than it would have with a 50 tape, and then there would a risk of the tape being driven across at gaps in the central divide. By the time I reached the 700m point the road had been closed, so I discontinued using the laser, calibrated my bike, and continued using that - much easier. I did check the accuracy of my laser measuring by checking the 700 m point with the bike - The distance on the bike with scpf came out to be 699.4 metres. Adding the SCPF allowance of 0.7m and adding 5 x 3mm to allow for the sloping laser beam over 150 metres and subtracting 5 *16mm plumb bob offset, this gives 700.035 metres - which is good agreement especially since I only used thick chalk lines to mark the 150m points and did not attempt to locate them to better than 2 or 3 cm. Later I was annoyed that after all this marking out, in the end I was allowed to use my bike to record the exact finishing distances at the end of 24 hours, and the 25 points were not used except a rough second check. However it was another good check of the general accuracy of using this laser and of my laser technique.
3. I have had no problem yet with sunny days. At 250m you can just see the 16cm X 24cm target in the view finder if you know where to pick it out against the background. You then turn the laser on - the spot is visible in the viewfinder, but is not located in exactly the right position - you have to aim about 30 cm off to the right and lower. You easily know when you hit the retro-reflectors, since they light up with a bright red spot, visible through the viewfinder or with the naked eye. The telescope mount with good geared drives using worm gears is essential for alignment at maximum range. Dont bother with a tripod that has one of those friction controlled drives used by photographers - they have too much cross-talk between the axes.