Any stories of using STROBE as a Self-Defense Weapon?

[Woods Walker]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

I think a search will also show that historically the topic of using a flashlight as a self defense tool has been discouraged on CPF. Speaking for myself I do feel better when night hiking in the dank spooky woods if my light has the ability to really illuminate the entire area if needed. That said I would honestly consider another option for self defense.

 

[OnlyownEnergizer250lumen]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

I'd say it's the only thing that matters, and the only things that high lumens buy you are: 1. Bigger hotspot might be easier to aim, and 2. all things being equal, higher lumens will equal higher lux (but things are rarely equal), and 3. Depending on the situation, you might also want to light up the rest of the room/surroundings to identify other threats. Which is why, in my favorite form factor -- 1" 1x18650 lights -- you might be kind of interested in this: http://eagletac.com/html/dx30lc2/specs.html 40-50% more lux than most lights this size.

Whoa!! I wish I found that light before I bought my Nitecore MH20! :l Just what I was looking for, except no one pointed me to it. Only problem is that it doesn't have USB recharging capability so I'd need to buy a 18650 charger but still, that thing is nice!!!!!!

 

[Parrot Quack]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

Whoa!! I wish I found that light before I bought my Nitecore MH20! :l Just what I was looking for, except no one pointed me to it. Only problem is that it doesn't have USB recharging capability so I'd need to buy a 18650 charger but still, that thing is nice!!!!!!

Why not be happy with the MH20?

 

[ForrestChump]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

I was friends with a neighbor who purchased a trained security dog from Germany. Occasionally that dog would go all BatScat and (I think) she would yell "Platz!"

Our local meter readers who need to get out of the truck have a tool on their belt called the Bite Terminator. This can help them avoid a lawsuit with a homeowner for damaging a dog in self defense.

This is it.....really...

I think a search will also show that historically the topic of using a flashlight as a self defense tool has been discouraged on CPF. Speaking for myself I do feel better when night hiking in the dank spooky woods if my light has the ability to really illuminate the entire area if needed. That said I would honestly consider another option for self defense.

Discouraged from discussing lights as an impact weapon, which, unfortunately some of these threads devolve into ....causing more mod work..then they lock em up. Im with you on the last sentence. Wouldn't hurt to light them up though!

 

[Monocrom]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

Sorry guys, but let's be realistic. I'm not relying on any light, and I own a handful of lumen monsters, to protect me from a dog. Maybe if I owned a 5 or 6 cell Mag or similar model to use as a club. But no, not even then. Use the light to find the dog and what direction its coming from. Use pepper-spray to actually fend it off.

Last thing I want to read on these boards is how a member ended up in the hospital because his light didn't work for a purpose it was never created for.

 

[StriderSMF]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

god you cant even have any fun conversations on any of these forums anymore to many politically correct wimps rolling in with every bad scenario they can think of, cant even talk about an experiences you've had or they will tear it apart as to what could or should have happened. :shakehead

 

[OnlyownEnergizer250lumen]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

Why not be happy with the MH20?

I am very happy with the MH20! But for such a small light (.9 head, .8 body, 5in length) to put out 280 meter throw?? I bought the MH20 with a thick head cause I thought it was helping its throw ability considerably.. (10-30m more throw than most lights i could find in any comparable size) but 220m vs 280m for something with waaaaaaay thinner body and barely longer is mind blowingly attractive. Seems next-gen but I see no reviews for it yet. Not rechargeable though. Considering this thread is about self defense and lumens, not only does it have a much brighter hotspot, but 160 more lumens than the MH20. AND a tail switch for tactical use. Everything about it is better than the MH20 except for the inability to USB recharge from what I can see...

 

[WarRaven]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

With modded lights like anything else, there are trade offs.
Need special cells, runtime is reduced from OEM, heat is not ignorable, light and throw, heat sinking has all been improved greatly.
Though most OEM come with stellar warranties now, and do not need a disclaimer to use.
Can't lend it, can't use unattended, details are king.
If these details can accepted, then there you go.
Jmtc that IMO, OEM and warranties by a large manufacturer are king to me, YMMV.

For the record, I do not not own one modded light.
I've no interest, my life's up and down and forgotten details can bite me.

 

[Kestrel]

We have always preferred the blinding light to deter crime but recently I learned that it works with aggressive dogs...the rapid flashing caused an aggressive shepherd to lose his aim towards me, and I was grateful as I moved away.

I wondered, though, much rather to use a light than something like pepper spray, is there a basic minimum lumen range that works well in self protection?

The one I used successfully was rated 900 lumens.

Also, is greater range actually more effective in self defense? I think lumens might be more important, but I thought I would throw this in, too.

I always love learning here.

Just a FYI, we have a current thread on this topic which has been rather well-developed over the past month or so; I am merging this new thread with the prior one.

Check back on your thread often; it may be deemed verboten and removed, depending on how the cpf rules are interpreted.

Please note the context of said concerns; using a flashlight for physical defense is not encouraged here on CPF due to how poorly the topic has been handled by some members in recent years, among other reasons.

1. I think a search will also show that historically the topic of using a flashlight as a self defense tool has been discouraged on CPF.
2. Speaking for myself I do feel better when night hiking in the dank spooky woods if my light has the ability to really illuminate the entire area if needed.
3. That said I would honestly consider another option for self defense.

Exactly, I couldn't say it better myself :thumbsup: (in fact I'm obviously not as good about being so concise) - other options can most certainly be better.
Edit: In fact, I liked your post so much I took the liberty of breaking it down into three separate points - each can stand alone re: their individual validity, and all are very important IMO.

Related to point #3 above; of the few options I keep at hand, I happen to be partial to my S&W's.
We do have a flashlights/handguns/knives thread here on CPF which briefly documents that aspect: Flashlights, Pistols, and Blades...
A check of that thread has it at over 700 posts by now, and still running strong.

There are numerous other forums that can and do cover these other interests very well - this is primarily a forum for flashlight enthusiasts and related topics.

Personally, I happen to spend time on a few firearms forums. One topic I don't really bother with discussing on those forums is flashlights, as there is a better forum for that - here.

god you cant even have any fun conversations on any of these forums anymore to many politically correct wimps rolling in with every bad scenario they can think of, cant even talk about an experiences you've had or they will tear it apart as to what could or should have happened. :shakehead

After parsing out your statement into what I believe to be the pertinent points, I find your position somewhat ironic, given my interest & occasional correspondence in this topic:
Low light / Night fire training class
Related irony is actually getting a PM from a CPF member accusing me of being some sort of anti-self-defense peacenik after moderating (& discouraging) a poorly-thought-out "defense" thread, when I am actually exceedingly-well-defended at most any time of the day or night. (They apparently missed the point that I as well as others were trying to make in that thread, e.g. the approach taken in that specific case was a very poor one.) My personal feelings about that topic is that the capability for self-defense is both honorable & desirable; however I think that most CPF members would agree that CPF isn't the most appropriate or applicable forum for that subject.

The fun thing about online forums is that we can find one on most any fun topic that interests us.
I don't know what your specific complaints are about political-correctness but I'm guessing that they may be off-topic for this thread. We do have the CPF Underground forum which may provide a satisfactory venue for your thoughts in this regard.

----------

Was just hoping to clarify a few topics here this morning. Now back to your regularly-scheduled programming.

 

[ForrestChump]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

I think a search will also show that historically the topic of using a flashlight as a self defense tool has been discouraged on CPF. Speaking for myself I do feel better when night hiking in the dank spooky woods if my light has the ability to really illuminate the entire area if needed. That said I would honestly consider another option for self defense.

Sorry, but most of us leave our sledge hammers home when we go out for a hike.

 

[dazzleaj]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

When my son came back from his first deployment to Iraq he gave me a NovaTac SPAdefense, SPL-120. They used them in late night traffic and pedestrian stops to temporarily disorient a person that they had concerns with in order to physically restrain them. The alternative was to shoot them. This gave them the heartbeat needed to get their hands on the person. Remember this was a group of trained soldiers with a very specific goal, Not to get killed! I don't think it is the same thing as a girl in a parking lot trying not to get raped. I would never use it as a self defense weapon.

 

[kyhunter1]

Re: General Tactical Self Defense Question About Lumens

Ive used strobe to keep the neighbors dogs at bay in the past. They refuse to keep them confined to their own property. The dogs bite at my feet as I bike past them. If a light with strobe is the only weapon I have on me, then it will be used. I have a licensed conceal carry permit and have other options for self defense. I care less about what anybody else thinks about that. Would rather not end up in a situation requiring the use of a strobe to start with. There is a pretty high chance that my light will be attached to something much more effective.

 

[Jiri]

I have never done any scientific studies on the use of strobe as a defensive tool but from just some impromptu tests I have done on different friends, strobe would be useless with most lights. Yes it would surprise someone but it really isn't that hard to fight through it.

I had some friends over one night and we were looking at my lights and of course everyone was playing with the strobe modes because they are the coolest modes to non flashaholics. I decided to test the effectiveness of using strobe to disorient a person so I grabbed my Eagletac sx25l2t (1000 lumen, 81,500 lux @ 1m), set it to the alternating strobe mode, and had somebody run at me from about 20 feet. Everyone of them was able to run right at me and grab me. We did this four or five times with the same results. We tried it with the blue and green lenses with the same results. The only time we found it to be completely disorienting enough to do good was with the yellow lens. I'm not sure why but it was actually painful to look at with the yellow lens.

Yes you could say that strobe is effective based on what I said but only if you take into account the size of the light being used, the output, lux, and most importantly with a YELLOW lens and only then if it was shined directly into a person's eyes, if not directly into them it did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. If the person was only glancing up to see where I was and then putting his head back down it had NO EFFECT.

As for a 200 lumen light doing any good it would only do good if you threw it and it hit them hard enough to knock em out. I did the same test with my Eagletac D25A2 (2xAA, 350 lumens, 3200 lux) and it did nothing, not even enough to justify shining it at them.

Overall from what I have learned from actually testing it, strobe is not worth staking your life on. A white strobe does nothing and even though the yellow was painful I wouldn't stake my life on it if somebody had a gun, knife, bat, etc. I might use it as a show of force before I draw my weapon but I would not use it as my sole defensive tool.

May I suggest you and your friend try the simple experiment I did and tell us whether you believe strobe is beneficial afterwards. If you do try it, remember to actually try and grab the other person, I bet if you set your mind to it and mentally block out the light you will be able to grab him. As long as you just run towards the light it isn't hard to do. What is hard is being the guy with light and trying to move around while keeping the light directly in the attackers eyes because I would be willing to bet that if someone is trying to actually attack you, you be moving. Most people would be moving and trying to avoid the attacker, not stand perfectly still and focus solely on shining it directly into the attacker's eyes.

Did you have general lights off or lights on during the night test? DIfferent situation is when you shine someone when his eyes and his pupils are already adapted to night / or adapted to light.

 

[Tac Gunner]

Did you have general lights off or lights on during the night test? DIfferent situation is when you shine someone when his eyes and his pupils are already adapted to night / or adapted to light.

We had been inside with the lights on when we went outside. It was dark with no surrounding lights when we did it but no our eyes were not fully adapted. I understand the difference if our eyes had been fully adapted but I still don't feel like it would be enough to be a real self defense option. Most of the time parking garages, parking lots, parks, stadiums, etc have just enough ambient lighting that an attacker's eyes wouldn't be fully adapted anyways.

IMO the best self defense use for a light is a preventive tool using it to check around your vehicle before walking to it, checking your path from your car to house, and just use it in a way that says to a potential attacker you are alert and not as easy pickings as the other person who has their face buried in their phone. If you are alert to your surroundings and pay attention that by itself helps deter a lot of attacks. Of course it comes down to it use your light to illuminate your target and while drawing your ccw.

 

[Jiri]

We had been inside with the lights on when we went outside. It was dark with no surrounding lights when we did it but no our eyes were not fully adapted. I understand the difference if our eyes had been fully adapted but I still don't feel like it would be enough to be a real self defense option. Most of the time parking garages, parking lots, parks, stadiums, etc have just enough ambient lighting that an attacker's eyes wouldn't be fully adapted anyways.

IMO the best self defense use for a light is a preventive tool using it to check around your vehicle before walking to it, checking your path from your car to house, and just use it in a way that says to a potential attacker you are alert and not as easy pickings as the other person who has their face buried in their phone. If you are alert to your surroundings and pay attention that by itself helps deter a lot of attacks. Of course it comes down to it use your light to illuminate your target and while drawing your ccw.

I must totally agree with you! I defenitely use a flashlight as a preventive tool. I have got different means of self-defense always on me... awareness of my surroundigs is one of them. Off course... a good tactical flashlight with crenulated bezel can serve as a self-defense tool as well, if necessary.

 

[Tac Gunner]

I must totally agree with you! I defenitely use a flashlight as a preventive tool. I have got different means of self-defense always on me... awareness of my surroundigs is one of them. Off course... a good tactical flashlight with crenulated bezel can serve as a self-defense tool as well, if necessary.

I'm not saying I wouldn't use my light if it was the only thing I have, which being I'm not 21 till May a knife and light is all I have, but I'm going to do everything I can to keep it from getting to hands on.

 

[Tre_Asay]

IMO the best self defense use for a light is a preventive tool using it to check around your vehicle before walking to it, checking your path from your car to house, and just use it in a way that says to a potential attacker you are alert and not as easy pickings as the other person who has their face buried in their phone. If you are alert to your surroundings and pay attention that by itself helps deter a lot of attacks. Of course it comes down to it use your light to illuminate your target and while drawing your ccw.

That is in line with my preferred use of a flashlight - to illuminate my surroundings and gain insight of places that I can't see. I remember a surefire publication that was talking about tactical use of flashlights, most importantly lighting up "black holes" (a good example is just past the cone of light that a streetlamp provides) where there is not enough light to see. They also mentioned using a constant light to temporarily blind an attacker to give time to start running away. If I was to carry a dedicated self defense tool it would probably be a collapsing batton, as I don't intend to carry a light larger than a 1x18650, and while I don't have any real combat experience I have a good swing and a 26'' batton beats a 3 inch knife in my book. Of course that would be a last resort as I can run pretty fast on adrenaline.

I think that the greatest thing anyone can do to be prepared for self defense is mental readiness through proper training and awareness of surroundings.
Best way to survive an attack is to not get attacked.

 

[Blackstuff]

A bit bizarre that almost all of the 'tests' mentioned in this thread (i skipped page 3) are on people EXPECTING to be strobed There is a huge difference between expecting it and it being set off without the 'strobee' knowing whats coming. I have made someone be physically sick using a Klarus XT10 on strobe (Admittedly they were drunk which is probably the only reason they agreed to do it). And as for someone still being able to charge into you if you stand in the same place after/during strobing them, well no sh*t they're going to be able to find you if all they have to do is continue in a straight line The whole point of strobing it to get the other person to shut their eyes/lose focus momentarily so you can move out of the way if they're coming at you or to be able to hit them without them having their guard up or knowing where its coming from. :thumbsup:

If people were expecting a strobe to be a stun ray ala Star Trek its unsurprising that they've been disappointed :ironic:

 

[Jiri]

A bit bizarre that almost all of the 'tests' mentioned in this thread (i skipped page 3) are on people EXPECTING to be strobed There is a huge difference between expecting it and it being set off without the 'strobee' knowing whats coming. I have made someone be physically sick using a Klarus XT10 on strobe (Admittedly they were drunk which is probably the only reason they agreed to do it). And as for someone still being able to charge into you if you stand in the same place after/during strobing them, well no sh*t they're going to be able to find you if all they have to do is continue in a straight line The whole point of strobing it to get the other person to shut their eyes/lose focus momentarily so you can move out of the way if they're coming at you or to be able to hit them without them having their guard up or knowing where its coming from. :thumbsup:

If people were expecting a strobe to be a stun ray ala Star Trek its unsurprising that they've been disappointed :ironic:

Agreed! +1

 

[wjv]

Not against a human, but. . .

From my posting here: http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...ing-my-face-gnawed-off!&p=4732109#post4732109

About a month ago I walked out of my camper and came face to face with 2 large racoons. .

The short story was:

observations:

- The TK51 @ 1,800 lumens right in their eyes had zero effect on them. They just looked at me like I was an idiot. . .

- The LD50 on strobe @1,800 lumens right in their eyes also had no effect on them. Again, they just looked at me like I was an idiot. . .

- The TK51 @ 1,800 lumens PLUS The LD50 at 1,800 lumens right in their eyes also had no effect on them. Again, they just looked at me like I was an idiot. . .

Granted these were racoons, not humans, but I'm quite sure that some meth-head or PCP freak might just have a similar reaction.

I did have a firearm in my camper, but since they were not being hostile/aggressive, it seemed the best approach ultimately was to just let them "do their thing" and eventually they moved on.