Today I learned why not to trust a cheap light

[tuelleric]

Normally I do not go the cheap way and this also holds for lights. But besides my Surefire w/M61 I have a Solarforce L2P running a Solarforce drop-in as an all purpose light at home.



It performed well so far, so I kind of understand people who say they do not spend more money on a flashlight than a budget light from China costs. Well, if you are at home where you have light anyway, this might be okay. But now I know why you should never rely on such a cheap light when the chips are down.



Today I dropped my Solarforce from about 1 m to the floor and it died immediately. There were no visible harms on the body, but the light engine just quit working.



I installed my M61 in the Solarforce now, as I really cannot imagine that this would have happened with a Malkoff. I also think of replacing the stock switch with a McClicky. This combo should be tough enough then to survive at least at home.



But for all serious tasks I definitely will get another Surefire/Malkoff. There are enough situations when it is better not to stay in the dark just because having saved some 50 or 100 bucks...

 

[tuelleric]

Well, almost six years ago, but today I learned the lesson a second time. I just received a C8 flashlight from China which was said to have quite a good quality when bought from a "renowned" brand.

It has a programmable driver, so the first thing I did was to get rid of the blinky and flashy modes. After my reprogramming it worked for a short test, maybe one minute runtime or so. After let say 30 minutes I wanted to use it again and all of a sudden neither mode switching nor entering the programming menu worked anymore. No idea how to fix that.

While the mechanical build quality is indeed really good, the electronics seem to be quite unreliable. Once more i have to conclude that my all so simple one mode Malkoffs (in my MD2 and MD3 I use them with the high/low ring) are the lights I trust in most.

 

[bykfixer]

Wow! You musta dug deep to find your old thread.
Pretty cool.

Glad to see you weren't left in the dark.
Yeah there's a whole lotta very popular brands that I don't own nor will I. For the reasons you cited... twice.

 

[tuelleric]

I still use my Solarforce host with the M61, so I dimly remembered...

 

[scs]

Normally I do not go the cheap way and this also holds for lights. But besides my Surefire w/M61 I have a Solarforce L2P running a Solarforce drop-in as an all purpose light at home.



It performed well so far, so I kind of understand people who say they do not spend more money on a flashlight than a budget light from China costs. Well, if you are at home where you have light anyway, this might be okay. But now I know why you should never rely on such a cheap light when the chips are down.



Today I dropped my Solarforce from about 1 m to the floor and it died immediately. There were no visible harms on the body, but the light engine just quit working.



I installed my M61 in the Solarforce now, as I really cannot imagine that this would have happened with a Malkoff. I also think of replacing the stock switch with a McClicky. This combo should be tough enough then to survive at least at home.



But for all serious tasks I definitely will get another Surefire/Malkoff. There are enough situations when it is better not to stay in the dark just because having saved some 50 or 100 bucks...

Any unpotted electronics and solder joints might not survive a drop, so I don't think the inexpensive price tag is the problem here, unless there's is substandard workmanship in the construction of your Solarforce dropin that made it even more susceptible to damage.

 

[scs]

BTW, you can't trust an expensive light by default either.

 

[Connor]

I't not only cheap China lights. I dropped my ARC LS once, on the side, from about 1 meter high. Onto carpet.
About as dead as ARC flashlights LLC. If you sense a soft note of bitterness in there somewhere: it's not only in your head. ;-)

 

[scs]

According to a story here on CPF, there is a multi thousand dollar custom light offered here that's not even IPX-8. Imagine that!

 

[tuelleric]

Agreed, expensive is not necessary fail safe. But there is a lower limit for a quality flashlight, I think.

 

[matt4350]

I've got several Solarforce lights, and they're fun, but the only one I consider "reliable" holds a Nailbender dropin and has a McClicky replacement.

 

[peter yetman]

This is a "Pay cheap, pay twice" one.
Having said that, one of my first quality lights was a Surefire P3X, not my favourite light so it didn't get babied. I dropped it a few months ago and smashed the lens and it's also dead. Without getting onto a CS Bash, suffice to say it lives in the parts bin now.
I stick with Malkoff and Oveready.
P

 

[tuelleric]

I have the McClicky in my Solarforce as well, quite easy to install with the brass retaining ring.

 

[Tachead]

Normally I do not go the cheap way and this also holds for lights. But besides my Surefire w/M61 I have a Solarforce L2P running a Solarforce drop-in as an all purpose light at home.



It performed well so far, so I kind of understand people who say they do not spend more money on a flashlight than a budget light from China costs. Well, if you are at home where you have light anyway, this might be okay. But now I know why you should never rely on such a cheap light when the chips are down.



Today I dropped my Solarforce from about 1 m to the floor and it died immediately. There were no visible harms on the body, but the light engine just quit working.



I installed my M61 in the Solarforce now, as I really cannot imagine that this would have happened with a Malkoff. I also think of replacing the stock switch with a McClicky. This combo should be tough enough then to survive at least at home.



But for all serious tasks I definitely will get another Surefire/Malkoff. There are enough situations when it is better not to stay in the dark just because having saved some 50 or 100 bucks...

Even Malkoff's and Elzetta's can fail.

"Two is one and one is none"

Redundancy is key with all things in critical situations:thumbsup:

 

[ven]

I find solarforce as hosts are decent for the money, no issue. Some have been put through their paces many times. However their drop ins are cheap.............i would not trust them for any serious use.

 

[INFRNL]

Wow! You musta dug deep to find your old thread.
Pretty cool.

Glad to see you weren't left in the dark.
Yeah there's a whole lotta very popular brands that I don't own nor will I. For the reasons you cited... twice.

ha ha, I have seen some people bring back some threads from the dead, but not a 6ry old thread... and to top it off , it's his own thread. Never seen that before on any forum throughout the years.

Well at least this time he has gotten responses.


This is why I only buy from trusted and recommended brands. good thing for having other lights. I'm not sure what these el cheapo Chinese lights are costing you, but a few more bucks sure can go a long way.

I haven't owned many lights, Used to use the ole mag lights but got tired of the bulbs always going out. Finally a few years ago I came here looking for a decent light and ended up with a couple of 4/7 lights. Only ever had an issue once with the little quark123 but it got replaced under warranty maybe a weeks time without. Something went wrong in the head with the electronics. It still worked but acted up on occasion. It's been fine since then. and the other one (quark 123x2) has been flawless since the day I got it.


I feel that as long as you stay with the bigger names; Fenix, eagtac, etc these Chinese manufactured lights will be as reliable as the USA made lights. Just got to stay away from the dollar store Chinese lights

hopefully after 2 times of el cheapo's, you will venture out further or stay with your Malkoffs. Best of luck and thank you for sharing your experiences

 

[Tac Gunner]

Sorry to hear that about your C8. If you head over to the budget light forum those guys over there should be able to help ya figure it out.

 

[Thom2022]

To be honest the C8 host seems pretty solid (although I have not used any other manufacturer so have nothing to compare to) there's only 3 things that could possibly be wrong with it. Maybe 4. Main ones is the shock has damaged the emitter driver or switch. For all of about £15 you can replace all three of those with exactly what you want. The 4th thing is the reflector may have shifted and caused a short.

 

[tuelleric]

ha ha, I have seen some people bring back some threads from the dead, but not a 6ry old thread... and to top it off , it's his own thread. Never seen that before on any forum throughout the years.

Haha, I thought if anyone is allowed to do so than me ;-)

Well at least this time he has gotten responses.

I actually could not remember that there was no feedback at all. It was one of my first posts with my experiences I made so far. Might have been shortly before the forum's crash, not sure...

This is why I only buy from trusted and recommended brands. good thing for having other lights. I'm not sure what these el cheapo Chinese lights are costing you, but a few more bucks sure can go a long way.

I spend around 25 USD, shipping included. That is one of the big advantages the Chinese vendors have, the ultra cheap international shipping costs. I mainly bought this one to test a XP-L HI. But I think that throwers are not for me. Still have to see.

hopefully after 2 times of el cheapo's, you will venture out further or stay with your Malkoffs. Best of luck and thank you for sharing your experiences

I will for sure test some other lights but new Malkoff stuff is already put on my list!

Sorry to hear that about your C8. If you head over to the budget light forum those guys over there should be able to help ya figure it out.

Thanks, Gunnar, I already asked there, hopefully the guys who programmed the driver software can help.

To be honest the C8 host seems pretty solid (although I have not used any other manufacturer so have nothing to compare to) there's only 3 things that could possibly be wrong with it. Maybe 4. Main ones is the shock has damaged the emitter driver or switch. For all of about £15 you can replace all three of those with exactly what you want. The 4th thing is the reflector may have shifted and caused a short.

The host is pretty good indeed, very solid and with the integrated head it has a good thermal management. Still thinking of replacing the driver with a single mode one (without any micro controller).

 

[Thom2022]

Deleted: was a duplicate of my earlier post for some reason.

 

[ScottFree]

Any unpotted electronics and solder joints might not survive a drop, so I don't think the inexpensive price tag is the problem here, unless there's is substandard workmanship in the construction of your Solarforce dropin that made it even more susceptible to damage.

Is there a thread or post somewhere that has a list of potted lights out there? HDS and Zebralights are the only ones that I know of. Would be interesting to hear what other ones there are.