What did you do for runtime before LEDs?

[XR6Toggie]

In LE we usually used a Magcharger and only took it out of the charger when we got out of the car. It was standard to keep a supply of fresh D cell batteries available too.

 

[ZMZ67]

Another person who used lights sparingly or carried bigger lights. With no lithium primary AA/AAA or LEDs, D cell or 6V lights were used quite a bit.

One other alternative I used for camping and walking the woods at night was a kerosene lantern. The output of a kerosene lantern was modest at best but even a small font lantern would run most or all of the night on low and a little light goes a long way in a dark woods.Maybe not as great an alternative here in Colorado these days but in the woods of Ohio where I spent my youth they worked just fine.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

I also remember my father buying the 6V lanterns using the large square spring topped batteries and coleman lanterns. I still have my dual fuel unleaded coleman lantern but now that we have battery lanterns that can match the output of it.
I kept the coleman around as the best lanterns for a long time were dual tube fluorescent lanterns using 8D cells (rayovac).
They had older fluorescent lanterns that use 1-2 6V lantern batteries also. My dad decided to use the 4D to 6V lantern battery adapters when he found people kept leaving the lanterns on and I still have one in my garage with batteries in it that are about 20 years old that still puts out light. My coleman lantern sits in storage still I should probably consider selling it but for $2 you can buy a gallon of gas and run it for a long long time and not have to bother with batteries at all plus in the winter it can be a source of heat in an outage.

 

[AVService]

Mini Mags and many batteries.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

One of my favorite lights was a 2AA silver Eveready clicky penlight with a #222 bulb. The only problem with it was short runtime about 2 hours off new alkalines. It was expensive to feed vs the C and D cell incans I had. I even had a 1AA with a #122 bulb but the runtime of it was worse you were lucky to get an hour from it at rather dim output better than a solitaire though. I had a 2AA minimag clone that was nice till it got ruined by alkaleaks. I didn't start using rechargeable batteries till I got some Rayovac RAM (rechargeable alkaline) batteries but after about 2 dozen recharges of them the runtime was way too short to be useful.

The first white 5mm LED light even though cheap junk was a wonder in that it could use batteries my incans would not longer work with and run for hours and hours. I was instantly sold as the output of a 5mm LED mimicked the pattern of the #222 bulbs with weird bluish color but saved me a ton of money on batteries when I was rather poor. I went from rationing use of incans to playing with LED lights.

 

[Paul6ppca]

3D mag. Eventually converted to mag 1185.
Fit some reason I put it up for sale.
Mistake.

 

[xevious]

Thank you, everyone!!

This is exactly what I was hoping for in starting this thread, I'm so glad y'all have shared these stories.

We flashaholics have it ridiculously good in 2019, and it is so fun the learn about the hobby from times past.

I absolutely agree. We had a rough period for quite a while, where lighting was just painfully anemic and expensive. Knowing what once was makes it so much easier to appreciate what we have today. It's astounding how far LED technology has come and I'm really curious as to where it's going to go.

I'm really eager for the next battery breakthrough. Already there are prototype solid state Lithium Ion batteries, very safe, and eventually more efficient. Imagine 1,000 lumens for 1,000 minutes on a single charge.

 

[fivemega]

Back in the heyday of the P60 incandescent lamp run times were 60 minutes for 60 lumens.

What did you do when you were going on a four hour hike?

1- More brightness.
2- Longer run time.
3- Small flashlight size.

Pick two only. You can't have all three.
Let's say you want to keep brightness same (Incand. genuine P60) but more run time. Say 2.5 hours. In this case, you go with bigger flashlight size.
This is possible to use P60 on this body powered by 2S/2P primary CR123A. I do have this and use it.
You can also get about 4 hours if you have a tri bored body for 2S/3P primary CR123A. (total of 6 cells).
Your another option is to use 2P protected 18650 (3500mAh) with 3.6 volt lamp module and run time of about 4 hours.

 

[kelmo]

I got a MN02 LA for my Defender and had and a spares carrier with a MN03!

 

[kelmo]

I'm carrying a C2 in my jacket pocket!

 

[WalkIntoTheLight]

I used a 4D mag for runtime and output, back in ancient times. Loaded with 4 NiMH rechargeable D cells, it would last about 12 hours. Still have both the light and batteries, and they all still work (though the batteries hold less than half their original charge).

 

[zespectre]

I used to do a TON of "back country" camping where you packed everything in and weight really mattered. In the winter the lithium batteries were a godsend for their temperature tolerance but you used that light very sparingly and for many MANY years I used a combination of a UCO CandleLantern and/or this midget kerosene lamp for "campsite light" along with a mini-maglight, spare batteries, and definitely spare bulbs!

Mostly back then you made camp early, tried to get your cooking and cleanup done before dark, and then stayed put until morning because it was just too risky to be messing around in the woods or on the trail at night.

 

[LeanBurn]

Rayovac Workhorse...2D
Maglite 2D

D cells continue to be very affordable and useful...like the cells, the size of the light was the drawback. I was perfectly happy with the output...I still use sub 100 L for nearly everything.

When we went camping, we used Coleman naphtha lanterns for area light.

LED light size, output and run times have made have lighting affordably possible in any circumstance.

 

[alpg88]

back in those days i did the only thing i could do, got more batteries.

 

[Chadder]

Like everyone said already. I carried a 3 c cell mag and a mini mag as backup. I worked at a summer camp and lights were a must. The thing about incans was that the light got dimmer over time so you knew your batteries were dying. They typically got longer runtime because of the diminishing brightness. Your night vision would adjust to the diminishing light. That's what I love about my surefire LEDs they were not regulated and would diminishing over time and that little bit of light really helps rather that a regulated light that just shuts off.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

Like everyone said already. I carried a 3 c cell mag and a mini mag as backup. I worked at a summer camp and lights were a must. The thing about incans was that the light got dimmer over time so you knew your batteries were dying. They typically got longer runtime because of the diminishing brightness. Your night vision would adjust to the diminishing light. That's what I love about my surefire LEDs they were not regulated and would diminishing over time and that little bit of light really helps rather that a regulated light that just shuts off.

That was a major problem with incans of the day they typically started out with good to mediocre lumens and as they dimmed the lumen output and tint dropped to the point where you were having to rely on night vision along with the light. I've not ever heard of a regulated incan light back prior to the first white 5mm LEDs and often batteries measure 1.25-1.3v would render a light too orange tinted and dim to be useful. Fluorescent lighting was a godsend in that the tint didn't shift nearly as much to render it useless even though there were enough lumens output. The main drawback to fluorescent lighting is replacing tubes as I think when the batteries reach the end of their output it stresses the tubes with low voltage leading to quicker failure. CCFL was another innovation in that the tubes in them didn't suffer the darkening and were slightly more instantly on and warming up to max output. CCFL didn't catch on big time back in the day only a few lights used it till white LEDs started taking hold of the market. I still have a hybrid CCFL LED light called a doublebright essentially an redesign of the arc white light but with an integrated 5mm LED replacing the PR base incan bulb. This light didn't catch on mainly because the single 5mm LED was too weak compared to the incan version and the light was too expensive also. There was a coleman lantern using a U tube CCFL in a flip type fashion powered by 4AA batteries that was interesting also. The problem with these CCFL lights is the output while decent wasn't overly impressive and runtime even though good powered by 4AA limited the runtime to compete with full size D fluorescent lanterns. They never made a CCFL full size lantern it could have been a good thing but IMO CCFL came too late in the picture.

I still had and used incans during the 5mm LED light phase even shower head lights often had more output but the beam and throw nature and failure rates of the LED arrays etc made the incans still a better solution. It wasn't until the dorcy 1AAA LED keychain light that the trend of pocket keychain throwers started an LED war with the incans out there. I had a brinkman 2AA incan that was essentially a mini mag clone that I equipped with a nite ize 3x5mm drop in and switch that made the light from rarely used to very useful going from a few hours runtime of dimming orange light to greenish blue LED light for 5-10 times as long that was a bit blotchy.
The writing was on the wall.. keep tossing money at batteries for incans or go LED and save a lot of money on batteries and use some of that money for other LED lights.

 

[kelmo]

It was foggy the other night when I left the gym and I had a C2 in my pocket. What normally takes less than a minute to get to my car took 10 so i could goof off in the fog with my incan beam!!!

 

[Buck91]

For me, I started getting into flashlights when I got my first EDC, a green led photon microlight 2. Years of use out of the first set of batteries! The light got modded with a nichia gs and actually rides on a spare set of keys to this day decades later.

In the true spirit of the OP my answer is that my dad always used 6v lanterns. Or the Coleman propane lantern if in camp. When I got my first big Maglite (3D) and put the magnum star bulb in, I thought it was pretty dang impressive.

 

[offroadcmpr]

You would use a 5mm LED light as your main light. They only put out 2-3 lumens each so many lights would use 2-4 of them. That only gave you 5-10 lumens though. Enough to see your feet but not much else. You would use an incandescent light if you wanted to see any further. I had a couple of lights or headlamps that had both LED and incandescent. There was no regulation at this time. So LED's would last a very long time on a set of batteries, they would just get dimmer and dimmer as time went on.
Then the Luxeon LED's came out. Now you could do 20-40 lumens off of one LED, with double the efficiency of incandescent. They took over for EDC and smaller lights, but if you wanted 60 or more lumens, the p60 was still the go to light type.
Eventually some of the Luxeon lights started producing 60-80 lumens and there was lots of debate about whether to buy LED or incandescent. Around this time I stopped buying incandescent lights as LED's were bright enough as a lot more efficient. Except for my Mag85

So to sum it up, you either brought a lot of batteries, or made do with a lot less light than we are used to now.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

I remember the headlamps and lights with an incan main light and 5mm LED secondary flood light. Most of these had unimpressive bulbs in them barely 25 lumens if even that from them the white LED ended up brighter after the batteries were half dead on them.