Why I hate LED Flashlights and Lights

[wimmer21]

Grab the scatter gun Jethro!

 

[wimmer21]

I wonder... do I need to buy an incandescent light?

Hmm, a better question might be... what's an incandescent light? ;-)

 

[chillinn]

I wonder... do I need to buy an incandescent light?

Hmm, a better question might be... what's an incandescent light? ;-)

Pretty thorough treatment on the Wiki

 

[Bushman5]

BAH HUMBUG TO these new fangled geeewhizits and hoodads...incandescent light! LED light! Tools of the devil! real men use Dietz #80 kerosene lanterns!

BAH!

:sick2:

 

[Need a Light?]

I've gone on one night hike. It was up a ~500-1000ft hill that was basically a huge rock up in Maine, quite steep, wooded for the bottom 80% and open rock up top. I went with a best friend and our girls. Me and the friend were rocking 6D 'dynalite's (old Ohio based us made plastic lights with two stacks of 3 cells behind a huge reflector with a handle, not unlike a 6v lantern with inline D's) with HPR51s pushed by nimh and nicd d cells. The girls had a C8 and a mini mag pro. But my friend wouldn't stop praising the dynalite's, and I had to agree. Lots of fun.

Led is great, I love to laugh at how bright a room can get when I take a pocketable light and make a room decently bright. But my G2 with 17670 and 3.7v xenon is my best friend. Run times be damned! Batteries are rechargeable!

 

[tab665]

REUNITED!!! i lost one of my incan rigs about 2 years ago at work. it was an OR slim 50, P6 adapter and head,with a shorty tail to fit an 18650. In it i had a lumens factory EO-4 bulb. fast forward 2 years and someone found it!!! simply put, it works better in my application at work than any other LED light i have tried. even though its only 150 bulb lumens it puts those lumens EXACTLY where i want it. EDC sized LED lights tend to put their lumens all over the place and lights up everything equally, which in turn, still makes it hard to focus on what im trying to look at.

 

[bykfixer]

^^ I ♡ happy endings.

Although it's an LED I fell for the unregulated SureFire E1Bc because it acts like an incan, has that tunnel beam of an incan and the lumens of a much larger incan in a 1 cell size.

 

[KiwiMark]

I've got so many LED lights I lose track. Many are neutral white or warm white and quite a few are high CRI Nichia versions. Personally I think LEDs are great for the efficiency, which makes a really big difference to smaller lights. Multimode is a true Godsend too, so useful to be able to set the amount of light to whatever suits the task best.

I've also got a bunch of incan lights. Pretty much all of them are bigger lights that use larger batteries where efficiency isn't nearly so critical. The one I use the most is my Maglite 2D with Pelican low bulb running 2 x 32650 5,000mAh cells - it can run for a couple of hours on a charge which is pretty decent and the light output is very useful. I've been known to take that ROP Lo Maglite camping, colour rendition is fantastic and it throws decently well.

In my world LED and incan happily co-exist!
The only LED I hated and swapped away was a Fenix E-01 that had a horrible 'angry purple' output.

 

[badbs101]

To me,

Incans are for fun and LEDs are for survival/bugout bags. When you need the light to work, and for a long time, LEDs.

When lighting something in a less stressful or critical environment, I prefer incans. It's more natural, no PWM and easier on the eyes. Even low output LEDs can give me that scratchy-eyed feeling I remember after getting my picture taken by my mom's Brownie Hawkeye camera with it's nuclear powered flash bulb.

 

[bykfixer]

To me,
Even low output LEDs can give me that scratchy-eyed feeling I remember after getting my picture taken by my mom's Brownie Hawkeye camera with it's nuclear powered flash bulb.

Awe yeah, those disposable flash bulbs were the worst man. Your grandmas whips out her point n shoot with the flashbulb that rotates each time it fires...
"Say cheese" wait, n wait, n wait "little johnnie slide closer to your sister"... wait n wait n wait knowing sooner or later your brother will blink at the exact moment you hear the click and grandmas gonna say "alright somebody blinked, but that was the last flash so stay put while I change the flash bulb." Ugh!
So yeah 3 or 4 pics later your jaws hurt from fake smiling and you're bumping into walls from being blinded repeatedly because your dum@$$ brother kept blinking.

Yup some LED's at 2am brings back those fond memories.

 

[Hugh Johnson]

I bought this night light for $125k.
It came with a free house.

It's 3'x1.5' wooden frame covered with red white and blue incan Christmas bulbs that was hanging in the den of the house I looked at. I told the real estate lady "tell the seller to throw in the house with that flag and they've got a deal."

Nice! Where I come from you can only buy a studio apartment for twice that price. Not necessarily a nice one, either. I wish that wasn't so.

 

[Hugh Johnson]

Yeap I did away with many LEDs in my house.

1.) I am using flashlights to search for items either outside or inside, I need to be able to see colors that incandescent bulbs provide, and that white LED just washes out.

2.) Discreet searching. I feel like I'm holding a signaling devices rather than a flashlight with LED flashlights, seems like something to get someones attention with. See them before they see you right? Not let them see you with a bright LED looking for them (lets say an intruder) Another reason I like incans

3.) Why would I need a super bright light for just searching within 50 meters as most people do with their flashlights?

4.) This should be my #1, better on eyes, the light has a closer wavelength to normal sunlight I would say, helping them adjust better to what you are looking at especially at night.

5.) But LEDS have better battery life! Batteries are getting better, are cheap and rechargeable now a days it is something I am willing to risk with incans.

6.) But incans burn out way quicker than LEDS! I know a lot of people with incans that have gone for 10 years without a bulb burnout.

7.) Health. Blue light from LEDS is unseen that can disturb sleep rhythms and possibly increase the risk of serious health conditions, including cancer and cardiovascular disease. The AMA also cautioned that those light-emitting-diode lights can impair nighttime driving vision.

This just came out this September..

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nati...7bbd53d2b5d_story.html?utm_term=.34ab1fa1db67

My thoughts:
1. I agree incans are superior here.
2. LED advantage. Both of my new lights have modes that are more discreet than even my incan Maglite solitaires (which I love).
3. Because some people need their lights for more than searching close to moderate distances. For myself, searching is a distant priority.
4. Agree.
5. As batteries improve the advantage of led's increases. I need a light to get me through the night in the unlikely event I get lost in the woods during one of my adventures. Not having to carry a pile of batteries with me makes it more likely I will have such a light with me.
6. Depends on the use case. I think empirical evidence shows that led's last longer.
7. Agree.

 

[Modernflame]

Yeap I did away with many LEDs in my house.

1.) I am using flashlights to search for items either outside or inside, I need to be able to see colors that incandescent bulbs provide, and that white LED just washes out.

2.) Discreet searching. I feel like I'm holding a signaling devices rather than a flashlight with LED flashlights, seems like something to get someones attention with. See them before they see you right? Not let them see you with a bright LED looking for them (lets say an intruder) Another reason I like incans

3.) Why would I need a super bright light for just searching within 50 meters as most people do with their flashlights?

4.) This should be my #1, better on eyes, the light has a closer wavelength to normal sunlight I would say, helping them adjust better to what you are looking at especially at night.

5.) But LEDS have better battery life! Batteries are getting better, are cheap and rechargeable now a days it is something I am willing to risk with incans.

6.) But incans burn out way quicker than LEDS! I know a lot of people with incans that have gone for 10 years without a bulb burnout.

7.) Health. Blue light from LEDS is unseen that can disturb sleep rhythms and possibly increase the risk of serious health conditions, including cancer and cardiovascular disease. The AMA also cautioned that those light-emitting-diode lights can impair nighttime driving vision.

This just came out this September..

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nati...7bbd53d2b5d_story.html?utm_term=.34ab1fa1db67

When Surefire started introducing LED flashlights back in...whenever that was, I purchased a U2 Ultra. The cool factor was off the charts, but I was disenchanted by the the tint of the light. I decided then that I would continue using incandescent lights for many of the reasons you listed. However, today's neutral white LED's have remedied many of those woeful tint maladies, at least in my estimation. After I read your post, I held my old Surefire 6P incandescent in one hand and my neutral Hound Dog from Malkoff devices in the other. The incandescent light is warmer, but the color rendition is excellent in both lights. In fact, in my very unscientific test, the Hound Dog's 4000k beam seemed a truer representation of daylight. All that is to say that you may find it worth your while to experiment with neutral LED's.

 

[ssanasisredna]

I wonder... do I need to buy an incandescent light?

Hmm, a better question might be... what's an incandescent light? ;-)

I think you can find them next to the 8-Tracks.

 

[bykfixer]

Nice! Where I come from you can only buy a studio apartment for twice that price. Not necessarily a nice one, either. I wish that wasn't so.

Houses were on the clearance rack when I bought mine.

Yeah, some say LED's help stop global warming, others say they cause epilectic seizures and adhd.
But the bottom line is what once seemed like the hoola-hoop is here to stay. Thankfully, through time many are begininng to mimic the fabled light bulb.

 

[TKC]

The OP hates LED's, and I LOVE them. I am NOT a fan of incan's.

 

[fivemega]

I am NOT a fan of incan's.

You are. Because you view and post in incandescent subforums.

 

[scout24]

These are the not the lights you're looking for...

 

[KITROBASKIN]

Are incandescents the equivalent of having a manual transmission in a car for stop and go commuting?

 

[scout24]

Manual transmission, no ABS, traction control, vehicle stability control, or any of that jazz. Headers. Straight pipes. High-test gas. 4 barrel carbs. Y'all can keep that EFI nonsense. You may be faster in your new Dodge Demon, but you'll NEVER have the '70 Hemi Cuda with a shaker hood, pistol grip 4 speed and Cragar's cool factor. Never. (Now, gotta walk my dog. Gonna grab a handful of Surefire M6, and burn some filament.) :bow: :thumbsup: :rock: