Why does anyone make incans anymore? Just bought a 2xAAA MiniMag and it's incan

Just bought a 2xAAA Minimag off your favorite auction site and to my surprise it turns out to be incan. I assumed it was LED, and that they haven't made them in a while. Wasted 12 bucks on it. I thought it was for sure LED.

And the icing on the cake is, there is no upgrade for it. Not cost-effective anyway. There is a TerraLux floating around that's been Unobtanium for 7 years. And even if not, would end up costing $28 which is the price point that allows many AAA lights, I prefer the 3xAAA configuration.

Acquiring a nice functioning flashlight, especially one as iconic as the Minimag, is never a waste. I agree there is no good upgrade path to turn it into an LED light, but incans have a charm all their own. If nothing else, it will make a nice gift to someone, or something your kids can play with without worrying about them damaging or losing a more expensive light.

I really liked the fact that one could unscrew the bezel and slide it onto the other end and make a candle of it. Like most churches, ours had a tradition of lighting small candles for all the congregation members for the close of the service. I believe it was Christmas, but it might have been Good Friday. One year with were with my wife's family, and our two year old nephew was having a fit because he didn't get a candle to hold. I pulled out my Minimag, took the bezel off, and handed it to him. He was so pleased that he got to be like all the grownups.

I am going to gift it somebody.

Then going to get Rayovac Roughneck 3aaa light.
Makes a fabulous gift.

There's a lot of discussion on this forum about tint. It seems like an effort to approach incan tint. People are even willing to sacrifice output and/or battery life.

I think the answer to the Op's question is that there's a market for it. So who are these people and what are they looking for? I'd guess they simply don't know or care that there are more efficient alternatives.

The slightly yellowish tint in incan lights is less harsh on the eyes and seems to affect how we see colors at night less.

Incandescent is still the gold standard for color rendering. And cheap to produce in some variants.

As far as "converting" a 2xAAA mini mag, I believe a 3mm red or yellow LED should fit in place of the bulb and operate on the supplied voltage. Most white LEDs won't find enough voltage to operate very bright.

Efficient LED lighting has been here for some time, well over a decade, and yet incan lighting still persists. If LED could replace incan lighting, it would have by now, so OP is making a hidden and incorrect assumption that LED light is equal or better than incan. Clearly, because incan still exists, this is not the case. LED is efficient at producing a kind of light, but it cannot reproduce the light that incan can no matter how efficient or inefficient it is, at least not yet, not in general. The color temperature curves are quite different between LED and incan. Incan light is far closer to the natural light of the day and the Sun, which is the light that our eyes evolved to see. If the quality of the light itself is not a concern, then I can see how someone might not understand why incan lighting is still used anywhere. Fortunately, the quality of the light is very important, thus there remains a market for incan lighting, including flashlights.

The typical eBay seller has new old stock items they bought real cheap somewhere and sell them to make a profit.
Not all are honorable, however many times it comes down to a basic lack of understanding the details. The seller not knowing the details does not share them. The buyer under a presumption figures it's this or that for less than a store has it.
And sometimes the seller is sketchy and presents just enough details to lure someone in for the sale. I have neighbors who buy stuff at auctions and sell the stuff on eBay with no clue about details. Surprisingly the stuff sells for the large part.

Mag stopped making incan lights in 015 or 16. But when they made them they made literally millions.

Actually there are not many companies still making incan items be-it flashlights or bulbs. A few still do. The market just isn't there anymore and producing LED's has become very inexpensive. There is just a lot of stock laying around.

And if you did a poll of folks in "flyover country" you'd likely find most still prefer the incan bulb, yet do find brighter and more efficient LED's a necessary evil in todays USA.

answer: because it's cheap.

and they have a gazillion units made.

color rendition? Please.

No, Joe sixpack prefers 2.99 walmart special. Not better color rendering.

It seems it will take 5-10 years to flush the junk out of the system and for incans to go the way of the payphone.

etc- I'll gladly give you $12.00 for it, and throw in an as-new 1xAAA LED Minimag. If you're interested, PM me. I'll throw the AAA and cash in a padded envelope tomorrow to you.

You got mail. . .

scout24 said:

etc- I'll gladly give you $12.00 for it, and throw in an as-new 1xAAA LED Minimag. If you're interested, PM me. I'll throw the AAA and cash in a padded envelope tomorrow to you.

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Good score!!
Chillin did a thread in the incan section about some military use bulbs. I think they were F-14 dash bulbs... anyway the beam would probably make op puke, but if you like a nice swirly filled beam (looks like a hurricane on a wall) in a bullet proof bulb they are goodies. I finally got one to blow at 7 volts. lol... and it lasted a minute or two before it exploded inside of the globe.

Lamptronix thread.

Hugh Johnson said:

[...]I think the answer to the Op's question is that there's a market for it. So who are these people and what are they looking for? I'd guess they simply don't know or care that there are more efficient alternatives.

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Actually, my feeling is that there really isn't a market for it anymore - could have been more like laziness on part of the manufacturer.
Mag hasn't exactly been known for innovation IMO; their basic designs may have been competitive a long time ago, but the unreliability of the Minimag switches should have prompted some sort of improvement like, 20 years ago. :ironic:
I got rid of mine as fast as I could when I joined this forum.

PeterH said:

[...] As far as "converting" a 2xAAA mini mag, I believe a 3mm red or yellow LED should fit in place of the bulb and operate on the supplied voltage. Most white LEDs won't find enough voltage to operate very bright.

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+1 on the 3mm LED 'upgrade', I have done this a time or two.
The only trick is to make sure the polarity is of course correct for the LED leads, and to use alkalines for their 2x1.6V compared to NiMH's 2x1.2V.
(While we consider the voltage 'under load' to be comparable for these two differing chemistries, the miniscule load of a direct-drive 3mm LED is such that the output voltage of the alkalines approaches their maximum 'at rest' voltage.)

bykfixer said:

Mag stopped making incan lights in 015 or 16.

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I once believed this also, but take a look at their website. They still sell incans, and they advertise recently introduced incan flashlight models.

Also, all the Mini LED models, possibly all the LED models, have "LED" in the model name, while none of the incandescent flashlights have "LED" in the name. The Mini MagLite LED flashlight model appears nearly identical to the Mini MagLite Flashlight, so one failsafe and successfully repeatable method to determine which one is which is to closely examine the model name for the letters "L," "E," and "D," either all appearing together in order, or not at all.

Keep it. We are only taking 12 bucks here. Toss some AAAs and have fun. No seals broken, no end of days. If yea don't I am sure others will want it! No big loss either way. In fact probably a gain for someone.

LED minimag vs incan is easy to spot at the business end.


Both double A and triple A are like that.

And the packaging of LED ones are easy to spot since they are white. Incan are blue.

The old LED packaging was the tricky one.

And Mag said they stopped making incan lights. I believe them.
Between 1984 (the year they began) and 1990 14 million were sold. Like I said before... they made millions before they stopped. The triple A... not so many. But they still have a ton of stock left.
The ML25 incan was released Oct 2015. (According to the package of a blue one I have #71) and by the close of 2016 incan ML25's were serial numbered over 10 million.


Kept the blue one nip because the sealed package says it's black.

scout24,

Your mailbox full, the light was shipped off to you today and there should be a couple of Eneloops inside..Respectfully yours

The AAs I know. It's the AAA that I am not familiar with, never had one so it got me confused.

It's amazing they make that C-based Mag with "Xenon". In 2016?

etc said:

scout24,

Your mailbox full, the light was shipped off to you today and there should be a couple of Eneloops inside..Respectfully yours

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Thank you! I left a cell in yours as well, can't remember what it was. And a small brass splitring. Thank you for the PM heads up, they get away from me on occasion...

+1

I prefer incan light to LED but concede that LED has advantages over incan in many situations.

We stocked up on incan bulbs for the home before the government imposed change and have years worth of bulbs. My wife still picks up incan bulbs for the home at estate and garage sales when she sees them. We both prefer the warm soft light.

I still have a 2aa incan minimag that sees regular use and plan to pick up a 2aaa version off ebay to round out my collection.

The (relatively) dim yellow light has several applications. If you've got kids, checking a sore throat with an incan flashlight (like your new 2aaa minimag) renders better color and I know some doctors swear by incan bulbs for their examination flashlights due to their ability to more accurately render color.

chillinn said:

Efficient LED lighting has been here for some time, well over a decade, and yet incan lighting still persists. If LED could replace incan lighting, it would have by now, so OP is making a hidden and incorrect assumption that LED light is equal or better than incan. Clearly, because incan still exists, this is not the case. LED is efficient at producing a kind of light, but it cannot reproduce the light that incan can no matter how efficient or inefficient it is, at least not yet, not in general. The color temperature curves are quite different between LED and incan. Incan light is far closer to the natural light of the day and the Sun, which is the light that our eyes evolved to see. If the quality of the light itself is not a concern, then I can see how someone might not understand why incan lighting is still used anywhere. Fortunately, the quality of the light is very important, thus there remains a market for incan lighting, including flashlights.

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