Time to revisit a classic value for money LED flashlight.
I bought my first Dorcy 1AAA (1LED) almost as soon as I saw discussion about it on CPF. Apparently at the regular price of $5.94 - WalMart could not keep them on the shelves for long, and people were reporting them sold out .
So it was just about a week later that I bought my second one when they came back in stock.
All in all the Dorcy 1AAA was considered great value for money and had a performance in the ballpark of the highly regarded ArcAAA - the CPF favorite at the time.
In my review of my second Dorcy 1AAA I thought I had figured out a way to pick a light with a good beam while it was still in its blister pack. This turned out only to be partially true. Although it was true for the one I picked and others reported similar success - I have to admit that I have bought 4 more Dorcy 1AAA's over time that I had to return for one issue or another.
The Dorcy 1AAA went through a new issue - which was more in a cosmetic change and a slight difference in circuit component going from a CX chip to one that's marked AM...... But basically it remained unchanged materially.
Until recently when I heard about a change from reflector to focusing/collimating lens and a significant difference in its circuit and construction - enough that many people were saying they had better stock up on the older versions.......
I got a newer version recently - one with a focusing lens - so what are the differences?
Side-by-side one can see the difference between a generation 1 and the two later generations - cosmetically the Dorcy printing on the barrel has been removed and the rubber inserts have gone from a parallel; ribbing to a diamond shaped pattern - with Dorcy embossed.
It's not until one examines the front of the light that it is clear gen3 has the focusing lens
There wasn't much difference between the gen1 and gen2 - other than the obvious lottery in beam quality for a cheap flashlight. Often there were also tint variations - I've seen very blue beams and the more recent ones seem to tend to a warm brown. But basically a Dorcy 1AAA was not going to surprise too much.
But the gen3 lens version performs quite differently
gen3 vs. gen1 Dorcy 1AAA
As expected the new gen 3 Dorcy 1AAA with lens - gives a spot beam with very little side-spill. Compared to the older versions the spot beam is like a cartoon spot light circle - pretty well delimited - whereas the older versions using a reflector give a much wider and usable side-spill which helps light up a room.
I initially was negative about spot beams - until I tried the River Rock 1.5w 2AA (focusing lens) - I was impressed enough with its spot beam - that I went and got the similar performing River Rock 1.5w 2C as well.
In my course of using/playing with these spot beams I thought that sometimes I saw more clearly using the spot - like it was a "higher-definition" light - I thought it might have to do with the spot beam being pretty even in level, whereas we're used to lights that are very bright in the center with fade outwards.
I'm still thinking of ways to show this phenomena - but since I have two versions of basically the same flashlight one with lens spot beam and the other with regular reflector - I attempted to show it......
First was to put two optical test targets side by side and more or less point the lights at the center. Expose for the spot and take the side-by-side comparison.
The reflector beam of the gen1 shows a lot more than the spot beam as expected - and I could not say with any certainty whether one was better defined than the other......
However illuminating a printed page with the two lights and exposing for the spot -
Even though the gen1 again shows more - I think the gen3's beam may actually show a bit better definition - I think it simply comes down to the evenness of the spot beams - whereas the reflector gen1 beam is more patchy - so the results are variable within the beam - some parts may look better, others less so.......
Here are the circuits from the 3 generations -
I bought my first Dorcy 1AAA (1LED) almost as soon as I saw discussion about it on CPF. Apparently at the regular price of $5.94 - WalMart could not keep them on the shelves for long, and people were reporting them sold out .
So it was just about a week later that I bought my second one when they came back in stock.
All in all the Dorcy 1AAA was considered great value for money and had a performance in the ballpark of the highly regarded ArcAAA - the CPF favorite at the time.
In my review of my second Dorcy 1AAA I thought I had figured out a way to pick a light with a good beam while it was still in its blister pack. This turned out only to be partially true. Although it was true for the one I picked and others reported similar success - I have to admit that I have bought 4 more Dorcy 1AAA's over time that I had to return for one issue or another.
The Dorcy 1AAA went through a new issue - which was more in a cosmetic change and a slight difference in circuit component going from a CX chip to one that's marked AM...... But basically it remained unchanged materially.
Until recently when I heard about a change from reflector to focusing/collimating lens and a significant difference in its circuit and construction - enough that many people were saying they had better stock up on the older versions.......
I got a newer version recently - one with a focusing lens - so what are the differences?
Side-by-side one can see the difference between a generation 1 and the two later generations - cosmetically the Dorcy printing on the barrel has been removed and the rubber inserts have gone from a parallel; ribbing to a diamond shaped pattern - with Dorcy embossed.
It's not until one examines the front of the light that it is clear gen3 has the focusing lens
There wasn't much difference between the gen1 and gen2 - other than the obvious lottery in beam quality for a cheap flashlight. Often there were also tint variations - I've seen very blue beams and the more recent ones seem to tend to a warm brown. But basically a Dorcy 1AAA was not going to surprise too much.
But the gen3 lens version performs quite differently
gen3 vs. gen1 Dorcy 1AAA
As expected the new gen 3 Dorcy 1AAA with lens - gives a spot beam with very little side-spill. Compared to the older versions the spot beam is like a cartoon spot light circle - pretty well delimited - whereas the older versions using a reflector give a much wider and usable side-spill which helps light up a room.
I initially was negative about spot beams - until I tried the River Rock 1.5w 2AA (focusing lens) - I was impressed enough with its spot beam - that I went and got the similar performing River Rock 1.5w 2C as well.
In my course of using/playing with these spot beams I thought that sometimes I saw more clearly using the spot - like it was a "higher-definition" light - I thought it might have to do with the spot beam being pretty even in level, whereas we're used to lights that are very bright in the center with fade outwards.
I'm still thinking of ways to show this phenomena - but since I have two versions of basically the same flashlight one with lens spot beam and the other with regular reflector - I attempted to show it......
First was to put two optical test targets side by side and more or less point the lights at the center. Expose for the spot and take the side-by-side comparison.
The reflector beam of the gen1 shows a lot more than the spot beam as expected - and I could not say with any certainty whether one was better defined than the other......
However illuminating a printed page with the two lights and exposing for the spot -
Even though the gen1 again shows more - I think the gen3's beam may actually show a bit better definition - I think it simply comes down to the evenness of the spot beams - whereas the reflector gen1 beam is more patchy - so the results are variable within the beam - some parts may look better, others less so.......
Here are the circuits from the 3 generations -