A good cheap household flashlight?

[smurfonice]

Hi all.

We live out in the country a ways in Arizona where we spend quite a bit of time outside at night when it's cool. Im looking for a household flashlight for under $50 for use camping, night activities, and attaching to my rifle for coyotes ect. which is rather important I can see clearly long ranges.

(Dont read these)
1) I will be mail-ordering or buying online, so this doesn't matter.
2)Less than $50.
3) I want a flashlight.
4) Size is not important
5) LED (known for efficiency, longevity, and compactness)
6) Manufacturer: Don't know.
7) What battery type do you want to use? Dont Care
8) How much genuine out the front (OTF) light do you want/need? Enough to be clear at a couple hundred yards
9) Throw vs. Flood: At what distance will you be most likely to use this light? Select all that apply.
____50-150 yards/meters (I live in a very rural area/farm with wide open spaces)
10) Runtime: Not over-inflated manufacturer runtime claims, but usable brightness measured from first activation to 50% with new batteries (Measured on maximum output).
____Up to 30 minutes (I want the brightest [and potentially smallest] light for brief periods)
____30-60 minutes (I have plenty of batteries just ready to be changed)
____90-120 minutes (Runtime is moderately important, but still not critical)
11) Durability/Usage: Generally the old phrase “you get what you pay for” is very accurate for flashlights.
____Slightly Important (Walks around the neighborhood).
13) User Interface (UI) and mode selection. Select all that apply.
____I want 2 light levels. (Brighter/short runtime and Dimmer/long runtime.)
____I want multiple light levels. (Some lights have 5-16 light levels.)
14)Material/Finish/Coating ____I don’t care.


I purchased a little 1200lm ultrafire knock off which has been working fine for the past week, and am looking to buy a couple more similar cheap lights to mount to different guns and to have handy, one of which I need to be more powerful. This is one I have been looking at:
a 3800 lumen trustfire light

Trustfire Xm-l T6 5-modes 3800lm Led Flashlight Electric Torch

Can someone tell me about what lumen rating surefire would rate these 1200, 1600, 3800lm flashlights at, and if theres any other disadvantages of the knock off brands?
Also, the knockoffs all seem to use leds from the company cree. Does surefire use these same leds?

Thanks for any response!

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[RCS1300]

Fenix Ld20. I'd suggest the LD22 instead for its simpler user interface, but it is $55 vs $48.

 

[Diablo_331]

Fenix Ld20 on eBay. I'd suggest the LD22 instead for its simpler user interface, but it is $55 vs $48.

I miss my LD20 :(

 

[Gunner12]

Output for those lights will depend on the type of LEDs thy have, the number of LEDs, and how well they are driven. Usually, a 1 XM-L T6 light is ~400-500 lumen, 3 would be 1200-1500 lumen.

I'm not sure how well some of those lights will hold up to recoil or abuse, since quality can be a hit or miss. Shiningbeam's lights are within your price range and could are well build from what I read.

As a note, lumen = overall output, lux = lumen per meter (light intensity) Laser = high lux, low lumen, flood light = low lux, high lumen.

Cree's LEDs are used in all sorts of lights from sub $10 to over $1000. The LEDs themselves are only a few bucks.

:welcome:

 

[smurfonice]

Thanks gunner, that was spot on what I wanted to know! Ill probably go with that light, and maybe another cheap one for around the house.