Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

[Turbo DV8]

Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Seems the Cree and SSC goal is to get more brightness or a little more run time and more brightness. Are there any Cree or SSC lights out there that make no pretense to aspirations of crazy brightness but instead are designed to take advantage of the Cree or SSC efficiency by returning crazy-long run times?

 

[WadeF]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Fenix P3D, put it in general mode, click on and it starts right up in LOW and it will run for 65 hours on two CR123A primaries according to Fenix, but some have done tests and had 70+ hour run times.

 

[Theatre Booth Guy]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

I've got a brass Peak LED Solutions SSC that they claim will run for 40 hours without dimming followed by 72 hours of dimming light - all on a single AA cell!

I'm very happy with the light and am still on the original cell (have not tested the run time but, trust their word). If your eyes are at all adjusted, the light is great for indoor usage and can actually be too bright if your eyes have gotten more than slightly adjusted to the dark.

 

[Art Vandelay]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

The NovaTac 120 has very high, very low and everything in between.

 

[Derek Dean]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Although I don't think anybody has done an actual runtime test yet, my figures (based on NovaTac's published runtime of 240 hours at .33 lumens) show that the NovaTac 120P set to it's lowest level of .08 lumens, running a fresh primary CR123 cell, should get somewhere around 1000 hours, which I believe is around 40 days of continuous operation.

 

[FASTCAR]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

I remember some crazy post where a HDS on lowest ran for months and months.Maybee blink mode.

 

[270winchester]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Novatac.

 

[KenAnderson]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

I remember some crazy post where a HDS on lowest ran for months and months.Maybee blink mode.

Actually it's still running. More then 11 months continuous.

 

[fordwillman]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

.08 lumens would not be very useable in my opinion. I am sure someone will want to argue that, but outside that is just not useable. Still, pretty amazing.

 

[flashy bazook]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

hey, as to the novatac 0.08 lumens or blink mode with a very long runtime, I've got an idea. Keep any flashlight completely OFF, and it can run forever! :laughing:

Seriously, I thought the point of the original question is how can you get good runtime with some decent amount of light. The novatac emitter does not look very efficient when you examine the specs.

Lumapower generally puts out lights that pay attention to runtime yet produce useable and decent amounts of light. I.e., they input current at levels that are EFFICIENT for the LED being used. The M1 CREE will go on for more than 4 hrs at lumen output of 25 (battery 18650). And that flashlight has a strong high mode as well.

The Fenix (another company that has excellent efficiency regulator circuits) L2D CE will go on for 55 hrs at the low setting of 9 lumens.

If you care about runtime mainly you could also consider multi-LED flashlights (not CREE based, but smaller Nichias). The streamlight propoly 3xC with multi-LED's has an advertised running time of 336 hrs. The light output you get is not large, but is still fairly useable. Especially if you worry about emergency use - say prolonged power outages.

Finally, the newer Rebel 100 LED's may be even more efficient, but your question focused on the CREEs.

 

[swxb12]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

A $10 1xAAA Arc/E0 killer from UltraFire or something would be nice. No nasty blue nichia color either.

 

[BentHeadTX]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Turbo,
The Peak Baltic (AAA or 2xAAA) or Pacific (AAA or AA) have 4 different output levels that can be ordered. The lowest is XLR for extended long runtime. I recall the XLR pushes the LED at 1/3rd of the brightness of the standard so a Pacific with lithium AA should run around 40 hours of regulated brightness.
You could call them and they might make a special one with even lower drive levels. Another weird option would be to pick up the Peak First Responder and have an extended tail pack that would hold 5 NiMH/alkaline or lithium AA cells. When turned down to it's lowest level via a variable knob, it will drive the three SSC LEDs at 10mA each. This should run around 50 to 80 hours in regulation depending on the battery used.

 

[parnass]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

The Cree version Surefire E2L gets 9 hours of 45 lumen light output on a pair of SF123A (CR123a) batteries.

There are a couple of threads here on CPF which discuss this.

 

[john2551]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

If you want LONG runtime you would have to go with a 4, 5, or 6D maglite with a drop-in bulb. It will give you DAYS of bright useable light. Small cr123 powered lights are not in the same league.

http://www.led-replacement.com/4_maglite.html

 

[Derek Dean]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

hey, as to the novatac 0.08 lumens or blink mode with a very long runtime, I've got an idea. Keep any flashlight completely OFF, and it can run forever! :laughing:

I've been using my NovaTac almost every night set to .08 lumens, with a diffuser made from FASTCAR's excellent diffuser material, and it makes the most perfect night adapted light I've seen yet.

I'm amazed at how usable that amount of light really is. This was exactly one of the reasons I bought the NovaTac, so to discount it as not be a 'decent amount of light' is a disservice to all the effort required to produce a light capable of both extremes.

And, while I do agree that the blink mode could be debatable as to it's usefulness for navigation, I feel strongly that the .08 lumens is very usable and quite valid for this discussion..... certainly better than keeping the light off.

As a matter of fact, while I had it set up in candle mode in the bathroom during my nightly foray there, I was musing....... if I was in a situation that required it, I could easily be happy with this tiny bit of light 10 hours a night, rather than sitting in total darkness. That comes to over 3 months of use, every night, all night. To me, that's pretty cool.

Of course, we may just have different definitions of what is a 'usable' amount of light, and that's fine.

 

[Curious_character]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Several inexpensive direct drive lights including ones sold by DX have a two-level tailcap switch that just switches in a series resistor for the low mode. This can actually be a reasonably efficient way of reducing the light output when the battery voltage isn't a lot greater than the LED voltage. It's easy to swap out the resistor for a larger one. If you run one of these lights from a single Li-ion cell, you can choose any light level you want by increasing the resistor value, and the run time will increase accordingly.

c_c

 

[nikon]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

The Cree version Surefire E2L gets 9 hours of 45 lumen light output on a pair of SF123A (CR123a) batteries.

There are a couple of threads here on CPF which discuss this.

Though not quite as miserly as the new E2L, the Surefire G2L provides excellent output (80 lumens) while drawing only 350mA from the batteries. That should translate into sometyhing like 5 or 6 hours to 50% brightness.

 

[Illum]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

I think this was the intention of the McGizmo Miser...sipping gas for high runtime:candle:

 

[ElektroLumens]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

Seems the Cree and SSC goal is to get more brightness or a little more run time and more brightness. Are there any Cree or SSC lights out there that make no pretense to aspirations of crazy brightness but instead are designed to take advantage of the Cree or SSC efficiency by returning crazy-long run times?

To answer your question, the Elektro Lumens Anglelux is made for long run time. It uses the SSC P4 LED, powered from 2D, and a SHO Micropuck. Easy 24 hours to 50% original brightness.



The Blaster-1D runs from a single D cells, boosted by a puck, and runs seemingly endlessly. Not designed for maximum brightness at all, just super long runtime functionality.

Wayne

 

[tebore]

Re: Any Cree or SSC lights that say, "Screw brightness" and goes all out for runtime?

A chime in on ultra low brightness. I use My modded HDS a lot at night on Level 18 which is around 0.3lm so it's definitely usable and helps preserve night vision.

I did a little calculation using a formula mentioned by the HDS manual where every step down is a doubling of runtime. So on level 18 I've worked it out to [FONT=&quot]2621440 [/FONT]mins which works out to about 1800 days(that's like 5 years). I wonder if that's even possible with the way a li-ion battery self-discharges.