Hunting/Tracking

[bower4311]

First off I'm going to say that I respect a place like this a lot, I too have some hobbies that I'm very into. Unfortunately, this is not one of them I'm looking to pursue, but am looking for a little advice.

I will be training my dog for legal deer tracking in New York state. I will legally be allowed to track and put down game at night. This is different than hunting at night mind you. My job will not be to put down a live and running around animal. I know I've read some topics here where they suggest lower lights for hunting because of scaring the deer. This is not a concern of mine. The deer I'm tracking are supposed to be critically injured, and spooking a healthy non-critically injured deer is not a problem. I've read about blue lights but don't think I've seen enough solid evidence to see that they're worth it. I'm young with good color recognition.

Here's what I'm looking for. I want a preferably better quality/more expensive light for myself as the lead tracking with the dog. I would also like a couple backup lights, or lights for the hunter as he follows. Being at night in the wood, I assume I can sacrifice intensity for duration, being around 2-3 hours. I am all for building one, but have no current experience with that. If that is the best route, I would love to go that way and have some electrical engineer friends that have a lot of experience with electronics. My budget would be around $150 and this is a Christmas gift so that's where I want to start. I'll say that 2 lights under this would be great. One better than the other, if I could get three out of it without sacrificing tons of quality then better yet.

I understand some of you are operating with top notch gear, and I respect that more than anything, I'm the same way with other things, but I don't need the best of the best, hopefully something that falls into a good price-range that will serve me well for my purpose. If it isn't worth building then I won't go that route, but I'm really hoping it is, I love projects like this and hopefully to save some money.

Thank you so much for any help, I really appreciate it.

Regards.

Adam

 

[cland72]

Welcome to the forum! This forum won't allow me to provide links to outside sites regarding sales or products, so let me summarize this way:

Being in NY, and winter, it'll be cold. You want a light that won't transfer cold. That leads me towards recommending the Surefire G2-YL. It is yellow for high visibility should you drop it. These can be found for $40 shipped online (B&H Photo/Video has a great website).

Now, buy a Malkoff M61L HCRI2 drop in from Illumination Supply. This will give you 5 hours of constant output, and excellent color rendition. After the 5 hours is up, it will slowly dim over the next 2-3 hours until the batteries are fully depleted. These are $69 plus shipping.

I really believe this would be an excellent combination.

You could upgrade to an aluminum host, the Surefire 6P, for about another $10-20.

This would run on CR123 batteries, or if you wanted to get into rechargables, you could get a couple of AW17670 cells and a Nitecore i2 Intellicharger.

Hope that's not too much to start with! Good luck with your search.

 

[Lou Minescence]

Hi bower4311,
I'm not sure how tracking wounded game with a dog works. Will you be following the dog closely or will you catch up to it barking in the distance ? I find it takes a light that has at least 100 yards throw to navigate through the woods. Not enough throw or too floody and all you see is a wall of trees with darkness behind them. I like my Nitecore SRT7 or Arnytek Predator XPG2 the best. They can be run very low or high intensity and can throw out far up ahead.
Good luck with your search.

 

[bower4311]

Welcome to the forum! This forum won't allow me to provide links to outside sites regarding sales or products, so let me summarize this way:

Being in NY, and winter, it'll be cold. You want a light that won't transfer cold. That leads me towards recommending the Surefire G2-YL. It is yellow for high visibility should you drop it. These can be found for $40 shipped online (B&H Photo/Video has a great website).

Now, buy a Malkoff M61L HCRI2 drop in from Illumination Supply. This will give you 5 hours of constant output, and excellent color rendition. After the 5 hours is up, it will slowly dim over the next 2-3 hours until the batteries are fully depleted. These are $69 plus shipping.

I really believe this would be an excellent combination.

You could upgrade to an aluminum host, the Surefire 6P, for about another $10-20.

This would run on CR123 batteries, or if you wanted to get into rechargables, you could get a couple of AW17670 cells and a Nitecore i2 Intellicharger.

Hope that's not too much to start with! Good luck with your search.

So, $40 for the surefire, (I'll be scrapping the internals?) $69 for drop in, $12 for Nitecore charger $28 shipped for two AW17670 batteries.

That is $150 plus a little shipping for 1 flashlight with rechargable batteries?

 

[bower4311]

Hi bower4311,
I'm not sure how tracking wounded game with a dog works. Will you be following the dog closely or will you catch up to it barking in the distance ? I find it takes a light that has at least 100 yards throw to navigate through the woods. Not enough throw or too floody and all you see is a wall of trees with darkness behind them. I like my Nitecore SRT7 or Arnytek Predator XPG2 the best. They can be run very low or high intensity and can throw out far up ahead.
Good luck with your search.

The dog will be on a 30' lead. There could be an opportunity for a deer being up ahead I would want to see, that is laying down and ready to be put down if still alive, but either way you usually end up getting pretty close to the deer.

 

[cland72]

So, $40 for the surefire, (I'll be scrapping the internals?) $69 for drop in, $12 for Nitecore charger $28 shipped for two AW17670 batteries.

That is $150 plus a little shipping for 1 flashlight with rechargable batteries?

The "internals" is a $5 bulb assembly, and yes on the rest.

Or, you could try this:

http://www.cpfmarketplace.com/mp/sh...l-ring-80-shipped-CONUS&p=4802564#post4802564

 

[bower4311]

One more thing, but less important would be the possibility for red if my brothers and I ever get into coyote hunting. It would only be nice for that as an option, but definitely not the main purpose.

I'll look at that one for sale. It says it comes with 2 P90 drop-ins, would there be any cheap way to make those into a couple smaller lights for other people while tracking? Or they're pretty useless.

 

[cland72]

Unfortunately the P90's would be pretty worthless for your application. With 3 CR123 batteries they provide about an hour's worth of runtime.

 

[bower4311]

Unfortunately the P90's would be pretty worthless for your application. With 3 CR123 batteries they provide about an hour's worth of runtime.

What set-up will only provide an hours worth or runtime? I'm a little confused now.

 

[cland72]

What set-up will only provide an hours worth or runtime? I'm a little confused now.

The P90 is a bulb assembly that goes into 9 volt/3 cell Surefire hosts like the 9P, C3, and Z3. They are much less efficient than LEDs, hence the short runtime.

If you want a turnkey setup, try the Malkoff MD2 with the high/low ring at Malkoff Devices.

 

[bower4311]

The P90 is a bulb assembly that goes into 9 volt/3 cell Surefire hosts like the 9P, C3, and Z3. They are much less efficient than LEDs, hence the short runtime.

If you want a turnkey setup, try the Malkoff MD2 with the high/low ring at Malkoff Devices.

Oh okay, so those are useless. The Malkoff MD2 seems it would be a bit expensive. I'm thinking to try and keep the cost down a little bit. Do you think the light you recommended in the marketplace would be alright in the woods? That seems like a pretty good deal. If I wanted a different drop in, and found a buyer, I could sell that one and use the flashlight for a new drop-in? Might save me a little bit here and there.

 

[cland72]

The reason I recommended the one in the Marketplace is because I thought the AA battery type would save you some money since you could just run lithium AA or normal alkaline AAs instead of rechargeables. If you bought that one, it wouldn't need to be upgraded or altered: it would be perfect as is for your application (in my opinion).

 

[bower4311]

The reason I recommended the one in the Marketplace is because I thought the AA battery type would save you some money since you could just run lithium AA or normal alkaline AAs instead of rechargeables. If you bought that one, it wouldn't need to be upgraded or altered: it would be perfect as is for your application (in my opinion).

Yeah actually I wouldn't really need rechargables. I don't even know how much I'll use it off the bat anyway. A few sets of AA's would probably last me a long time realistically. I might jump on it.

 

[Norm]

Posting on behalf of the OP, he asked this question in a sales thread in the Marketplace were it was OT. - Norm

I'm new to all this. What would be the best setup for rechargeable batteries for this light? Where can I buy, and how much will it cost for batteries? I'm interested in a light like this, but I don't know enough to make a decision.

The post was in response to "SF G3 host with Zeno SS bezel ring and a Malkoff M31LL dropin installed"

 

[bower4311]

Posting on behalf of the OP, he asked this question in a sales thread in the Marketplace were it was OT. - Norm

The post was in response to "SF G3 host with Zeno SS bezel ring and a Malkoff M31LL dropin installed"

Yeah I figured that would be not the appropriate place but I wasn't sure how to get my three posts over there since it's a separate forum.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

[TEEJ]

To understand the specs that would work...it sounds like your main purpose is to simply follow the dogs on the 30' lead w/o tripping on roots/rocks or whacking your head on a branch, etc....with the occasional burst to look ahead, perhaps to realize that to cross an upcoming stream you might need to appraoch it where there's a crossing point, and need to know where that was, etc...or, to see if there was actually a deer ahead somewhere, etc.

Depending on the terrain, the blue lights tend to make blood look black...so of the spatter trail, etc, is light enough in color so that's a good contrast color, it does tend to make it pop out well...but if the background is darker, the contrast is reduced, and its not as helpful. 365 nm UV is good, but, you can't use that if working with the dogs, you'll make them go blind, etc.

Assuming 100 meters is a minimum range, that's a need to put about 15 lux or more on an object 100 meters away. That would require the spec to be ~ 150k cd in throw...too high for your price point, and too focused a beam to be truly useful to see with at close range, as it would not be floody enough to avoid roots AND branches at the same time, etc.

That means you might be looking for a headlight to light up the immediate environment/follow the dogs safely, but need a throwy light to do the long range spotting.

If you only needed 50 meters of range, the Armytek Predator Pro with XPG2 would give you enough lux on target at that range for example (It was also mentioned above). Its focused beam is too focused in my use to really work as a good root/branch light though, but, if augmented by the afore mentioned headlamps with floody patterns, that's covered.

So, assuming your fellow hunters are going to get equipped, perhaps have THEM wear the headlights, as the flood will probably be enough to spot stuff for you too...perhaps with a useful range of 30 yards, and you can carry the xpg2 light to see out there further.

If going Armytek, as an example, the Wizard headlights are pumping out ~ a thousand lumens each....with regulated runtime (Don't dim as the cells draw down), and the XPG2 flashlight, while closer to ~ 600 L or so, has a 40k cd which will put over 15 lux on something 50 meters away.

Those lights are individually available for less than $100 each, and are very tough IPX8 rated, etc.

I would recommend getting a bunch of 18650 3400 MAH cells and a charger that can charge a lot of cells at once (6 bay for example). The secret with rechargeable cells is to simply carry spares and rotate them in as needed. When you get back, recharge them, rinse, repeat, etc.

:D

As all the lights take the same cells (1 each)...if you have 3 lights, that's 3 cells, plus 3 spares for example...which should give you ~ 4 hrs run time. Pop all 6 into the 6-bay charger, and in a few hours, you're ready to rock and roll again.

If you find you can see fine with less output, you can use a medium instead of high on the headlamps, and extend the runtime to double that, etc. The RANGE is reduced proportionally when the runtime is increased, so, the XPG2 light would probably only be used on high.

If you want a headlight for you too, then you'd simply get another set of cells for it, and so forth.

If you get the 6-Bay chargers, say an Xtar WP6 II, its an inexpensive way to charge them all..as its a good charger than is only a teeny bit more than a decent 2 bay charger.

If you want a light that DOES have a lot more throw but with longer runtime, then you need a multicell light to support that draw...and then you have to CARRY that heavier/bulkier light, etc, which, for what you describe, might get inconvenient...as spare cells are very small and light. If taking ~ 30 seconds to swap in fresh cells is a problem, AND you NEED that higher output, THEN you DO need a multicelled light to do it all.

 

[bower4311]

TEEJ: Thank you for that advice. That was very involved and helpful. Right now I'm thinking of 2 lights in the $150 price-range. These are all good choices and I'm sure if someone else chimes in this decision could get even a little harder, which is alright haha. I'm going to stay away from the headlamps for now, if everything works out well with the tracking, more money will be invested for sure. I'm still feeling good about this one, http://www.cpfmarketplace.com/mp/sh...l-ring-80-shipped-CONUS&p=4802564#post4802564 , which I think is a good price point, I would also like a second opinion though.

One more thing to take into consideration, I don't NEED even 50 yards, the NE is mostly heavy brush, so being honest with myself 50 yards would even be far. Also, 50 yards to shoot a deer, vs. 50 yards to see a deer should be two different things? The close-up is going to be the most helpful. Also, multi-cell vs single cell isn't huge with me, trackers have been working for years and years finding hundreds of deer with bigger bulky lights.

EDIT: If there are cheap incandescent options for big bulky lights, it is ILLEGAL for a hunter to have a weapon while night tracking which means he may only need to hold on flashlight, I'm find with that, they won't be getting used as much anyway considering most tracks will have 2 people, maybe more depending on the trophy, so cheap backups are a good option also.

 

[bower4311]

Will the Armytek Predator Pro support anything relating to red light for coyote hunting? I'm probably going to do short distance light for tracking right away. Then split a longer thrower for coyote hunting and tracking with my brother...I just need an option that supports red light.

 

[Lou Minescence]

Teej's post seems to be the best advice to me. A headlamp and a flashlight
to shine out a few hundred yards. I used an Armytek Wizard headlamp to go to and from my stand. There were times I needed to shine my SRT7 up ahead to get a bearing which way to go. With just the floody headlamp there were times all I could see was a wall of trees and needed the spot beam of a second light. I didn't recover any game this year but holding a flashlight and dragging something is tougher than wearing a headlamp. That's why both types of lights seems to be a good recommendation.

 

[bower4311]

Teej's post seems to be the best advice to me. A headlamp and a flashlight
to shine out a few hundred yards. I used an Armytek Wizard headlamp to go to and from my stand. There were times I needed to shine my SRT7 up ahead to get a bearing which way to go. With just the floody headlamp there were times all I could see was a wall of trees and needed the spot beam of a second light. I didn't recover any game this year but holding a flashlight and dragging something is tougher than wearing a headlamp. That's why both types of lights seems to be a good recommendation.

Knowing the areas that I hunt I know there is no need for a few hundred yards. It's almost all brush. I snagged the close range light from the marketplace. I may grab a headlamp next, or possibly a longer range light just in case, or for coyote hunting. But the closeup one will be the most necessary for finding blood on the ground. The leash isn't held in the hand, but dragged behind the dog.