Power Outage, How many Lumens, How many batteries? (for lights and more)

Candle Power Flashlight Forum

Help Support CPF:

I said I seldom have power outage last week, but there will be one on 19th March because of annual electricity checking
that inspection will be in the day time.

I love headlamps more than lanterns, but I am still a newbie so I want to try more headlamps and lanterns
I can see many stores sell Energizer 4D LED folding lantern. Is it useful in a power outage?

I hope the situation in Crimea will get stable soon.
 
Romanko said:
Some of russian politics think that Crimea is a russian land. And they want Crimea to enter Russia. Russian helicopters are flying over Crimea and russia forces block ukrainian bases. Happily nobody is shooteng each other. But there could be provocations if somebody will be shot down and poop will hit the fan.
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Good luck - keep your head down.
 
LowLumen said:
I'm with you. I had a few too many power out nights with blinding spots from lanterns. I much prefer a fully shrouded light and to keep the source completely out of the field of view. I still have some low power lanterns but at the culmination of this attitude I ripped the top off of the 4 & 8 D cell Coleman lanterns and retro-fitted goose neck desk lamps with neutral XM-L2. Very nice. (and stylish too) My other favorite for indoor power outage is the (shrouded) mule light, hanging over the table, kitchen counter, etc.
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That's a great idea! Perhaps I should do a project like that as well. If I don't do anything except extend the wires to fit the internals into a different package then it shouldn't be too hard of a job. (I haven't done any light mods before so this might be a good introduction project).
 
callmaster said:
What the hell is going on with the world? How bad is it over there?
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On the brink of a violent and bloody Civil war breaking out at literally any minute. My mother is Ukrainian, and one of my aunts and cousin still live there. Mom has been in touch. Thankfully the two of them are not at ground zero of where the tensions are flaring up. But they're close enough to where if things do break out, they'll need to flee the area.

Hopefully cooler, more rational heads will prevail.... Though more likely, some vodka-soaked idiot with a gun is going to just open fire and trigger a bloody mess.
 
Monocrom said:
Hopefully cooler, more rational heads will prevail.... Though more likely, some vodka-soaked idiot with a gun is going to just open fire and trigger a bloody mess.
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Certainly that has happened many times throughout history. Let's pray that cooler heads prevail.

Without making this a full blown prepper discussion, please consider, what aspects of your life may be affected if there is a prolonged power failure.

Consider that you may have advanced warning that a power outage may occur (such as a meteorological forecast of an impending storm, or a Russian invasion of your homeland), what steps might you take to prepare?

For example, we recently had a number of winter storms including record-breaking low temps, and inches of snow. I had read Sub_Umbra 's water epiphany thread, and always felt comfortable with the fact that I live a short distance to a large detention pond, and within 1/2 mile to a small reservoir. It recently struck me that they are both currently frozen! I lined a couple of 32 gallon garbage cans with plastic liners, and filled them with water, and put them in the garage. If the water lines break due to the frigid weather, or electricity fails, and for some reason they can't pump the water to my elevation, we'll be OK for a while.

Additionally, I made sure all cars' fuel tanks were topped off, including the van we rarely use, and the portable fuel containers for the generator. I also topped off the batteries in my 18650 flashlights, and the spare batteries that I keep at 80% charge in the refrigerator.

What did I miss? What would you do?
 
Regarding battery storage: Does anyone have a link I can read that shows some testing about battery storage temperatures vs longevity? I know that high temps (over 80-90f?) aren't good for battery longevity, but is there empirical evidence that shows that storing batteries at significantly below room temp (~70f) leads to significantly better battery life/longevity? Because as everyone has noticed, battery performance tends to suffer at colder temps, which means batteries stored cold would need to be warmed up to get maximum performance out of them. I DO recall way back in the day (LOL), buying 35mm film when it was on sale and storing it in the refrigerator because it prevented deterioration better when unused for long periods if it was kept cold.


Max
 
Poppy said:
Max,
I keep my extra batteries in the refrigerator at 80-90% charge. They'll last longer... have a longer shelf life if I kept them at a lower charge, but I want them ready to go if I suddenly need them.

Here is where I got the temperature information.
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_store_batteries
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Thanks for the link. Bookmarked it. According to that site, it appears that there are advantages (for battery longevity) to storing the batteries down to freezing temps.


Max
 
bluemax_1 said:
it appears that there are advantages (for battery longevity) to storing the batteries down to freezing temps.
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It's not worth the effort; you're looking at a low-single-digit difference from room temp storage, and then when you take the battery out of cold storage, it'll be wet with condensation, so you'll have to carefully dry it and then allow it to come up to room temp before attempting to put it in your device. That's not "ready to go" compared to just grabbing a loose cell from a drawer somewhere and slapping it in.
 
StarHalo said:
It's not worth the effort; you're looking at a low-single-digit difference from room temp storage, and then when you take the battery out of cold storage, it'll be wet with condensation, so you'll have to carefully dry it and then allow it to come up to room temp before attempting to put it in your device. That's not "ready to go" compared to just grabbing a loose cell from a drawer somewhere and slapping it in.
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A valid point too. I suppose it would only really be a consideration for long term storage cells that aren't really going to be used (I've got some new SureFire Lithium CR123 cells that are ~10 years old that I haven't used since switching to 18650s. I recently tested a few on a digital multimeter and in some lights and they still work fine. I guess those might be OK in the fridge since they tend to work pretty decent in cold temps too).


Max
 
StarHalo said:
It's not worth the effort; you're looking at a low-single-digit difference from room temp storage, and then when you take the battery out of cold storage, it'll be wet with condensation, so you'll have to carefully dry it and then allow it to come up to room temp before attempting to put it in your device. That's not "ready to go" compared to just grabbing a loose cell from a drawer somewhere and slapping it in.
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Maybe I don't understand the data presented in the table at batteryuniversity, but here's my take on it.

Stored at 100% charge at freezing (or just above it in the refrigerator) in three months the battery will lose 4% of its charge.
Stored at 100% charge at room temps it'll lose 15-20% of its charge in the same three months.

Perhaps the information is poorly written, but it would seem that they infer that the battery will lose that much capacity, but we know from experience, that can't be true.

Regarding condensation, If you store the batteries in a zip lock bag and get out as much air as possible before storing them, you can pull them out and let them come up to room temperature, any condensation that occurs, will occur on the outside of the bag.
 
Beer n' popcorn

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@StarHalo Geeez, I hadn't seen a single reference to this year's 2014 Power Outage Practice until I actually did a google search for "Earth Hour" I'm a little upset that I missed it this year.

It seems that YOU have been vigilant in posting this annual event, I guess in the Cafe section of the site. Would you please consider posting an annual link in this thread to your announcement?
 
Poppy said:
It seems that YOU have been vigilant in posting this annual event, I guess in the Cafe section of the site. Would you please consider posting an annual link in this thread to your announcement?
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Yeah, I didn't get an Earth Hour thread up this year until the night before the event, so there wasn't much of a reminder for folks who weren't aware of the date. If this thread is still alive next year, I'll link it.
 
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