Got the Shiningbeam switches in the mail today and so far works perfectly. It is a pain to get them to fit into the body of the Rayovac (drilling, cutting is involved) and it's hard to get solder to adhere to the metal. I had to drill a hole and make it work. And then getting the assembly into the cover with the stock switch rubber & plastic was a pain but finally got it all together and works well! :thumbsup:
Rayovac Sportsman Extreme 300 Lumen Lantern - MORE INFO ???
- Thread starter yalskey
- Start date
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HOLD ON! I just got the subject 300 lumen light (2/24/12). Counter to most all posts, I am not particularly impressed by this light. The $25 price is not huge, but there are many other lights out there that are far better. E.g., the basic Coleman propane camping lantern beats the proverbial pants off of this so-called "extreme" light--as do many other battery operated lights. There's nothing at all extreme about it, but it's ok--giving off a decent number of lumens (did not measure to see if it was 300, or not), but its really nothin' special, IMHO. The plastic cover that distributes the LED-based light does not do a good job of disseminating the output, although, again, it's ok. I just disagree with all the hype as to how great this is. For the price it's okay, but if you're looking for a light to light up your campsite, or your first floor, this is NOT the one for you. Look into others before you buy. This is a highly overrated light, IMO.
Well I guess all lanterns are overrated because the campfire is soooo much brighter. Seriously though, we are talking about different technology here. In regard to the safe LED lantern type vs. the more dangerous propane lantern type, this lantern is hard to beat. And after it is modded, I would like to find an LED lantern to beat it. My modded lantern on the highest mode (with the removable top diffuser part off) is brighter than my CFL bulb in my room while using half the wattage. Impressive indeed!
I don't know what mods you did, so can't really comment further. I was speaking about the "stock" version, without mods. Any light, with appropriate mods can be made to function in just about any way. I do not have the knowledge or time to modify lights, but cudos to those who do. I do completely agree with the safety issue, which is particularly relevant to indoor /power outage-type of use. Obviously, the subject light is highly preferrable to any fuel consuming/combustion by-product emmiting product. Again, my only point was that most all responses seemed to imply that this light created output similar to daytime. In my experience, unmodifed, it does not. Thanks for your response.
I think that the fact there are not many bright LED driven lanterns out there is one reason why this lantern gets so much attention. It's 300 emitter lumens so actual ANSI measured lumens would be less. There are o-ring seals everywhere on the body of this light and hooks on both the head and bottom so this light can be hung and angled in almost any way (on a tree branch, nail, etc). It's also the perfect host for a good mo. Flashlights have thousands of lumens but lanterns for some reason don't get that much attention. There aren't even any 18650 LION driven lanterns out there either.
Hmm that's interesting. So there's a 20% loss with the top off on high (240 / 300 lumens), and 16.6% loss on low (100 / 120 lumens). Too bad there's no regulation on the stock driver. The light keeps deminishing over time no matter the mode.
I noticed that one of my lanterns had the diffuser more frosted than the other from the factory. I went to Walmart and bought Krylon clear matt finish spraypaint. If you have the patients to put about 10 coats on, it makes the stock diffuser much better. I noticed that with both my neutral XMLs and neutral XPGr5s, the light that comes out of the sides of the LED is yellowish and the light from the top of the LED is white. I guess with a flashlight reflector it all mixes as one color but with an LED bare you can see the color rendition change. Frosting the sides of the stock diffuser seems to help a bit with this.
I noticed that one of my lanterns had the diffuser more frosted than the other from the factory. I went to Walmart and bought Krylon clear matt finish spraypaint. If you have the patients to put about 10 coats on, it makes the stock diffuser much better. I noticed that with both my neutral XMLs and neutral XPGr5s, the light that comes out of the sides of the LED is yellowish and the light from the top of the LED is white. I guess with a flashlight reflector it all mixes as one color but with an LED bare you can see the color rendition change. Frosting the sides of the stock diffuser seems to help a bit with this.
There's a 25% loss in High mode with the top on (180/240). There's a 25% loss in Low mode with the top on (75/100). The 300 and 120 lumen values you quote are from the previous packaging materials which were not ANSI ratings. 240 and 100 lumens are ANSI rated, and therefore lower. Putting the top on further reduces output from those values.
Putting some coats of that clear matte spraypaint finish on the diffusers made a nice difference in the beam. By nature of the neutral LED itself, I notice that the light coming form the bottom of the LED is yellow and the light coming from the top is pure white. In a flashight with a reflector I assume the colors mix as a one-color beam because of the nature of the reflector. But with a diffuser sitting over a netural LED itself, the light from the bottom of the diffuser is yellow but the light from the top of the LED is pure white. So with just the diffuser (not the detatchable top) you will notice a color different depending on what's being lit up by the lantern around the room. With the detachable top on, this color difference is still easily noticable.
So after spraying the diffuser and making it diffuse the light more, the color of the beam pattern is more uniform. It's not 100% the same color but it's much closer. With the detachable top on, the color is MUCH better because it looks almost 100% like a single neutral color coming from the lantern. So if anyone is doing this project and notices this, get the Krylon clear matte spraypaint from Walmart for like $3.
So after spraying the diffuser and making it diffuse the light more, the color of the beam pattern is more uniform. It's not 100% the same color but it's much closer. With the detachable top on, the color is MUCH better because it looks almost 100% like a single neutral color coming from the lantern. So if anyone is doing this project and notices this, get the Krylon clear matte spraypaint from Walmart for like $3.
I replaced the neutral XPG with the neutral XML on my 1st lantern so now both are sporting neutral XMLs. Since the switch I'm using just does not adhere well at all to solder, I ended up drilling a very tiny hole about 1/4 inch or so and folding up and tinning the copper wire from the driver to the switch. Then used electrical tape over it around the outside of the switch so this thing won't be coming apart no matter what. I got the process down to almost clockwork.
If anyone has any questions feel free to post.
EDIT: I put 3 of my average capacity matched eneloops in each lantern, so a total of 6 eneloops were used, 3 per lantern. I used those cheap 2AA to D cell adapters. Each lantern was turned on high mode and from power on to blinking mode was 1 hour 22 minutes. It's funny that the lanterns started blinking within seconds of each other. The eneloops I matched and the drivers in the lanterns are very consistent.
If anyone has any questions feel free to post.
EDIT: I put 3 of my average capacity matched eneloops in each lantern, so a total of 6 eneloops were used, 3 per lantern. I used those cheap 2AA to D cell adapters. Each lantern was turned on high mode and from power on to blinking mode was 1 hour 22 minutes. It's funny that the lanterns started blinking within seconds of each other. The eneloops I matched and the drivers in the lanterns are very consistent.
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I have done more or less the exact same modification as described by netprince.
LED: XM-L T6 3C tint from cnqualitygoods
Driver: 1.4A driver from shiningbeam
Reflector: LEDiL Boom-W
Here are comparison shots. The unmodified lamp is a Varta and not Rayovac, but they're exactly the same thing other than one being grey and the other being green. The camera had the same settings, especially aperture and white balance so you can see the difference. They are using the same set of batteries - 6x fully charged GP Recyko AA cells in 2xAA to D-cell adapters
Unmodified:
Modified:
LED: XM-L T6 3C tint from cnqualitygoods
Driver: 1.4A driver from shiningbeam
Reflector: LEDiL Boom-W
Here are comparison shots. The unmodified lamp is a Varta and not Rayovac, but they're exactly the same thing other than one being grey and the other being green. The camera had the same settings, especially aperture and white balance so you can see the difference. They are using the same set of batteries - 6x fully charged GP Recyko AA cells in 2xAA to D-cell adapters
Unmodified:
Modified:
for the switch, I had a spare tail switch that came with a Shiningbeam S-Mini, and it fit perfectly after I widened the switch channel a bit. I didn't even remove the spring that came with the switch PCB as I used it to keep the switch stable.
Fitting the switch was a bit hard to do as the space is very tight.. but only until I learnt how to do it right.
Fitting the switch was a bit hard to do as the space is very tight.. but only until I learnt how to do it right.
netprince
Enlightened
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- Sep 7, 2008
- Messages
- 547
Nice mod BigRiz, and nice comparison shots!
tritan
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- Dec 27, 2005
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I can't find the 400watt model on amazon anybody? Do they have it retail some where is it worth the extra price?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgvxPL-V2r8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgvxPL-V2r8
No such thing as a 400 watt version. 400watts at 4.5v is about 90 amps.
Sure there is. It's being marketed as a professional work light for arc welders. Just clip it on the welder's output leads and it lights up the work area between arc strikes. That way you don't need one of those expensive auto-darkening helmets... The light is bright enough to see everything through a standard fixed filter.
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I am thinking maybe he meant 400 lumens instead but there is nothing that comes up in a search for that online.Sure there is. It's being marketed as a professional work light for arc welders. Just clip it on the welder's output leads and it lights up the work area between arc strikes. That way you don't need one of those expensive auto-darkening helmets... The light is bright enough to see everything through a standard fixed filter.
filibuster
Enlightened
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- Dec 27, 2005
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- 205
This lantern looks like the same 400 lumen version mentioned above but branded differently. And it is rated at 400 lumens not watts.
It runs on 6 D cells to power four 1 watt Nichia LED's.
It's simply a bigger version of the Rayovac 300 with the addition of a forth 1 watt LED and three more D cells.
It does have a front facing white LED light or two red LED's that can be run independently of the main lantern LED's.
This version of the lantern doesn't have the remote control like the Guide Gear, which I prefer because there isn't a problem with a constant power draw that a remote control sensor would have.
It runs on 6 D cells to power four 1 watt Nichia LED's.
It's simply a bigger version of the Rayovac 300 with the addition of a forth 1 watt LED and three more D cells.
It does have a front facing white LED light or two red LED's that can be run independently of the main lantern LED's.
This version of the lantern doesn't have the remote control like the Guide Gear, which I prefer because there isn't a problem with a constant power draw that a remote control sensor would have.
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saypat
Enlightened
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- Jul 12, 2011
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- 424
oh my goodness! I get my light tomorrow. After looking at this mod am I going to be disappointed? Tint and brightness - wowsa, beautiful!
