Should i buy the UK LIght Cannon?

[LEDagent]

At a local dive shop here in San Diego, they are selling the UK Light Cannon for 189.99

Every year, i try to setup a camping trip with all my friends, i think its about time to buy another SERIOUS flashlight/torch. On my last trip i brought my LSI spotlight which is rated at 1 million CP. Let me tell you that thing ROCKED! Unfortunately it only lasted about 45 minutes. I need something brighter and longer reaching that my SF E2, and something that can somewhat match the output of my spotlight and last more than an hour. Do you think the UK Light cannon will fill this void? DO you think it will survive the outdoors? (I rarely drop large flashlights)

I could care less about the SF HID becuase it's just waaay to expensive to be lugging around camping. Plus, with a runtime of only 60 minutes on a singe charge, it just doesn't do me any good to have another
"short-lived" light. Sure it's 2000 lumens....sheesh - what the hell am i gonna do with all that power? I already have a spotlight.

P.S.
Hey telephony, are there any updates on your experiences with your UK Light Cannon? SO far the question about the light's ruggedness is not really an issue anymore as i hear you mounted the light on your mobile chair.

 

[Mr Ted Bear]

You won't regret it. Much brighter than the 40 and 60 led dive lights from Tektite

 

[LEDagent]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mr Ted Bear:
You won't regret it. Much brighter than the 40 and 60 led dive lights from Tektite

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Do you own one? If so, can you compare it to any other light on the market? i.e. beam pattern and throw?

 

[Mr Ted Bear]

LED Agent

Heres the deal... The UK Light Canon is intended to be UW VIDEO DIVE LIGHT. As such, it does not have a long throw, nor does it well defined beam pattern.


Try this as example. Quite common is for people to describe a regular incandescant light as follows: From a distance of 20 feet, the center part of the beam is about 24", and then the .... when shinning it on my garage door.


Well, with the light cannon, it will illuminate the entire garage door!! Lots of light over a very large area

 

[recercare]

That's weird. The LC 100 has 6 degrees beam angle, which much be considered pretty narrow, that's why they provide beam filters with it. I though every light with less than 8 degree beam angle would throw pretty far.

 

[LEDagent]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by recercare:
That's weird. The LC 100 has 6 degrees beam angle, which much be considered pretty narrow, that's why they provide beam filters with it. I though every light with less than 8 degree beam angle would throw pretty far.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

That's what i thought too. But i went to a dive equipment shop to take a closer look at it and found that, like Chris M. said, it had a stochastic type reflector like SF has. with the experiences i have had with my E2, the light output is VERY useable at close distnaces, but not very so at distances of 30-50 yards or more. But i can't really compare the "useability" of the two becuase the differences in lumens between them is so great! about 440 lumens to be exact. So the only thing i CAN compare it to is an M6...but alas, i do not have one.

Anyway, it looks like the only way to find out if it works for me is to go out and shell out the 200 bucks and try it out for myself. Good thing there is a return policy of 30 days.

If anyone else has any comments on this light please keep them comming. Always interested in hearing about this light because it is the only, affordable, HID light out there.

 

[Chris M.]

My Light-cannon has a beam made up of 3 parts. At the very centre is a narrow bright spot, immediately surrouned by a softer, wider (but still bright) corona, kinda like a white LED`s beam dispersion. Outside of this is the dimmer peripheral light that comes straight from the bulb. I`d say it would shine 200-300ft easilly, though it is no LSI spotlight- the stochastic (read: orange peel) reflector smooths out the beam a lot so it won`t throw quite so far.
I can`t get 20 feet away from anywhere in but from 10ft away, the centre bright spot is not too circular, and about 6 inches accross. The immediately surrounding corona is hard to define as it`s soft edged. 2-3ft perhaps, to 50%?

The beam filters it comes with are really nice- they widen out that centre beam (which is probably about 6 degrees or so) to a very even smooth wide flood. Using both and you get light that is perfect for the viewing angles of most camera lenses. they don`t seem to block too much of the light out, but of course as the overall light gets spread over a wide area, it may not appear so bright.