4AA w/ flood beam?

I'm looking for something along the lines of the Streamlight PP Luxeon, but with more of a flood, wide angle beam. There seem to be some good options for 123A cells, but I haven't come across anything using AA's. As much as possible I want to use standard NiMH cells. The Streamlight 4AA Luxeon is a great throw light to have around. But I feel a need for something with comparable form factor/performance, but a less focused beam.

Does such a light exist?

The Streamlight PP 7 LED version has a nice wide flood beam. It's also cheaper.

Indeed, the Propolymer LED (7 LEDs) has a VERY wide beam. The newer model (last two years?) has a clickie (reverse clickie?) at the tail. But don't expect much brightness. The only reason I hold onto mine is that it's my only remaining LED light, and it comes in handy during extended blackouts.

The 7 LED ProPoly got such a poor review from Flashlightreviews that I hadn't seriously considered it. Have they fixed the overheating issue? Normally I'd use NiMH, so maybe I wouldn't experience the failures others have. It certainly has the beam pattern I'm after--if anything, it's too much of a flood--but sounds like it might not be very bright at all. I'd gladly trade most of the runtime for more output.

The price is certainly reasonable. I'll probably pick one up to try.

Thanks!

I've been curious about the 7 LED ProPoly too. I haven't seen much here about it burning out bulbs from them being overdriven. Is it still a good idea to replace one of the batteries with a dummy?

http://www.flashlightreviews.com/reviews/streamlight_4aaled.htm

The review makes it look like the beam is blue. I'm trying to avoid blue beams now.

I have the ProPoly Luxeon and sometimes I wish it had more flood. Has anyone tried a beam shaper on it?

I have had two 7 LED ProPolys for a couple of years of intermittent use (always NIMH cells) without any problems. The beam seems pretty white to me, not the obvious blue like the RR 2AAAs. I like that the bodies (switches) are interchangeable with my LUX ProPolys. In general I use the 7 LEDs indoors and the LUXs outdoors (more throw).

Yes, I would say the beam is on the blue side, like most 5mm LEDs I've owned, perhaps a bit more. The bluest I've owned was on the 16-LED 2AA Wave. I gave it to a hitchhiker.

take a look at this one:

http://www.flashlightreviews.com/reviews/pt_impactxl.htm

The Streamlight 4dbA ProPolymer Solid State LED that I have is a little on the blue side with a wider beam dispersion compared to the SL.4dbA.ProPo.Lux. Either way I like them both.

JackJ, Try an UK 4AA eLED. It has a very wide hotspot with a very wide corona. It will run for 10-12 hours on standard alkaline batteries. I don't know how long it will run on Nimh batteries. It is a 5 star light. Brightguy.com has a very good price on this light. And they have exceptional CS. Good Luck.

Happy Dark Trails

Yeah, I think as far as 4AA Luxeons go, the UK would be my first suggestion. It's a 2xAA, but the Elektrolumens XM-3 is pretty floody.

If you want a true flood type light and don't mind the 5mm LEDs, the Princeton Tec Attitude is pretty nice. Granted, it runs on 4xAAA cells, but it runs so long... who cares? It will readily light up a room and is certainly plenty of light for working in a small area such as inside a computer or finding something on the flood.

Personally though, I really like the CMG or Gerber Infinity Ultra for a floody light that runs on a single AA cell... Or one of the Nuwai 0.5W lights such as the TM313 or TM317.

That Elektrolumens XM-3 looks pretty good. I wasn't aware that any Luxeon 3's came in a 2AA form factor, and the runtime is better than I expected. The UK dive lights look pretty good too. In checking them out, I also came across the
Xtreme Light 1 Watt Dive Light (DLX-014AA), which caught my eye.

Choices, choices.....

Well, runtime is usually going to be inversely proportional to brightness and the XM-3 isn't the brightest Lux III light out there. Matter of fact, the Lux 1 Streamlight TL-2 2nd Gen looks to be twice as bright and have about 3 or 4 times the throw of the XM-3.

Having said that, for indoor use or for outdoor use within about 15 yards, I'd rather have the XM-3.

Give it a look and see what you think. If you don't like it, you'll be able to get close to your money back.