Hello everybody! Before I get to my question, I'd like to say one thing: wow. I never would have guessed that I would find such a large and active community devoted to flashlights. Neat stuff. Kind of a different hobby...but that's coming from a guy who has some strange hobbies himself!
Anyway, now, a little about myself, and what I need a flashlight for. I have been, for quite some time now, devoted to the hobby of "urban exploration" - basically, my buddies and I explore any old/abandoned/unused building, tunnel, or structure we can find. While the legality of what we do may be questionable at times, I just want to go ahead and say that (while we may be a gang of college age idiots) we are good people. We do what we do because we are curious, not because we are thiefs, punks, or vandals. We would never dream of damaging or breaking into someone's house or buisness...but when we run into, say, an old and unused mental hospital that hasn't been active for who knows how many decades...we just can't help ourselves. :naughty:
While we don't feel that anything we do is morally wrong, it is certaintly something we don't want to share or advertise to the world - we just want to keep quiet, be unseen, and not cause problems. As a result, a substantial amount of our exploring takes place at night. We are less likely to have to explain ourselfves to (perpexed, but usually friendly) police officers or security guards - and as I'm sure many people on this forum know, running around at night is just plain fun.
Since we operate at night often, flashlights are an important part of our gearkits. Unfortunately, we go through them quickly. Our flashlights take lots of abuse - they have been dropped down staircases and off of roofs, shattered, fallen upon, submerged in water, lost in fog, covered in mud, caked with dirt, left in tunnels, and abandoned in old buildings. As a result, the majority of the flashlights we own are cheap and shoddy and would pobably make most people on this forum cringe.
For quite some time I have been considering purchasing a sturdier "high end" flashlight instead of whatever I can get for under $5 at home depot. I want a flashlight with decent power and outstanding reliability and ruggedness...something that won't ever fail on me. I was in a Wal Mart the other day and I was seriously considering purchasing a 6 D cell maglite...that thing is beastly! I figure that, in addition to being far more powerful than the disposible Garrity Life-light I currently use most of the time, it looks like it can take a beating...and maybe serve as a decent impromptu baseball bat if the need ever arose. But before I went ahead and bought it, I decided I would hit up google and find out a little more about flashlights..and that's how I got here!
So, fellow illuminati, do you have any suggestions for a good main flashlight for my purposes? Are these newfangled LED's as sturdy as normal bulbs? Do they last as long? I am so confused!
Anyway, now, a little about myself, and what I need a flashlight for. I have been, for quite some time now, devoted to the hobby of "urban exploration" - basically, my buddies and I explore any old/abandoned/unused building, tunnel, or structure we can find. While the legality of what we do may be questionable at times, I just want to go ahead and say that (while we may be a gang of college age idiots) we are good people. We do what we do because we are curious, not because we are thiefs, punks, or vandals. We would never dream of damaging or breaking into someone's house or buisness...but when we run into, say, an old and unused mental hospital that hasn't been active for who knows how many decades...we just can't help ourselves. :naughty:
While we don't feel that anything we do is morally wrong, it is certaintly something we don't want to share or advertise to the world - we just want to keep quiet, be unseen, and not cause problems. As a result, a substantial amount of our exploring takes place at night. We are less likely to have to explain ourselfves to (perpexed, but usually friendly) police officers or security guards - and as I'm sure many people on this forum know, running around at night is just plain fun.
Since we operate at night often, flashlights are an important part of our gearkits. Unfortunately, we go through them quickly. Our flashlights take lots of abuse - they have been dropped down staircases and off of roofs, shattered, fallen upon, submerged in water, lost in fog, covered in mud, caked with dirt, left in tunnels, and abandoned in old buildings. As a result, the majority of the flashlights we own are cheap and shoddy and would pobably make most people on this forum cringe.
For quite some time I have been considering purchasing a sturdier "high end" flashlight instead of whatever I can get for under $5 at home depot. I want a flashlight with decent power and outstanding reliability and ruggedness...something that won't ever fail on me. I was in a Wal Mart the other day and I was seriously considering purchasing a 6 D cell maglite...that thing is beastly! I figure that, in addition to being far more powerful than the disposible Garrity Life-light I currently use most of the time, it looks like it can take a beating...and maybe serve as a decent impromptu baseball bat if the need ever arose. But before I went ahead and bought it, I decided I would hit up google and find out a little more about flashlights..and that's how I got here!
So, fellow illuminati, do you have any suggestions for a good main flashlight for my purposes? Are these newfangled LED's as sturdy as normal bulbs? Do they last as long? I am so confused!
