"Is It Bright Enough?"

I find it funny that this question comes up so often with lights. Now barring any specific need such as lighting up a field or warehouse etc. just about any half decent light made today is insanely bright.

Take the Surefire L1, with ONLY 65 (Surefire Strong Like Bull lumens) on tap. I remember a time when 65 lumens was scorching.

Take the HDS offerings. 120ish real lumens out the front from a light that disappears in your palm. Hell the 85 lumen model is plenty bright.

50 dollar Fenix lights that light up my whole back yard on a single AA cell.

At any rate I am just musing at the state of our illumination tools. I am astounded that we have lights that size of a film canister that not only put out more then enough light for any normal task but will also run for extremely long periods of time. Blows my mind.

So my personal answer to those folks looking for a utility light that is meant to be a tool is that yes it is most definitely bright enough.

I know, I know there are specific needs for super super bright lights and more is always better. But hey I still think an Inova X5 is an extremely useful light for indoor uses.

Or is it too bright?

greenlight said:

Or is it too bright?

Click to expand...

Depends on what you're using the light for... :devil:

I've been wondering how much light is enough. I've been pretty happy with just a few lights for some time. Strion for outdoors, long throw, piercing light to see what is happening out in the yard (i.e. what are the dogs doing... particularly the puppy...), HDS for almost everything else, and a Peak Pacific CR2 for pocket carry (LuxIII High Power version).

But I've been thinking about an upgrade of some sort, mostly to a brighter emitter (like a new Peak P4 head, maybe Ultra Power) but have to come back to the reality that I use my HDS a LOT on the lowest setting and often the Pacific is more light than I need for a task. So do I really need a scorcher? I think we're all attracted by raw output, just because we're flashaholics and the wow factor is, well, wowing!

But I'm still wondering how much is enough. Heck my B42 on max still puts out a lot of light!

Speaking of "bright enough", that also depends on the ambient lighting. When I was back home earlier this year, I could light up trees pretty good about 100 feet away with my PD-S - but that's in an area with not a lot of ambient light "contamination".

Indoors I find the 1 watt luxeon flashlights (L1P) and PR drop ins (TLE-1F; LPR-2,-3,-113; SMJLED) bright enough.

I live downtown lots of streetlghts so I do not use flashlights much outdoors. When I do use flashlights outdoors I prefer more light especially in the spill area. Have not been outdoors during a blackout so i never found out how much throw I need.

50 lumens or less will fill my needs 70-80% of the time. But it's also nice to know there is more available when needed!

Just one of the reasons why I think multi-level lights are neat in many cases.

I like a little more light than needed - the L1 is good for moving round the house etc because there is more light there if you need it, however outside I want a bright light cause I'd rather light everything up so I don't get surprised!

I'm with ya, for most my years I thought it stopped (read: topped out) with mag lite.

But, not this year

thanks, CPF:twothumbs

4 days ago I received a new Lumapower M1-R(ebel). I was disappointed in it because with a 18650 battery in it, it was not as bright as my D-mini. I would say it was putting out about 100 lumens on high with the 18650. When I later thought about it tonight, I realized that I had a light that would run for 3 hours putting out over 60 lumens with no batteries to buy. Plus had a low mode brighter than a AA maglight that would run for over 23 hours.

After thinking about it, I realized that I was loosing touch with what is important in a light. There are very few ocasions when I need over 100 lumans of light. When I do, I really need 1,000 or so lumans that a good hid provides. But that is less than 1% of the time. In most cases, 20-100 lumans is more than enough.

Someone asked me why I had seven guns once. I told him it was like having a set of golf clubs. I think you can easily have a bunch of lights with different size, brightness, throw, and spill for different applications.

IMO as EDC's even cheap $10 Luxeon I lights are too bright for what I use em for (night time walking) -- I use it for walking/running at night, and I find that a low-stage with ~10 lumens of output is plenty, unless something alarming happens, at which point it's nice to be able to kick it into a high mode > 50 lumens.

I once asked for a recommendation for a nightstand light primarily for checking on sleeping kids at night. One person suggested a Lumapower M1. :shakehead

aggiegrads said:

I once asked for a recommendation for a nightstand light primarily for checking on sleeping kids at night. One person suggested a Lumapower M1. :shakehead

Click to expand...

LOL

I think the Lumapower is a perfectly reasonable suggestion for checking on sleeping kids........two houses away.

^ no no, one of those MaxaBlaster modded HID's is perfect.

Bushy, no such thing as TOO BRIGHT

I've been wrestling with this dilemma as well, especially in light of the fact (no pun intended) that my most used lights are also my dimmest: my Lumapower M3 and my Arc AAA-P. When I go for walks in the light-pollution-hell that is my apartment complex and the Virginia Tech campus, I like to take either my Boxer24W or ROP-HI, but indoors, at work, or out in the country away from the lights, the dimmer lights really come to life - even the AAA-P is impressive.

I remember when I went camping with my Dad in West Virginia several weeks ago, even the floody low-mode on my PT-Apex was too bright if we weren't trying to see very far and preserve our night-vision for stargazing. He had a little Black Diamond headlamp with very very low output (one brightness setting only) and that was the only thing we had with us, including my Arc, that wouldn't lessen our night-vision in some way.

I was pleased to see the reasonably low brightness settings on the Zebralight as well - AND we're getting 50 lumens out the front on a single AA battery for over an hour! We are truly spoiled.

I'm hoping that Lumapower will keep the low setting low on the new D-mini, the medium setting between 20 and 30, and the high at around 120-130... because I'm going to stick it with an 18650 tube and use that as my "everything" light - as has been said, it's rare that you need very much light for very long. And now, since emitters have gotten better, we CAN have very much light for a long time!

Bright enough is cool, but I want it coupled with dim enough. I'm waiting for an AA light with a low akin to an Arc AAA

The low on the PD-S and Mule is enough for me 80% of the time, for night reading, around the house etc....but it is comforting to know that you have oundles of lumens available at your disposal at any time.