Bright flashlight needed for night address work

I often work at night and need a bright flashlight for reading address numbers on homes and apartments. Sometimes they even do them in black numbers on brown backgrounds, things like that. :sick2:

I need to be able to read them from the car while out in the street.

I'd like to find the brightest possible flashlight for under about $100, that uses lithium batteries, preferably the largest ones they make? Like maybe dual 18650's?

It needs to run for about 5-6 hours on a charge. It's ok if it gets dimmer after 4 hrs but not a whole lot dimmer.

But the biggest thing I need is one that comes with a drop-in charger, so I don't have to remove the batteries to charge them after each night out.


I go out about 4 nights a week and it would be a real hassle having to mess with the batteries after each night out.

I've been using a Lightwave 4000, which is marginal at best, if I keep fresh alkalines in it, but it does last a lot of hours on a set of them. But I really really need something brighter, it just won't cut it for reading addresses from the car, most of the time.

And I do want rechargeables with a drop-in charger unit, so I can just put the whole flashlight into the charger each night and not have to remove the batteries.

I've heard that the Luxeon series of LED's are much brighter than this Lightwave 4000 that I have, and that there's a Cree LED that's even brighter than those now?

First, welcome to CPF!

This light might work for you and the price is right. This uses the new Cree LED and throws the light really well and uses and collimating optic.

http://www.rayovac.com/flashlight/se4w3c.shtml

Nitroz said:

First, welcome to CPF!

This light might work for you and the price is right. This uses the new Cree LED and throws the light really well and uses and collimating optic.

http://www.rayovac.com/flashlight/se4w3c.shtml

Click to expand...

Cradle charger?

A Streamlight Strion would be a good choice. Won't run that long (more like 1.5 hours) but you can buy a 12v cord for the charger (mine came with it but you can buy them without the 12v adapter) so you can basically keep it in the charger while you drive to your next stop. Lots of throw, a good amount of light, small, light and less than $100.

That's an interesting mix of requirements. 5-6 hr runtime, Li-Ion, drop in charger, sub $100, must be a good thrower. All of those are implemented on current lights, but I can't think of any one that has them all. The Rayovac certainly has the brightness, cost, runtime, and throw, but it's not rechargable.

Edit: Listen to Gatsby. A good incandescent will work better with ambient light around.

Melissa2007 said:

Cradle charger?

Click to expand...

No charger, but with a really good run time battery changes will be a lot less frequent. Even so, carrying 3 c cells along would not hurt.

What about the MagCharger?

Mellisa The WF 800 uses two 18650 batteries- is very powerful..and big, but not too big. You could buy 4 batteries, and a charger. THe batteries are very quick and easy to change. There is a good chance the light would last all night...maybe even several days of intermittant use. RUn time should be 4 plus hours.
Sorry, no car charge option, but all of the other wants are here.http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.6965

Marduke said:

What about the MagCharger?

Click to expand...

What is it and what does it do?

Lighthouse one said:

Mellisa The WF 800 uses two 18650 batteries- is very powerful..and big, but not too big. You could buy 4 batteries, and a charger. THe batteries are very quick and easy to change. There is a good chance the light would last all night...maybe even several days of intermittant use. RUn time should be 4 plus hours.
Sorry, no car charge option, but all of the other wants are here.http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.6965

Click to expand...

Oh, did I mention a momentary contact switch too, in my original post?

That helps, like on the Lightwave 4000 I have, so that the thing doesn't have to be on all the time if I just need to spot an address.

Marduke said:

What about the MagCharger?

Click to expand...

Not LED?

Melissa - the Magcharger is the rechargeable duty light made by Maglite. It is, however, a good deal more powerful than any stock Mag.

Your cradle requirement is a tricky one - limits you to "duty" lights - i.e. lights designed primarily for police, fire, rescue, etc... The Streamlight Strion I mentioned earlier is a duty light. Others are the Streamlight Stinger (including a new LED version), the Inova T4 and the Magcharger. All are designed to be put in a cradle to charge rather than removing the batteries. Most of those lights won't have a 5-6 hour runtime either although they'll be bright enough.

I know the Strion has a 12v car charger option, I suspect the Stinger does but can't confirm nor do I know if the T4 or Magcharger have car chargers. But I think that a 12v car charger may be the best solution for you if you want a cradle or don't want to have to change batteries during your shift.

Wayne Johnson at Elektrolumens sounds like he has some great lights but again, no drop-in charger.

Gatsby said:

Melissa - the Magcharger is the rechargeable duty light made by Maglite. It is, however, a good deal more powerful than any stock Mag.

Your cradle requirement is a tricky one - limits you to "duty" lights - i.e. lights designed primarily for police, fire, rescue, etc... The Streamlight Strion I mentioned earlier is a duty light.

Click to expand...

Eeew! And they have a Tac light version available too!

Maybe for my Mossberg Persuader 12 gauge too some day.

Others are the Streamlight Stinger (including a new LED version), the Inova T4 and the Magcharger. All are designed to be put in a cradle to charge rather than removing the batteries. Most of those lights won't have a 5-6 hour runtime either although they'll be bright enough.

I know the Strion has a 12v car charger option, I suspect the Stinger does but can't confirm nor do I know if the T4 or Magcharger have car chargers. But I think that a 12v car charger may be the best solution for you if you want a cradle or don't want to have to change batteries during your shift.

Click to expand...

Sounds cool, I'll look at them, thanks!

I'm intrigued by this idea of the police/fire type work lights. They could come with car chargers and AC chargers for the desk and be bright enough.

The MagCharger is incan, but quite powerful, has momentary switch, and cradle charger (car, or house).

http://www.maglite.com/product.asp?psc=RECHARGE
http://www.orderoutdoors.com/magcharg.htm
http://www.opticsplanet.net/mag-charger-system-rx1019.html
http://www.copquest.com/13-1100.htm

You also may want to look at the Inova T4
http://www.inovalight.com/t.html

Marduke said:

The MagCharger is incan, but quite powerful, has momentary switch, and cradle charger (car, or house).

http://www.maglite.com/product.asp?psc=RECHARGE
http://www.orderoutdoors.com/magcharg.htm
http://www.opticsplanet.net/mag-charger-system-rx1019.html
http://www.copquest.com/13-1100.htm

You also may want to look at the Inova T4
http://www.inovalight.com/t.html

Click to expand...

Every once in awhile I trip and fall on concrete in the dark, which is why I'm thinking LED may be best ( if I can find all the features I need ). The Maglight would go flying on the concrete and trash the bulb filament, no?

I've been delivering pizzas for almost 5 years, I can tell you right now, you probably don't need that much runtime, flashlights used for this are generally turned on for a few seconds at a time. I use tactical configurations with ~30 minutes total runtime and that will last an entire weekend of delivery.

A few recommendations:

LED:
Tiablo A8 or A9, probably A8 for running on a single 18650
LumaPower MRV
Lowes TaskForce 2C WITH CREE (look for the one that says "60X brighter", no 30X brighter)
New Rayovac 3C 4W cree.
Wolf-Eyes storm or thunder

Incandescent:
Wolf-Eyes M90 w/2x18650>LF EO-9L, or HO-9L for more runtime.
Wolf-Eyes M100 or M300
magcharger
SL stinger type
SF M4 w/2x17670>MN16 (or 9P+extender and KT2 kit with 2x17670)

The strion has a fast charge option. It will charge a DEAD battery in about 2 hours.

Since the runtime is 1 hour and charge time is 2 hours this means that roughly it charges half as fast as it runs down.

If used for 3-4 minutes and allowed to charge for 6-8 minutes it will be fully charged when you need it.

Basically I'm saying that if you are delivering items at night you would be HARD pressed to run it down in an 8 hours shift due to the quick recharge time.

It's also got a great momentary switch. It's tough enough to use as a hammer and still not break the bulb.

The Maglight at http://tinyurl.com/247epd
looks really interesting, but I guess when I said charging cradle, I wasn't specific enough. I meant something that had either contacts or induction charging, so I wouldn't have to keep plugging and unplugging the thing all the time, just drop it in the home or car cradle charger and pick it up and go.

Are there any that can do that?

Melissa2007 said:

Every once in awhile I trip and fall on concrete in the dark, ...

Click to expand...

What happens to the pizzas in these cases?

This thread answers some of your questions.
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/166760