LED or Incand for Damaged Automobile Inspection

My brothers daughter came to me yesterday and said her boss told her she should get a good flashlight. She just got a new job and has been training to be a claims agent for one of the large insurance agencies. She said she laughed because she new uncle Bill was the place to go. I told her I would give it some thought and run it by my CPF friends. Primary use will be for inspecting damaged automobiles for damage estimates.

Here is some of the criteria I came up with.

Small enough to fit in a purse.
Bright enough to see body dents, frame damage under the car, and inspect the engine compartment for damage.
Since the light will only be used for short periods of time run time not critical.
Clicky or twisty not critical.
Good flood type light with a soft spot I'm sure would be best for this type of close up work.
I would think two levels would be useful but not mandatory.

She is checking to see if the company covers the cost and if so how much. At present lets just leave cost out of the mix.

What I'm not sure about is wether an LED or Incand would be better for this type of work.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated. Don't be shy.

Thanks

Bill

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Maybe an E2E? Does she want to stick with easy to find batteries or are CR123s ok? Maybe when Fenix starts selling the L1T/L2T again that would be a good AA option.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Given the fact that she will be doing her work in daylight or rtificial light mostly, I am not so sure if a floody light will pack the punch to overcome the light pollution present. Just a thought.

As with all women and their purses, size might be critical ... so I'd personally opt for a 1xCR123 primary light. Primary to avoid the hassle of rechargeables which she as a non-enthusiast will not use anyway.
Same goes for the interface. I'd go as far as to opt for a single level torch or something as intuitive as a SF L1-type interface, but not more complicated.
Ruggedness might not be a key factor.

Make it easy for her, make it small and convienient. She is not one of us.

Lights that come to mind are:

Fenix P1 CE (not the "D", mind you)
Nautilus
Arc LSH

If size is not critical ...

McLuxIII-PD
SF L1
SF E2L

IMHO and from personal experience, of course.

I'd choose the Fenix P1 CE as a first try.

bernie

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

For LED:

Maybe a 1AA or 2 AA 1-2 mode Cree/Seoul DX light? Something like the MTE Seoul.

Or maybe pay more and get her a Fenix L1/2D-CE, Jetbeam CL-E, or Lumapower LM31.

Not sure how well it will work though.

What is the biggest practical light you would pick in the fitting in a purse category.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

The purse seems to be generating some questions. Heck I don't know. You know the fairer sex, one day the size of a bread box the next day the size of a shoe.

I like the L1D or especially P1 Idea. It's listed at 90 lumens which is probably plenty. I think the L2D is too long for a shoe. It seems everyone so far feels an LED light will show up fine in the daylight when she will be doing most of her inspections? One of the reasons I asked the question was because I thought the yellower incand light might show up better in the daylight, but I have never personally run any tests.

Interesting so far.

Thanks

Bill

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Gunner12 said:

For LED:

Maybe a 1AA or 2 AA 1-2 mode Cree/Seoul DX light? Something like the MTE Seoul.

Or maybe pay more and get her a Fenix L1/2D-CE, Jetbeam CL-E, or Lumapower LM31.

Not sure how well it will work though.

What is the biggest practical light you would pick in the fitting in a purse category.

Click to expand...

MTE SSC. Plus she won't be too sad when it gets dropped.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

I'd choose a Surefire L4 for close up work but I'm partial to Surefire. The L2 is a good option with it's two levels though it is bigger. Realistically if she's not into lights most any $10 hardware store LED light will do.

I prefer incandescents in general for the more accurate color rendition. This probably isn't very important to her. A good LED will be able to illuminate a bad paint match as well as an incandescent anyway.
I'm sure this whole decision is much more fun for you than it is her.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

I think the P1 or the P1D Q5 would be a good choice, its small, it can be cliped to a keychain, and it bright enough. The only problem is that its not easy to operate with one hand, I would guess that she has a clip board to hold her paperwork so needing two hands to operate a light would not be easy. My suggestion would be for the P3D Q5, it can run on rechargeables or primaries and is easly operated with one hand.

I also detailed cars for many years and found that the low like that of the P3D works well in finding small dents and minor paint mistakes.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

JimmyB said:

I'd choose a Surefire L4 for close up work but I'm partial to Surefire. The L2 is a good option with it's two levels though it is bigger. Realistically if she's not into lights most any $10 hardware store LED light will do.

I prefer incandescents in general for the more accurate color rendition. This probably isn't very important to her. A good LED will be able to illuminate a bad paint match as well as an incandescent anyway.
I'm sure this whole decision is much more fun for you than it is her.

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I like the L4 myself and originally thought it would be a very good choice if the company was paying. We don't know yet. I think Bernie brought up a good point I hadn't thought about. In the daylight a total flood beam may not be the right choice. It may take a nice spot to cut through. I plan on doing some experiments tomorrow to see. I will compare my Olights to my Fenix lights. The Olight has a much more defined spot.

Bill

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

I run a Ford dealership and appraise trade-ins on a daily basis in sunshine, night, rain, snow... you name it.

I have used SF G2 with P61 with great success. I just recently switched to a Malkoff M60L Q5 drop-in and find that to be even better to point out imperfections in auto bodies, tires and interiors.

Occasionally I use my HDS 60XR, Novatac 120P, Fenix P3D Q5 or various other models, of which all work pretty well. I can say this, during the day you need at least 100 lumens with a decent spot, floods are no good in the sun. In the evening you can get a way with a flood, but I still prefer a stronger spot, just take your time moving the light across the exterior and interior of the vehicle.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

GBone said:

I run a Ford dealership and appraise trade-ins on a daily basis in sunshine, night, rain, snow... you name it.

I have used SF G2 with P61 with great success. I just recently switched to a Malkoff M60L Q5 drop-in and find that to be even better to point out imperfections in auto bodies, tires and interiors.

Occasionally I use my HDS 60XR, Novatac 120P, Fenix P3D Q5 or various other models, of which all work pretty well. I can say this, during the day you need at least 100 lumens with a decent spot, floods are no good in the sun. In the evening you can get a way with a flood, but I still prefer a stronger spot, just take your time moving the light across the exterior and interior of the vehicle.

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Thanks G-Bone. You confirm what Bernie said about a spot probably being better. It's funny I didn't see it that way, but now that it is pointed out, it makes sense.

Bill

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Well after doing some testing I decided on a Olight T15 Q5. It is 120 Lumens on high. Takes an AA battery and is easy enough to operate that a collage educated (non-flashaholic) should be able to operate it. I think the tighter spot on this light vs the Fenix P1 ( my other choice ) will be better for outside daylight work.

Thank you Bernie for this observation because I would have went with the total flood. That may have worked OK but the brighter spot was definitely the better way to go. I also noticed in my testing that the whiter light of the LED may actually help in finding dents in panels better than Incand IMO. I hope that didn't open a can of worms.

Bill

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Hitthespot said:

Well after doing some testing I decided on a Olight T15 Q5. It is 120 Lumens on high. Takes an AA battery and is easy enough to operate that a collage educated (non-flashaholic) should be able to operate it. I think the tighter spot on this light vs the Fenix P1 ( my other choice ) will be better for outside daylight work.

Bill

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Smart. Of course I was going to recommend that The best things it has going for it is the reasonable user interface and the AA battery. She's not going to want to bug you for batteries, and if the light dies she's going to want to reload it immediately. That may mean a trip to the local convenience store, where CR123s are $10 a pop.

The beam will be tight and bright enough for daylight, no worries.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

The more I think about it - wouldn't you want some sort of LED and battery operated shop light to allow you to see if there's misalignments and other body issues like light ripples/etc?

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

I find that using incans for body inspection makes them look hotter and LEDs make them look flat.

EDIT: I see you meant car bodies. How silly of me :devil:

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Beastmaster said:

The more I think about it - wouldn't you want some sort of LED and battery operated shop light to allow you to see if there's misalignments and other body issues like light ripples/etc?

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I asked the same question. In the shop there will be shop lights but some of the inspections will be on site, tow facitlities, service stations, etc....

Thanks

Bill

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

I edc an olight T15, one AA battery, pretty small. I've used it to look at damage from a collision, and it worked very well.

Wouldn't you want something with a really tight beam so you can shine the light parallel to the side of the car to look for shadows (from dents)?

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

defloyd77 said:

I find that using incans for body inspection makes them look hotter and LEDs make them look flat.

EDIT: I see you meant car bodies. How silly of me :devil:

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The first time I looked at the title I new this was coming.

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

SF L4, Very nice spill beam excellent for close quarters work.
SF L1 Cree, compact, 2 stage, single cell and bright, add F04 beamshaper for spill.

But for colour rendition, incans are best, and an SF A2 .....

Re: LED or Incand for Body Inspection

Hitthespot said:

The first time I looked at the title I new this was coming.

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I honestly didn't know he meant car body, thought of a cop doing a body search. Anywho couldn't resist.