The last one to turn off the incandescent...

loszabo

Enlightened
Joined
Apr 17, 2008
Messages
356
Location
Vienna, Austria
Is it only me, but are you also starting to retire your incandescent flashlights?

It started with the SureFire E2D: four batteries plus one new bulb sealed away in the spare carrier sitting next to the E2D on my bookshelf in my second home. Then the Falcata 6V... Suddenly I started replacing all my SureFire P60s with P60Ls. And, now something really embarrassing! :( I took the two cells out of my SureFire A2 and put the light into my retirement bookshelf as well! :shakehead

What's wrong: is it politically incorrect to upgrade a M2 with a P60L and dreaming of a P61L? Did this all happen, because I played a little bit too long with a MagLite AA last weekend?

Yes, there are several discussions on CPF regarding incandescent vs LED. I loved them back in the good, old days. But, today LEDs are getting brighter and better every time someone posts a new thread. Not ~20 hours run-time anymore. No, hundreds and thousands of hours instead!

Sorry, my friends. I will keep my incandescent lights to be prepared for the day when the sun goes dark. But until then, I'm a LED junkie: a fast and cheap fix for my body! Ready whenever my soul needs some light.


Good bye, Incandescent! The last one leaving the room please turn off the incandescent flashlight...
 
Last edited:

Fallingwater

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Jul 11, 2005
Messages
3,323
Location
Trieste, Italy
I don't even have any incandescent flashlights.
I recognize the usefulness of having a flashlight, but I wouldn't be remotely interested in them if all we had were incandescents. I'd just be carrying a small one, for which I'd have all the affection I have for, say, kitchen cutlery, and that would be it.

It's the technology behind LEDs that makes me care about them. I find two batteries and a filament that glows white-hot singularily boring; in contrast, the various technical aspects of drivers, emitters and so on make LED flashlights very interesting to me.
 

TITAN1833

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Oct 27, 2006
Messages
3,267
Location
Dark! Dank! Murky! England.
i have one a WF-500 and it is used,but the fear is incandescent flashlights lamps.
Will be like LP'S and 45'S,
hard to get ..the prices will go through the roof!
But don't worry led is moving fast,and my guess is it will surpass incandescent lighting anyway :devil:

[edited]i was meant to say,before i got cut off,the lamps for incandescents will become more! and more! expensive and harder to get.
As less manufacturers will produce them :)
That is my opinion.
 
Last edited:

yellow

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Oct 31, 2002
Messages
4,629
Location
Baden.at
makes no sense, and the outcome (if there is one, better say: the way the tread will go) is still the same...

as someone has typed lately: compare number of treads & posts at the forums. Everything is clear then
 

P220C

Newly Enlightened
Joined
Aug 11, 2008
Messages
81
I still carry my E2e because I am too cheap to buy an E1b just yet.

I just bought a G2 LED and it rocks. I am waiting (im)patiently for surefire to release the P61L so my C-3 will get some more use.

I was (am) a huge fan of SureFire. I know it's kool-aid to some, but I trust their stuff. That and they fix everything I manage to break or tear up.

I really need a long distance LED upwards of 200 lumen. If they don't hurry up with that P61L I am probably going to nab a Malkoff.

I don't foresee myself buying an incan light ever again. It just doesn't make sense. On the other hand, if I loose something in the thick grass of my yard I really have a difficult time finding it with an LED. The yellowish xenon at around 60 lumens is just the ticket for searching close up like that. I have some depth perception problems with LED light. Some tints are worse than others. CREE, P4, Rebel, all seem to equally as good for me with that slight depth perception issues. All of these choices are inferior in that regard to Xenon.

Of course the trade of is that my Xenons eat batteries and the filiments break. I am really hard on my stuff, so I go though a bulb a year or so.
 

BlueBeam22

*Super Flashaholic*
Joined
Apr 18, 2008
Messages
1,518
I am completely addicted to LED flashlights and I like them a lot more than incans. I only like incandescent spotlights (I have lots of them), but NOT flashlights.

My favorite two LED lights in my collection are currently my 150 lumen Task Force and my Coleman 530 lumen CREE XR-E LED spotlight.
 

Tomcat!

Enlightened
Joined
Jun 5, 2007
Messages
408
Location
London, UK
For a long time I used only LED because my original xenon lights didn't give me usable run times. They were an E1e and an E2e. For me, a single cell xenon seems totally pointless because it would all too often unexpectedly leave me in the dark, which is useless for a pocket EDC. I used the E2e at work but again it would let me down without warning and for my purposes could be too bright. Plus, I was concerned about the cost of all the part used cells I was having to get rid of. It's not that there was anything wrong with the lights themselves, just that the technology was wrong for the need. Also, I was new to premium flashlights and just bought bright and expensive without thinking it through. So, multimode LEDs replaced those and they performed the tasks really well. Gradually I bought a lot more LEDs in ever brighter configurations to cover my lighting needs and then some.

Now that I was well and truly bitten by the flashaholic bug, I wanted more and more output. Although I was keeping up with the latest LED technology, I came up against the limits of the technology. It seemed that LEDs could not get up into the 250+ lumen output. Sure the manufacturers were making all sorts of wild claims, but none really lived up to expectation. The lights themselves were getting quite expensive without delivering a correspondingly higher output. I kept thinking that incan would give me higher output with a lower outlay... ah but the running cost?

That was when I took the plunge and delved into the world of rechargeable Li-ions. Here was a solution which makes incans viable by getting rid of the high running cost and wastage, and giving me back the incan advantages of higher output and good colour rendition.

Of course incans still have disadvantages, but unlike some in the LED vs Incan debate whose views can be so polarised, I prefer to grade the technologies according to the job and buy accordingly. My feeling is that in the sub 200 lumen range, LEDs reign supreme. They are so much more fuel efficient and reliable than incan that they really cannot be beaten in the average persons EDC role. Starting small, there isn't an incan that can beat an LED in the area of keychain and small pocket single cell EDC. IMHO the disadvantages are simply too great. Moving up to 2 cell, LED still offers better pocket lights, although this can be a grey area depending on personal use. Just ask anyone who loves their E2e, A2 or 6P. For me personally, LED is better for this area. A 2 cell T1/TK10/TK11 for example gives me plenty of light for the size. 3 cells or above I regard as moving into specialist territory and pocket carry stops being important. My 9P gets expensive to run on primaries so the option was to drop in a LED. That of course worked well, but gave me an output no greater than a 2 cell LED. The point was more output, so switching to Li-ions and a 380 lumen lamp gave me what I wanted, a bright thrower. In the future I many well go for even higher output, which is something far easier to achieve with incan than LED. I cannot write off one technology as bad, merely not suitable for a particular job. It's true of course that LEDs get better every year and will continue to squeeze incans out of certain sectors of use, but to simply dismiss incans altogether is foolish. Both technologies can coexist (if required) in a users light arsenal provided you use it in the manner for which it was intended. EDC and emergency lighting is really the province of LED but does not entirely preclude incan. And incan users cannot afford to be sniffy about LED just because of colour rendition or output because LED offers a reliable light source to help you when your bulb goes pop or your stock of cells is used up faster than expected. I have a place in my collection for both types of light. It just so happens that EDC and preparedness interest me more so LEDs are my go to lights, but incans take me to light levels that LEDs cannot touch. Yet!
 

Alan B

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Nov 19, 2007
Messages
1,963
Location
San Francisco Bay Area
I was converting all my M@glites to LED (good ones, not the M@g LEDs) and planning to dump the old 3D M@G I had from 30 years ago. Then one day I decided to try a hotwire (souped up incandescent). So I put together a M@G85, which is a Welch-Allyn 1185 bulb in a M@G. This 30 watt bulb really makes your M@G come to life. After that I decided to keep my very old 3D M@G stock for comparison purposes. Something like "remember when we thought a 3D M@G was an impressive light". Do a little demo and compare it with things like the little Fenix L0D, and work up the chain. Save the M@G85 for last. One can go even higher in power than the M@G85 but the heat and runtimes limit the practical use. The 85's are still pretty useful with moderate runtimes.

For me the only impressive incandescents are the higher powered ones, and the LEDs like the SSC P7 and Osram Ostar are catching up fast.

Alan
 

angelofwar

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Nov 17, 2007
Messages
3,336
Location
South Carolina
NEVER!!! I have plenty of both, and an equal love for both, but I love the throw/size ration of my E1e, the ability to use my IR filters, and I keep (probably always will) my 6P w/ P61 by my bed stand for any unwanted guests. I still buy 2D M*gnum Star Xenon's to keep in my M*g 3-D's. Incan's are better throwers (think HID's). I think some of us have turned into "battery-holics", and are always looking for "runtime, runtime, runtime". Never underestimate to power of an incan!!!. There's no doubt LED has IT's advantages, but there are some advantages of Incan's that an LED of the same size, probably won't be able to duplicate for awhile, namely IR light radiation, and yellow color rendition. I'll be the last, if I ever do!:candle:
 

monkeyboy

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Mar 7, 2006
Messages
2,327
Location
UK
Is it only me, but are you also starting to retire your incandescent flashlights?

For me, it's quite the opposite. I'm building a small collection of high powered incans since they still have some advantages over LEDs. IMO incans won't become truly obsolete until an LED can match it in output, beam pattern and colour spectrum, whereas the current generation of LEDs will become obsolete as soon as the next generation is announced.

I still use incans for:
1) playing with
2) bump in the night
3) long distance spotting

For everything else, I use LED.
 

Flying Turtle

Flashaholic
Joined
Jan 28, 2003
Messages
6,509
Location
Apex, NC
Except for my big old cheapo spotlight I retired my incands. back sometime in 2002, after finding a Dorcy Cool Blue, an Energizer 4AA Folding Lantern, The LED Museum, and this place.

Geoff
 

DoubleDutch

Enlightened
Joined
Apr 21, 2005
Messages
525
Location
The Netherlands - one foot below sea level
Only yesterday I took the batts out of my trusty old Princeton Tec 40, and put it in my museum collection. There it joins other incans like PT Blast, Rage, Streamlight TL 2 and Ultrafires.

The reduction in size, better (choice of) runtimes and high dependability of LED's have won me over. Of course there are still things to improve on, especially focus and colour. But this will come (in the latest Fenix e.g.).

With the Nitecore D10, Elektrolumens DeCree and several Fenix lights, my EDC needs seem to be fulfilled for a while. When a nice pocketable P7 without bugs sees the light, I'll consider it. The last couple of weeks my interest is once more leaning towards knives, one of my other EDC tics.

Kees
 

foxtrot29

Enlightened
Joined
May 21, 2008
Messages
534
Location
Canada
I still carry a Streamlight Strion as a backup duty light to my Surefire C2 (C2 has an LED drop-in, gonna replace current drop in with a Malkoff as soon as one becomes available!).

I'm also partial to my Streamlight Scorpion, but it doesn't see much use anymore. Nitecore D10 and Defender Infinity seem to be my EDC lights now when not at work.

So yeah, the incan's don't see much use anymore, but they are there occasionally... I find I still like the Strion for simulated night shooting -- I can see the target better with the incan than I can with the LED... not sure if it's just in my head, but that's how I feel.
 

Lightraven

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Sep 2, 2004
Messages
1,170
Haven't used an incandescent in quite a while now. Only carry one for backup purposes--Surefire M6.

However, I'm using High Intensity Discharge at every opportunity.
 

metlarules

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Jan 30, 2008
Messages
1,027
Only yesterday I took the batts out of my trusty old Princeton Tec 40, and put it in my museum collection. There it joins other incans like PT Blast, Rage, Streamlight TL 2 and Ultrafires.

The reduction in size, better (choice of) runtimes and high dependability of LED's have won me over. Of course there are still things to improve on, especially focus and colour. But this will come (in the latest Fenix e.g.).

With the Nitecore D10, Elektrolumens DeCree and several Fenix lights, my EDC needs seem to be fulfilled for a while. When a nice pocketable P7 without bugs sees the light, I'll consider it. The last couple of weeks my interest is once more leaning towards knives, one of my other EDC tics.

Kees
Stick a 1w led replacement bulb in that P-40 and put it back to work.:grin2:
 

JNewell

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Apr 28, 2006
Messages
1,800
Location
Land of the Bean and the Cod
I am an old-line incan fan...have been using SF incans for 10 years now...but the logic of the LEDs is hard to resist. Higher output AND longer runtime. I will not be retiring or selling my M6 or my A2...but I have converted several 2x123A lights, including one of my EDCs, a 6Z. Runtime/output...runtime/output...:popcorn:
 

CM

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
Sep 11, 2002
Messages
3,454
Location
Mesa, AZ
I got rid of my last incandescent (Surefire M6) about a year ago. I see little need for 500 lumens except on rare occassions in which case I now turn to HID. LED's are now coming out with higher CRI's which is yet another nail in the coffin for incandescents.
 
Top