Impressed? Sort of...

I have been away from CPF for some time now. I am back in my flashlight mode. I also have 1 more child to add to the family so the flashlight fund is . After seeing the current crop of new lights I guess having a low fund is ok.

I am very happy for Jetbeam to have such an impact on our world these days. I currently carry my C-LE v2 as my primary EDC. For what I need this light is excellent. High is just enough for me, and low is a good low. I rarely use med, strobe, or SOS.

It seems that light ramping is becomming the norm. This has to be one of the best features for us flashaholics. The ability to set your light to your preferences. Still tough for me to go with ramping because my C-LE has some great settings built in. If I had to go with a ramping light I think my money would go toward the Jet-I MK IBS (Selfbuilt, your reviews are badass). I am impressed with the output of that light with a 14500 in the pipe. Whoa.

Now, to topic. Yes I am impressed with the ramping. Yes I am impressed with the current output of these new lights. But....we have a situation that will have to be worked out with these crazy bright small lights. Heat. I am unimpressed with some of heat issues. These lights are being pushed to the limit. It isn't as if the heat is a new problem. Even my sissy (compared to the new lights) C-LE gets warm if it is on high for an extended time.

Elektrolumens has a new light on the market, the EDC-P7. Light uses the Seoul P7 emitter, and it has a reported 700+ lumen count. Yikes. I am curious how hot that sucker gets after a few minutes. Do I want one? Hell yeah it do!!! :twothumbs

I know that somewhere there is a 2AA callin my name. That will be my next purchase. I just will not be getting some pocket rocket any time soon, unless they run cool. Plus a 22 min high isn't THAT friendly. Gimme that crazy output for at least 60 min! Those poor AAs are getting raped!

A lot of us have come to believe the Cree is rather robust. I have a few high powered AA lights a couple which have seen many hours of runtime on high and so far they are still going strong. I don't have any fears about their reliability. Beyond that yes ther e is not a lot of surface area or thermal mass to a 1AA light but so far it hasn't affected performance noticeably for me. It is rather uncommon for me to run on high for long periods of time.

As for the P7 yes it doe run hot. The Elektorlumens P7's though ahve some of the most massive heatsinks that can be found on CPF though. Zero worries there for a single P7. I hear his tripple P7 mags get very toasty though. :naughty:

I think I feel close to the same. Lights which produce a ton of lumens but get hot quick of have super short run times (jetbeam jet II pro) don't interest me. I want a light that I can use on any of its settings without worrying if I'm overheating the LED or overworking the battery.

Personally, I like a really high high, just in case I ever need it, which pushes the emitter and the battery to their absolute limits. Then I want a slightly more sensible mode which isn't limited by heat to using for 5 minutes, but makes a level of heat which doesn't make the light get too hot (i.e, High mode on fenix's- ~100 lumens). Then an option for all the other levels- medium ~10 lumens and a very low low (~1 lumen). That'd be a good light for me

I would hold off buying another 2 x AA torch until the Nitecore D20 comes out.
As well as Fenix there is Eagle-Tac as well.
Wait until one of the CPF experts do a comparison test of all the new 2 x AA lights before buying.
Thats my 2 pence worth

I dont think we will ever shed the issue of heat with flashlights will we? I mean to get light you produce heat right? At least with the current technology of Light Emitting Diodes. They would have to come up with some sort of revolutionary lighting source technology. Calyum Light sticks dont produce heat that I know of but they also dont create much light and they crap out after an hour or so.
Maybe I am wrong, Not a rocket scientist here, but Light is energy transfer and energy transfer gives off heat? Maybe I should just shut upoo:

litetube said:

I dont think we will ever shed the issue of heat with flashlights will we? I mean to get light you produce heat right? At least with the current technology of Light Emitting Diodes. They would have to come up with some sort of revolutionary lighting source technology. Calyum Light sticks dont produce heat that I know of but they also dont create much light and they crap out after an hour or so.
Maybe I am wrong, Not a rocket scientist here, but Light is energy transfer and energy transfer gives off heat? Maybe I should just shut upoo:

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That is why I believe that the 1AA form is closely coming to some roadblocks. New LED crops just get brighter and brighter. The smaller lights will suffer first. Less metal to wick it away.

I'm coming from the technological side. There was a thread awhile ago that brought up what kind of technology makes you buy a light. I was one of the people that voted for a big jump to make me buy, compared to what I currently own. Right now there is a jump with customizing your light levels, and there is a jump in output, but that still isn't pushing me into purchase mode.

I may be content for awhile. Although I am still gunning for a 2AA at some point.

Gaffle said:

That is why I believe that the 1AA form is closely coming to some roadblocks. New LED crops just get brighter and brighter. The smaller lights will suffer first. Less metal to wick it away.

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I think it's actually the reverse of that. 1xAA lights are just recently in the past couple years taking off because of continuing improvement.

If you keep the brightness in your light the same, you can reduce the power requirements, and therefore the heat produced decreases, all while getting better runtime. Conversely, if you keep the power the same, newer LED's give you more brightness with no affect on performance or heat.

Either way, things can only get better, not worse.

PS
For infinite variability, definitely keep an eye on the numerous NiteCore models, particularly the D10 and D20 for 1xAA and 2xAA

Gaffle said:

Elektrolumens has a new light on the market, the EDC-P7. Light uses the Seoul P7 emitter, and it has a reported 700+ lumen count. Yikes. I am curious how hot that sucker gets after a few minutes.

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I have one on order, so I'll let you know :thumbsup: The one-piece design of the EDC P7 is specifically set up to make the light a better heat sink, so I'd wager it's probably not too bad.

Gaffle said:

I know that somewhere there is a 2AA callin my name. That will be my next purchase. I just will not be getting some pocket rocket any time soon, unless they run cool. Plus a 22 min high isn't THAT friendly. Gimme that crazy output for at least 60 min!

Click to expand...

Jarl said:

Personally, I like a really high high, just in case I ever need it, which pushes the emitter and the battery to their absolute limits. Then I want a slightly more sensible mode which isn't limited by heat to using for 5 minutes, but makes a level of heat which doesn't make the light get too hot

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That's the beauty of JetBeam's IBS interface - you can have your Maximum-Flank-Ludicrous Output mode, and then set another mode 20-40 lumens or so below that for a more sensible high. Their current 2xAA model, the Jet-I Pro EX V2, claims one hour at max output/200 lumens, so even if that runtime is slightly inflated, you can just set a ~175 lumen mode and get at least an hour for sure.