LED lights and the general public on a cave tour.

We just returned from a cave tour with our son's cub scout pack and I noticed that out of around 100 people, only a few had incandescent lights. Mostly we had those cheap Energizer single LED headlamps. Not surprising since most of these people would seldom have a use for a headlamp and that was the model suggested by the pack leader.

The more surprising part was that the handheld lights most everyone had were a LED of some sort. I only saw one 2d maglite, two incan headlamps, and two to three chaepie incans. So at least for scouts and their families, LEDs are leading the way.

Also, my C2H with a Q35A was by far the brightest light down there.

Ayeaux said:

So at least for scouts and their families, LEDs are leading the way.

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How representative do you think scouts are of the general flashlight-using population? My guess is they're a little ahead.

This Halloween I saw nothing but LED lights all up and down the streets.

Guess people finally got tired of ugly beams and chewing threw batteries like there was no tomorrow? The last cruise I went on I only had my Surefire 6PL and I went on a day trip that did a lot of caving and hiking. Surprisingly they gave us some fairly nice gear and a nice headlamp (Forgot what it was ) I wish I could get into caving as a hobby but the nearest places to my home are an hour and a half or more away :thumbsdow

My 11 year old daughter recently went on a cave tour with her class. I gave her an old Task Force led light I had laying around to take on the tour. She later told me that everyone was amazed how bright it was compared to all the others. This surprised me. I can only assume all the other parents gave their kids the worst flashlights they could find to take with them (can't really blame them) or a lot of people are still using crummy old icand. 2D Maglites.

Lol, I'd love to see their faces if she showed up with my 35w HID spotlight!

gsxrac said:

I wish I could get into caving as a hobby but the nearest places to my home are an hour and a half or more away

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That's quite close!

that everyone was amazed how bright it was compared to all the others. This surprised me.

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we here are lightyears ahead!
What we already consider as "outdated", is something the "General Public" has not even realized...

so we are the geeks, indeed

Seems like LED lights are what Target and WalMart has the most of these days. I guess the general public has finally caught on.

Geoff

yellow said:

we here are lightyears ahead!
What we already consider as "outdated", is something the "General Public" has not even realized...

so we are the geeks, indeed

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Yeah I can agree with that... the old 3D P7 M@g I pieced together ages ago still blows peoples minds (non flash-a-holics of course) when they see it's output


As far as basic entry level lighting... I can understand not sending an expensive light along with your children on any kind of excursion (or camping adventure) as whilst they may look after it there's bound to be some little feral that would mishandle it (or worse)

I recently attended a Scout camp that included nighttime activities (BB shooting, hay rides,) and daytime activities including hiking and such.

I was aware of the flashlights and most of them were cheap LED lights. There was a smattering of LED MiniMags and several headlamp LEDs.

My 10 year old son had his AAA Maratac and I had a Fenix LD01 stainless, a Nitecore EZCR2 clipped to my jacket zipper and a Nitecore D10 R2 clipped to a pocket.

Fellow campers were simply astounded by the output of these lights. The hayride line was very long (45 minutes +) as there were almost 1000 campers there. While standing in that line, my son would light up the treetops and folks would say "Wow, what kind of light is that?"

He enjoyed having the lights and when we were back at the tents, he and I both utilized the Chapstick top trick to hang our AAA lights with 550 cords. Folks thought that was the neatest trick.

Maybe when we go back next year we will see more quality flashlights among the ranks.

The real problem lies in convincing the general public that spending more than $10 on a flashlight is a good idea.

And then convincing them to spend between $50 and $100 for a good light, not just an acceptable one.

-Trevor

Was climbing (more like a hike) a mountain (Kinabalu mountain in Sabah, Malaysia) last April and there was a night climb where everyone wakes up at about 2am and try to reach the top to catch the sunrise and literally everyone was using LEDs.

Cuz the China made LED lights are easily available here in Malaysia and well they're really cheap. The thing is, they worked pretty well and were more than bright enough for the hike. Wish i was into lights then, only had my incan mini mag. :mecry:

Well, that's what started me into this hobby anyway.

strinq said:

literally everyone was using LEDs. ... only had my incan mini mag.

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A CPFer was the only one with an incandescent light instead of LED.

No, wait, you joined the month after. That's all right then.

Flying Turtle said:

Seems like LED lights are what Target and WalMart has the most of these days. I guess the general public has finally caught on.

Geoff

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I'd say that the stores are forcing newer stuff on the ignorant general public. They don't advertise half as much as they should, but I did notice that the flashlight rack in most stores becomes pretty empty once camping season is started. Doesn't matter, I'm still light years ahead of Mr./Mrs. everyone...

In my early days of flashaholism I was not a true believer. Back in 2004 I went to Carlsbad Caverns with my Wife. At the time I had 3 Surefires, an E2D, L2, and G2. What did I bring with me? My G2 w/P61. I would never take my E2D or L2 with me on trips for fear of losing them. Actually that turned out to be a good choice as the P61 really lit up the place. I recall only the Rangers and tour guides carried lights. Mags and Stingers mostly. Flash forward to last year. I went caving at Lava Beds National Park and my primary hand held was a 6P w/BOG Cree Super Premium drop in. That sucker worked great. Lots of throw and the output was sufficient enough to overcome the weak color rendition LEDs are notorious for. And it ran 3+ hours on a set of batteries.

If I'm crawling in the muck I will have a C2 with the above mentioned BOG drop in. This is the perfect balance of throw, lumens, and runtime for me. If I'm on a walking tour I will strap on my M3.

i wish i had a cave tour around here.
i hope that the general public stuff gets better so i dont have to throttle my output to be courteous

10 years ago I went to one of those corn mazes. They told people to bring a flashlight along with them. I had just the one in mind. My Magcharger.:devil: It's hard to imagine now, but back then the Magcharger was easily the brightest flashlight around. Most people had 2D icand. Maglites or even the little AA Mags. Anyway the Magcharger was a big hit there. At one point in the maze there was a bridge that rose above the whole maze. People were standing on the bridge shining their cute little flashlights down below. Hehe, I went up to the middle of the bridge and turned on the Magcharger. It was as if everyone else had turned their lights off when I flicked that thing on. I don't know how many people came up to me that night to ask wth kind of flashlight it was. I probably converted 50 people that night to flashlight geeks.

Don't beat up on incans. This is the general flashlight section, so you all need to keep your minds open. Once you have experience 700+ lumens of warm ROP goodness, Incans don't seem so bad.
In fact, it is hard for me to use LEDs now. They seem so faint when used otuside, since trees and earth reflect light of the wavelengths that incans output (basically everything, but a lot of red and yellow), but not much in the range that LEDs output (mostly blue).
Of course, you should only have an incan maglite if it is modified.