Advice requested: 700ish Lumen flood, $40ish.

Hey everyone!

I was wondering if I could get some advice on where to get a flashlight with reasonably high lumens (500-1000ish) for around 40 to 50 bucks. I don't need or want much throw, just pure flood.

Usage would be: Finding/defending from a burglar at night, bright light for seeing in the dark, lots of light for working (I always seem to need to litter the floor with conventional LED lights).

Ive done some reading and heres what Ive come up with:

A search at dealextreme.com for "P7 SSC" has a great variety of 900-ish (more like 500) lumen flashlights for $32 to $40. Ive read the reviews and this looks like a solid deal. Ill just find one with a really fat beam for maximum flood.

The Range Gear 200 flashlight has 200 LEDs. There is only 1 review in existence apparently though, so I am a bit dubious. It doesnt seem to have any low/medium mode either and I doubt any amp/voltage regulation.


Can anyone confirm that these are good deals (or a particularly good model), the best batteries to use, or other lights that I might try investigating? So far, I have yet to find anything decent on Amazon other than the Range Gear, and don't have enough general lighting knowledge.

The Mrs said I can get ONE more flashlight, then I'm done! (she seems to think the 10 or so 5 dollar lights should do me just fine...)

Please note that I am a flashlight noob, so be careful with your usage of acronyms, etc.

Thanks for any help or feedback you can provide!

:welcome:


Go to dealextreme.com or kaidomain.com and look at their mc-e and p7 lights. Just remember that 700lumens would be at the emitter and not out the front lumens. Expect about 300-400 lumens after reflector loss, which is still a massive amount of light to deal with a home intruder. However I hope a bright flashlight would not be THE only weapon you've got for home defence?!?

Try the Romisen RC-T5 4-Cree 3-Mode LED Flashlight or Aurora AK-P7-3 SSC P7-C 900-Lumen 2-Mode LED Flashlight

I've heard that the MTE's are pretty decent, you might try this guy:
dx/sku.16501

unfortunately, it comes on in medium not high which might be better for your wants.

Well, if you are only allowed ONE more flashlight, maybe you can increase the budget a little....

The cheap DX and KD lights are a bit of a gamble IMO in terms of quality of construction; I have bought 4 MC-E and P7 lights of this class over the last year and had some issues with all of them, which required extensive diassembly, cleaning, heat sink compound, soldering, etc. I had to fix conduction and thermal pathways. They all are working fine now but I would not recommend them to you unless you are prepared to service and mod them like I did. The worst issue that can arise is a hidden one, where the thermal path from the emitter is bad and allows heat to build up, severely impacting output and soon enough cooking the emitter. A hint that this is ocurring is if you run it on max and after 5-10 minutes cannot feel much heat on the outside of the light; these emitter DO make heat at high outputs and if it isn't making it to the outside of your light, it is frying the emitter.

If you can I would try to pick up a MG PLI, which is an MC-E based light made by MG and sold by Shiningbeam, although he has trouble keeping them in stock. They sometimes appear in WTS on the marketplace. You should be able to get one for something like the top end of your budget, maybe a few dollars more. If you post a WTB you might get some hits.

Just keep in mind when you shine a bright light at somebody in your house, at night (especially if you've been asleep), you're going to blind yourself too.

Find a light that has multiple modes, and set it on a low and then use the bright if you need to, but that way identifying/finding the intruder won't blind you.

Also, a light gives away your position TO the intruder, so if he/she is carrying a weapon, it makes it easier for them to fire upon you, even if they're blind, they might engage in the spray and pray method.

I took this advice from somebody here, and now I have a light that is programmed to a moonlight mode for bumps in the night, next to a 357sig pistol.

Thanks for the advice.

That MG PLI sounds really nice! Is it really 700 Lumens? I know the P7s claim 900, but from what I read they are more like 300-400ish. Still pretty good though.

I really like that it has Voltage Regulation for a consistent lumen output (until the battery keels over).

You were right though... they are sold out ATM.

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Can anyone chime in when deciding between a P7 and the 4 Cree that were recomended below?

I bought this one and it was definitely worth the $35:

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.19767

It puts a wall of light out. Doesn't throw better than a R2 but it puts a serious volume of light out. It will get hot if left on high for an extended period of time. It doesn't have mode memory so you have to cycle hi-lo-off each time which is a little annoying but for the price you can't complain.

I'm running these cells in it:
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.20392