Which 2AA Led Conversion or light for walking?

I want a light to use for walks at night on the road. Something I can use for close to medium range to light the way. I'll also be carrying either my E2, G2, or Legend LX in case additional light is needed. I've got several mini m*gs stuck away here and I figure I may as well put one to good use again with an LED conversion. I've narrowed it down to probably using either the Opalec, or Inrectech conversion. I thought about the Badboy or Madmax but it might be too much light for what I need and I'd like to end up with a few hours run time if possible. I've got ARC AAAs and Infinity Ultra G's but they don't put out quite enough light for what I need. Will the Opalec be enough? I also thought about the X5T but I'll be using the light quite a bit so I'd like to use rechargeables if possible. We will be moving towards the end of the year and will have approx. 10 acres of wooded area on our property so I may use the light for walking in there at night too. How does the Opalec do in woods? I want to try to keep the light cost down on this one to $35 or so right now if I can do it. Also does the case warm up considerably if you are running the Inretech for extended periods of time?
John

The Inretech can't use rechargeables, and the Opalec doesn't in anyway approach the light you'd get from the Inretech. I'd go with the Badboy. The Badboy and the Inretech both use a Luxeon, but the Inretech is direct drive. The rechargeables with the Badboy would probably be your best bet. It's much brighter than the Arc and Ultra G, brighter by far than the Opalec, but significantly dimmer than you E2, G2 or Legend LX.

John,
The Inretech does not heat up much, it is actually underdriven so no worries about that. The Inretech will be much brighter and batteries last for many hours...going into days etc. You can get a MadMax and adjust it down to the light output you desire. It would be your best bet so you can get exactly the light ouput you want and balance it with run time.

I have used the Opalec for walking on the road at night. I found it just BARELY bright enough, and I found myself wishing it was brighter. You can get by, but something with more throw would be better. It might do better in the woods, actually, where things are closer, but I cannot speak from experience.

How's the "quality" of the dark you'll be walking in? If there are streetlights and spill light from house lights, the Opalec may not be bright enough to adequately light much farther than the area ahead of your feet, although it sounds like you'll be covered with your other lights for distant illumination needs. I am an Opalec fan and for lighting within 10' in "good quality dark" I find it's plenty of light for my 40+ year old eyes. If you want to simulate the brightness of an Opalec, tape a couple of your ARC AAAs or Infinity Ultras together, the Opalec will be brighter than two, but not quite as bright as three. I consistently get 8 to 10 hours of use from the Opalec before the red LED comes on and it starts dimming (with good quality alkalines, not the cheap Sony batteries I bought on sale)

Where we will be walking is on a country road, no street lights and almost no traffic, houses are few and far between and all 300' or back from the road so it's going to be pretty dark out there. Good idea about trying a couple of ultras together. Last night I was just thinking about that same thing. I might take a couple of them out tonight and give it a try. With the Inretech will I get good enough light out of it to see out to approx. 20' in front of us? Sounds like I the Opalec might not be quite enough for what I need but I want so much light that it completely ruins our night vision. John

I find that a single 5mm LED (Arc AAA) is more than plenty for walking around in the dark. I have a CMG Infinity on order which is much dimmer and will see how that goes.

Since you want something brighter, you should be able to run a Princeton Tec Attitude (4aaa, 3 or 4 led's) on rechargeables and maybe that'll suit your purposes. The main complaint I hear about the Attitude is it's unregulated, but since rechargeables have flatter output voltage than alkalines, the brightness should stay more constant. It's not 2AA but I'm not sure why you want that.

The Opalec is a nice product but it seems ridiculously expensive to me, plus I don't like the Minimag any more and I'm not buying M@g stuff in general.

I just received an Inretech Green Luxeon and I can see my garage easily at 100+ feet. It would say that it would make an excellent walking light. I had it on in a friends shed for 3 hours tonight as our only source of light while we were having a few cold ones and shooting the (S@#t). It didn't even get warm and didn't seem to get any dimmer. Wonderful light.

Hunterson, Sounds good on the Inretech you got. What kind of batteries were you using with it? I want to stick with an AA size light since I'll be carrying another light with me and need to switch back and forth with one hand since I'll also be walking a dog most of the time. John

My choice would be the Opalec Newbeam in whatever 2AA body you prefer. Mine are not in MiniMags any longer, they are in my Dopalecs - there is a thread on the construction of a Dopalec here somewhere ... (Dorcy/Opalec)

An Inretech with a yellow Luxeon might work ok on two AA rechargeables with no voltage boost. With alkalines it would need a limiting resistor.

The Inretech with lithiums is very nice. It completely blows away the Opalec, and with alkalines it is still at least 50% brighter than the Opalec. The runtime is so long that I don't worry about using the more expensive lithiums.

The Inretech mod is very good for walks in the dark. Is very nice with lithium AA but still very good with normal alkalines.

Just using the duracells that came with the light.

great thread.

i can give a few lux readings which may help in your decision. i also went out west recently, and really learned some things about my lighting needs.

my white inretech was a big surprise. i used lithiums, and although the beam was a nasty green, it managed around 90 lux on fresh bats. it gave lots of light to walk around in really dark areas. it had no trouble getting 30+ feet throw.

the opalec, in contrast, put out about 40 lux. it was just fine for walking around the dark trails--in fact, it seemed pretty darn bright.

though not a AA, the attitude was a step up in brightness from the opalec at 52 lux.

as was stated above--in really dark areas, a well drivin single 5mm led was plenty for simply walking. the arc aaa or infinity ultra was fine at around 20-25 lux.

my advice: you already have a very bright light, so now you need a medium bright general purpose light, with a long runtime. i find that i only need 150-200 lux to get the job done. you should be able to easily get that out of a BB 400 or madmax. they should give close to 3hrs runtime (the MM can be detuned to go even further).

i think the BB400 was designed with rechargeables in mind (somebody correct me if i am incorrect). it drains the bats down to a level that does not destroy them. you could bring a spare set of rechargeables, to ensure you will have a ton of runtime.

perhaps a great combo would be: bright: G2 or E2 (~3000lux?). Medium: BB400 w/2 spare bats (~200+ lux?). Backup: infinity ultra or ARC aaa (20-25 lux).

good luck!

Bob

It's not a 2AA light, but the Streamlight 4AA Pro-Poly is rapidly becoming my favorite walking light.

Even more so than my ARC-LS or SL-3AA Luxeons.

Thanks for the info everyone. Maybe I'll take a look at the Babboy. I've already got several sets of NIMH batteries around here so no sense buying the alkaline rechargeables for the Inretech especially since they may not work well after multiple charges. If you run the Badboy for long periods of time, say 1 hour, does the body of the light get very warm? Can it be installed in something else besides a mag like a dorcy or s&w that comes with a click switch on it? John

im about to put some madmaxes in brinkmann legend 2aa--they have tail clickies built it. ant they lock out, if needed. very nice. cost about $10 from REI. even have some grippy rubber on the body and head. not sure aobut heat build up.

Bob

[ QUOTE ]
pedalinbob said:
great thread.

i can give a few lux readings which may help in your decision. i also went out west recently, and really learned some things about my lighting needs.

my white inretech was a big surprise. i used lithiums, and although the beam was a nasty green, it managed around 90 lux on fresh bats. it gave lots of light to walk around in really dark areas. it had no trouble getting 30+ feet throw.

the opalec, in contrast, put out about 40 lux. it was just fine for walking around the dark trails--in fact, it seemed pretty darn bright.

though not a AA, the attitude was a step up in brightness from the opalec at 52 lux.

as was stated above--in really dark areas, a well drivin single 5mm led was plenty for simply walking. the arc aaa or infinity ultra was fine at around 20-25 lux.

my advice: you already have a very bright light, so now you need a medium bright general purpose light, with a long runtime. i find that i only need 150-200 lux to get the job done. you should be able to easily get that out of a BB 400 or madmax. they should give close to 3hrs runtime (the MM can be detuned to go even further).

i think the BB400 was designed with rechargeables in mind (somebody correct me if i am incorrect). it drains the bats down to a level that does not destroy them. you could bring a spare set of rechargeables, to ensure you will have a ton of runtime.

perhaps a great combo would be: bright: G2 or E2 (~3000lux?). Medium: BB400 w/2 spare bats (~200+ lux?). Backup: infinity ultra or ARC aaa (20-25 lux).

good luck!

Bob

[/ QUOTE ]

Interesting quote about the BadBoy being designed for rechargeables. I was waiting for the MadMax Q3 to come back into stock, all along planning on using NIMH with it. Maybe I should buy at the BadBoy instead???

Madmax should work fine with rechargeables as well.

Badboy does get warm after you run it for a while, but the Minimag has enough mass that it doesn't overheat.