COMPLETELY random musings from my first camping/fishing trip of the year..

Well, after months of planning,Me, my son and his buddies went up to the Berkshires for a weekend of fishing and camping. I told them to NOT bring any illumination equipment, as I would be providing that for the duration of our trip. So, for the 1st time, I dragged most of my collection out with a freshly charged set of Li Ions in various sizes for a true "field test". Here's what made it up there:

1) Thrunite Catapult- 1st gen SST50 with AW 18650's
2) Lumapower Mini Ultra VX- with IMR's for "fuel"
3) RRT-0 in its 14500 configuration
4) Lumapower Trust 2 with AW 18650
5) Trustfire TR1200 with 2900 MaH Trustfires
6) Ray S20 with fresh 10440
7) ITP H01 headlamp with 10440
8) TI's IlluminaTi R5 with 10440
9) 4Sevens Mini XML with 16340
10) Shiningbeams XThrower SST50 with aw 18650
and, the crowds FAVORITE:
11) Xtar D30 Howitzer with fresh 3000 MaH batts.

We were lucky enough to get Yurts on this trip, so, I had electricity/chargers available, should we begin to run the batts down.

ALL of those lights gave a VERY good accounting of themselves, with the H01 coming in surprisingly handy for me on a jaunt into the woods to find a lost wallet at one point. The boys were astounded by the Mini XML and the S20- so much so that I gave them links so they could order some for themselves:thumbsup: But, far and away, the three most used lights of the weekend were the Xtar, the catapult and the LP VX. We had some nocturnal visitors (i.e. raccoons and some coyotes) both nights, and, the first light EVERYONE wanted to use was the Xtar- the amount of light that beast puts out over a wide area was just awesome! I also have to give kudos to the Catapult- I used it when I needed to see things and didnt want a whole bunch of spill- Thrunite certainly did their homework when they designed that reflector!

One night we decided to go for a night hike, so, besides the usual compass, water, and various pieces of survival gear and a well stocked first aid kit, we took all those lights out. I used the Mini VX and found that medium setting was just about perfect for anything I needed to light up-a quick stab at the clicky ramped it up to Hi, and, well, it certainly did a great job for something of that size! The other light that was rather popular with the guys was the RRT-0, both for the amount of light it put out and because it had a "cool" UI that they found very easy to use. And, because we had temps that were in the lower 40's high 30's at night, the lights were pretty well thermally controlled being outdoors as they were, plus, peoples hands do a fairly decent job of dissipating heat.

For quite awhile my son would pick on me for having all these lights that rarely left the house- well, now he and his buddies are all onto why we do what we do on this site-LOL! And, since they are graduating from high school in a few short weeks, I think i'll be getting them some cool graduation gifts. I'm thinking, since they all attend Tech School for various jobs, an EDC like my trusty IlluminaTi or the mini XML may be a welcome present, dont you?

Most definitely...

Thank you for your great account of what sounds like a fantastic trip! Did you take any shots of the lights in action?

Awesome story! Nothing like getting an opportunity to "bust out the arsenal"

Sadly, no- frankly, we were too busy throwing what amounted to an entire birch tree onto our firepit to take any pics. However, all I can say is, for what i paid for the Xtar on CPFMP, it was the deal of the year for me!! Plus, I found a supplier locally on Ebay that sold me the 6 18650 batts for 45$!!!! HOW can you beat THAT price???
AOW, the next thing I want to add are some momentary switches for some of my lights so that I can weapons mount them for hunting up in VT- the only issue I forsee is that I doubt some of them will handle the recoil of my 44 mag or .303 carbines...bummer.