Time for a new 3W Lux flashlight

Hey lads,

It's time for me to upgrade to a new 3W LED flashlight. A long time ago before I got my Caribbean, I almost got the Pelican M6 2390, but now is now.

Not sure if I should go with 123a or 18650s, apparently the latter is hot stuff. The requirements:

3W Lux, 2x123a (or one 18650, IIRC), tailcap switch, nice to have 3 brightness settings, non-abrasive styling.

Also thinking about a single AAA red LED light, like the old (Old?) Arc AAA red models.

Toss me your suggestions. Let me restate the requirement of non-abrasive styling -- clean & spartan is my preference. :thumbsup:

No? None exist?

ITP A3 EOS. Available from shiningbeam. He's a site supporter too.

As for the 18650 light. Also from shiningbeam is the s-mini. Looks like a pretty good light to me. High, mid, low nice compact clean design. If that's too pricey, a decent one in similar fashion is the Ultrafire 270-T60 on DX. It's stainless, very nice.

Lumileds had replaced the LuxIII with the K2 and then replaced the K2 with the Rebel. Any 3W Lux you can find is probably old (and dim) stock. (That is why you got no replies 1st time around.)

Your old 3W Luxeon is probably ~75 lumens.

1CR123A Twisty
Fenix E15: 75-10-140 lumens. $27.
Fenix PD10: 95-6-190 lumens. $42.
Quark MiNi 123: 3-40-189 lumens. $39.
Quark MiNiX 123: 1.2-45-210 lumens. $49.

1CR123A tail button.
Fenix PD20: Head tight 180 lumens stobe, head loose 9-38-90 lumens SOS. $57.
Quark 123 regular: Head tight 206 lumens stobe, head loose 0.2-4-22-85 lumens SOS-beacon. $57.
Quark 123 tactical: You program the levels of the head tight/head loose positions.
1CR123A side button:
Zebralight SC531, SC31w, SC31f, SC31fw: Click up to 220 lumens, press and hold 5 lumens. w= warm, f=flood. $64 Very soft side switch.

2CR123A tail button:
Fenix PD30: Head tight 257 lumens stobe, head loose 10-67-124 lumens SOS. $64.
Quark 123² regular: Head tight 230 lumens stobe, head loose 0.2-4-22-85 lumens SOS-beacon. $69.
Quark 123² tactical: You program the levels of the head tight/head loose positions.

1AA:
SC51, SC51c, SC51w, SC51f, SC51fw: Click up to 200 lumens, press and hold 2.8 lumens. $64 Very soft side switch. c=high CRI.
Xeno E03: up to 200 lumens. $35. Available in cool, neutral, warm white LEDs. Tail switch.

2AAA tail button:
Preon 2: 2.2-22-160 lumens. $45.

2AA twisty:
Quark MiNi AA²: 3-36-180 lumens. $43. This is only 5 inches long.

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Additional comments:
The Quark MiniX is the same size as your Caribbean but is 3X brighter.

1AA lights are the same brightness as your lux3. Some like the Zebralights and Xeno are 2X as bright.

18650 has almost the perfect voltage to direct drive a power LED. So the CHEAP chinese companies use them a lot. They are very bright but build quality varies.

The torches I mentioned is medium quality compared to Peak. The ITP is a notch below.

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For the red AAA you will probably have to go back to Peak.

Wow. Cool. Shows me how far behind I am.

Time to make up! I think I decided on the Quark 123² R5 Tactical.

You're right, I will probably (grrr not Peak again) go with a Matterhorn model.