School me on pen lights. I need to buy a couple as gifts

I want to buy two decent penlights for a couple of co-workers. One uses a cheap AAA pen light that is not even LED and the other uses a Mini-Maglite 2AA.

What I am looking for is a good penlight that doesn't cost much more than $20.00.
Would prefer it to run on AAAs because our company gives them to us free.

Size and weight are the two most important factors on this one. These guys won't use the light if it is heavy or bulky. They are not light people.

So ideally what I want is a 1AAA LED that costs $20 and has a pocket clip. It should be brighter than a Maglite if possible. What are the good ones like that?

Streamlight Microstream

Streamlight Stylus Pro - Though this takes 2 x AAA batteries

TerraLUX LightStar80 High CRI LED
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?315746-TerraLUX-LightStar80-High-CRI-LED

Icon Solo? It was made with input from Surefire's VP of Engineering, after all. The latest version is 30/2 lumens for 3/75 hours.

The Microstream is 20 lumens, the Stylus is 24 according to Amazon.

I knew about the Streamlight Stylus Pro but the Terra Lux and Icon Solo are new to me as well as others. I love the rubber bite ring on the Terra Lux, I tend to put my lights in my mouth at work and often thought a rubber coating would help tremendously.

I vote Icon Solo - extremely impressive for the price - especially to non flashaholics - and can be had on the cheap...

shao.fu.tzer said:

I vote Icon Solo - extremely impressive for the price - especially to non flashaholics - and can be had on the cheap...

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I looked the Solo up and it is only 16 lumins compared to 80 of the Terra Lux or 46 of the Stylus Pro. Seems a big difference.

Chrontius said:

Icon Solo? It was made with input from Surefire's VP of Engineering, after all. The latest version is 30/2 lumens for 3/75 hours.

The micro stream is 20 lumens, the Stylus is 24 according to Amazon.

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I own each of those lights. The newest C4 model Microstream is 28 lumens and the new C4 model Stylus Pro is now 48 lumens. The ICON solo is well constructed, but is considerably heavier than the Microstream and Stylus Pro.

I would recommend either Streamlight for this application as long as it is the newest C4 version.

Spend the extra money and buy the 4Sevens Preon 2. Yes, I know it exceeds your $20 price limit, but the Preon 2 just BLOWS AWAY the $20 lights mentioned already.

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ITP A3 EOS R5 can put out 95 lumens, runs on 1xAAA, tiny with a pocket clip and keychain, one mode or 3 modes depending on which version you get.

I hadn't realized the new Microstream and Stylus had so much oomph. There is, however, a new Solo - the older versions were 2/16, the new ones are now 2/30.

Alternately, the Sunlite 3w penlight is 100 lumens: http://www.powerledlighting.com/100lmSlim.html

They roll their own LEDs, and have a whole lineup. They're a little behind the latest Crees, but they don't put the latest Crees in AAA penlights.

Actually, hang on. There's this little shop on the Web called Countycomm; their Maratac series of AAA penlights are quite nice and use an XPG of high bins.

+1 for the streamlights people have already suggested, seem pretty good for the money

Chrontius said:

I hadn't realized the new Microstream and Stylus had so much oomph. There is, however, a new Solo - the older versions were 2/16, the new ones are now 2/30.

Alternately, the Sunlite 3w penlight is 100 lumens: http://www.powerledlighting.com/100lmSlim.html

They roll their own LEDs, and have a whole lineup. They're a little behind the latest Crees, but they don't put the latest Crees in AAA penlights.

Actually, hang on. There's this little shop on the Web called Countycomm; their Maratac series of AAA penlights are quite nice and use an XPG of high bins.

Click to expand...

They don't put the latest cree's in penlights? What are the LEDs in the fenix ld05 and 4sevens preon 2 then?

The penlights need to be as light weight as possible. I think light weight is more important than thickness but obviously thinner is better.

Also, they need to be about the length of a pen to fit in shirt pockets well. A short light will just get lost in the pocket. Thinking 2AAAs is the way. A clicky is mandatory, twist action is no good.

I am leaning towards the SL Stylus Pro because it seems well made and is in the $20 price range. I may get a Terra Lux for myself as it seems like an interesting light and I like the rubber bite ring.

Chrontius said:

... There is, however, a new Solo - the older versions were 2/16, the new ones are now 2/30.
....

Click to expand...

That new version Solo is the one I have. It is a lot heavier and thicker than the Streamlights.