Flashlight for a car mechnic

Hi!
I am looking to buy a good flashlight for a car mechanic as a gift. It think it should have a decent spill and would use some kind of magnets or something to attach the light to metal. It would also be nice if it would use rechargeable AA batteries.
I have experience with this:
http://www.blackanddecker.com/power-tools/MWLB14B.aspx
it sucks in terms of brightness, its too big and it has low runtime.

What do you recommend?

Being one myself I'd say steer away from the large magnetic stuff (chances are he'll prob have something amyway) and go for a decent inspection light. Maybe a penlight, like the preon 2. That way you can stick it in places for inspecting, in holes in wheels for pad thickness checks. Plus it's a pretty floody light and will do all his under body hand inspection stuff with ease.

Otherwise I'd go for a headlight. It depends what he mainly does really, I do a lot of inspections and servicing anf love a good inspection light. I also do a bit of heavier stuff and when you're underneath wrestling a gearbox a headlight is a handy tool.

Zebralight H51 and perhaps a Fenix E11. I do a lot of work where both hands are required and need a light. I use a 3AAA headlamp myself, but I plan on getting an H51 to complement my SC51 soon.

Perhaps something like this, but I dont know if it is any good:
http://joby.com/gorillatorch

This has been discussed many times, and the Preon 2 (2xAAA penlight) seems to always get nods from mechanics on CPF, and now that it's available with a neutral LED (instead of a cool white LED) it will be even better for color rendering, but these neutral Preon 2 lights are a limited production run, so don't wait to long.

A quick Google search turned up quite a few CPF threads discussing this subject:
http://www.google.com/search?q=mechanic+light&sitesearch=www.candlepowerforums.com

Good luck with your search.

igoman said:

Hi!
I am looking to buy a good flashlight for a car mechanic as a gift. It think it should have a decent spill and would use some kind of magnets or something to attach the light to metal. It would also be nice if it would use rechargeable AA batteries.
I have experience with this:
http://www.blackanddecker.com/power-tools/MWLB14B.aspx
it sucks in terms of brightness, its too big and it has low runtime.

What do you recommend?

Click to expand...

A Zebralight H51F


It's considerably smaller than the light you posted.

we use these at work and they are perfect. a really bright light will reflect off of everything and you will not be able to see.
http://www.streamlight.com/product/product.aspx?pid=25

preon 2 would make a nice gift, my only complaint is its body is too smooth for mechanic hands.

a headlamp would be nice too. requiring 2 hands to work happens alot. heheh

you can epoxy a magnet to the tailcap of a Zebralight. i think the H51f or H51wf would be good.

I think the best complement of automotive lights needs to include both a warm/neutral floody light and a cool/neutral tight beamed thrower for seeing past all the crap that populates the suspesion and engine compartment.



You won't believe how much nicer it is to have that tight spot to shoot past all the crap in your way and see just what you're trying to see.