Locator Beacon

The power went out and of course my home EDC was not with me the ONE time. The house ambient LED lights switched on but I was able to spot the TM11 across the room... Blinking red ring every 3 seconds.

What other lights have locator beacons?



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HDS if you care to activate it.

Norm

Norm said:

HDS if you care to activate it.

Norm

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Thanks Norm. An HDS has been on my short list for a while. Let me check out how their flash works...



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The Spark SP6 has a 5 LED display for battery charge state. It's on 24/7 and makes the light easy to find at night. Selfbuilt reports on this feature in his excellent review.
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...rger)-Review-OUTDOOR-BEAMSHOTS-RUNTIMES-VIDEO

Any light that a tritium vial is on/near.

StarHalo said:

Any light that a tritium vial is on/near.

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Heh I have many surplus vials, but finding a place to put them without a mill is difficult.



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HotWire said:

The Spark SP6 has a 5 LED display for battery charge state. It's on 24/7 and makes the light easy to find at night. Selfbuilt reports on this feature in his excellent review.
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb...rger)-Review-OUTDOOR-BEAMSHOTS-RUNTIMES-VIDEO

Click to expand...

Ah I saw that. Am hoping for something smaller (than the TM11). HDS is good but hoping for something using a secondary LED perhaps...



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Ualnosaj said:

Heh I have many surplus vials, but finding a place to put them without a mill is difficult.

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Too expensive, put it on the lanyard.

Nitecore explorer series

StarHalo said:

Too expensive, put it on the lanyard.

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Thanks, I've been through the "vial on a keychain" phase (not saying it's bad)...

sspc said:

Nitecore explorer series

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Unfortunately I find the Explorer series extremely, extremely, ugly Hopefully they'll style the V2 version away from the blocky platform the buttons sit on.

For HDS, shipping is quoted at $50 to Canada (!) and anecdotal reports show 4-6 week lead times. While that is generally what you get from DX (heh), those two are quite downers. I've emailed Henry to confirm that's the case...

Milkyspit mods have a locator beacon. I actually found mine after my son played with my flashlight and hid it somewhere. I looked everywhere for it and finally noticed a blinking light coming from a box where he keeps some of his toys.

Ualnosaj said:

Thanks, I've been through the "vial on a keychain" phase (not saying it's bad)...

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An alternative that I prefer is to just set the vial directly in front of your light, I do this with my EDC on my nigghtstand; I can see plainly where the light is in pitch dark, then when I carry it, I don't have to worry about damaging the vial. And I can see exactly where to put the light back without using the light.

One light I can always find is my Zebralight H502 as I always leave it on low low rather than turn it off. 3 months of location on an AA is fine by me

HDS locator is fine (as was the old novatacs) but the flash can be quite bright at 3am, even bezel down.

Trits are nice, but can't quite see them if the lights suddenly go out and are nice and bright when you are night adjusted

I found that GITD rings are a good solution. If the lights go out, they are at their maximum brightness and can be seen easily, and they hold their brightness for a good 5 or 6 hours (although very dim, but if you have been in the dark for 6 hours, night adjusted vision you can still see it quite well)

Also cheap... not as fancy, but it works well

PayBack said:

One light I can always find is my Zebralight H502 as I always leave it on low low rather than turn it off. 3 months of location on an AA is fine by me

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That's definitely good. Try that with something like the T60CS... 20 lumen low That's an interesting idea though for the IVR ring lights. Thanks for that.

I was going to say the Explorer series as well, but I seem to have been beaten to the punch. Very useful little beacon. I have a couple of lights stashed in easy-to-find-in-the-dark drawers though for times like that.

Golly gee whillikers, I just found an Energizer Find Me flashlight on sale on a website for only about $50, plus about a $9 S&H fee. Doesn't that sound like a swell deal?

Those things are still around but that "sale price" just floored me. As the saying goes, "There's one born every minute."


You could use GITD lanyards, beads, rings, etc.
You could use a beacon feature.
You could use the lowest setting on the light and always leave it on.


But what I'd use is one of my backup lights and remember why "One is none and two is one". :naughty:

Sometimes you just get caught in the rain without an umbrella or the spare tire is flat and so on. It's one way to learn a lesson though.

Sorry you were caught out.

There is a lot to be said for single AAA or button cell lights being bright enough and pocketable enough to be useful in a tight spot (no pun intended). A second (or third or fourth) light like one of those won't break your budget either so there's very little reason not to always carry an extra light(s).

I have several Palights stashed around the house, their always-on locator-glows are easily bright enough to find them in the dark (I point the one in my bedroom away from me so it doesn't disturb my sleep). I run them on the used 9V batteries out of my smoke alarms so nil cost for batteries. I prefer the "Survival" model modded with a plain (non-focussing) lens, but others may prefer the simpler UI of the "Star" model (Locator glow/Low/Med/Flash vs Locator Glow/Med).

I could use my Zebralight H502 on eneloops for similar results (on its lowest setting it is very low indeed, much lower than the locator glow of the Palights).