Surefire LED Flashlight life expecntacy

Hi,

I run a Surefire E2L Outdoorsman LED flashlight (CR123A Batteries). Owned it for years and go through a set of batteries every 4-6 weeks. My question is has anyone ever experienced a LED failure? My lamp has a lifetime warranty on the LED, but I was wondering how many years it would last for. I seen some manufactures claiming 50,000 hours. Nothing lasts forever. Just wondering what other peoples experiences are with Surefire LED lamps.

Thanks

Hello unicus, :welcome:

My hat is off to folks who actually wear out their lights.

Any discussions of LEDs wearing out are pretty unusual around here. Although there are significant 'real-world' issues with that questionable '50,000 hour' rating, the only instances I've heard of regarding the actual LED wearing out is regarding some of the Surefire lights with an overdriven LuxeonV emitter (SF L4 or L5's IIRC). There were some reports of the LED being noticeably dimmer after as little as ~500 hours of operation for those lights. Aside from the LuxV's, an LED that has been operated 'in spec' should go for many thousands of hours before any dimming is seen.

Sorry to not have much in the way of details for your question though. Best of luck,

Yeah, rare to the point of impossible. From a relieving anxiety standpoint, the thing to keep in mind is that it's not 'sudden death' but a gradual decline in efficiency. The hour ratings are based on when the LED will reach a certain point like 80% of new. After that there is still many thousand more hours to reach say 50%.

Bottom line: if it leaves you in the dark, it will be for something else, like the batteries.

unicus said:

Hi,

I run a Surefire E2L Outdoorsman LED flashlight (CR123A Batteries). Owned it for years and go through a set of batteries every 4-6 weeks. My question is has anyone ever experienced a LED failure? My lamp has a lifetime warranty on the LED, but I was wondering how many years it would last for. I seen some manufactures claiming 50,000 hours. Nothing lasts forever. Just wondering what other peoples experiences are with Surefire LED lamps.

Thanks

Click to expand...

There are 8760 hours in non-leap years, so even at half the 50k hour 'claims', we're still getting 2.5 years worth of ON.

The Space Station is going to de-orbit one day and I worry more about that, than burning through one of my lights.

Chris

5 years 2 months 1 week
E2L, give or take.

I was one of those people who burned out a SF L4 (a luxV driven very hard in a tiny light - it got hot very quick)
It probably had 500 hours on it (around 3 years of edc - managed to kill a Pila 168s cell too) and rattled a little towards the end - one screw had backed out of the heatsink and i dont think it was making proper contact - so it probably failed earlier than it should have

That is the only LED i have had issues with - my other lights have been great - the novatac did 4ish years of EDC and still runs perfectly - but it wasnt running flat out all the time like the L4 was

I wouldnt worry about burning an LED out - they will last long enough that you will probably have upgraded to a newer better light long before it fails

When the L4 first came out, I bought 2 of them, giving one to my wife. She still has hers, with the original 65 lumen head. Two of my heads stopped working, one rather soon after the purchase, and the second a couple of years later. After the second warranty head replacement, giving me a 100 lumen head, I carried and used the light for years without any issues. I would still be carrying it daily today had I not upgraded to an E2D LED, and still sometimes carry the L4.