Really great red LED light??

Somebody help me out here, please. I'm primarily interested in readily available lights, not esoteric custom whiz-blasts, but stuff that's readily available. What's your personal experience?

Many thanks.

I really like the Photon Freedom I have. The variable output is pretty handy, and it's brighter than expected. Plus it comes with a nice clip and extra clamp for attaching to a hat or shirt pocket.

If you're looking for something bigger/brighter, the Surefire L1-HA-RD is nice. Very simple two-level output.

My favorite red LED is the ARC AAA, but they are hard to find right now. This is the one I use the most of my red LEDs and this is the one that sold me on red LEDs.

The CMG now Gerber Infinity has a smoother beam than the ARC, but all colored LEDs have artifacts.

The Photon II is the lightest and I have one on my keyring with a ARC AAA with a white LED.

The X5T with red LEDs is quite a bit brighter than any of the red 1 LED lights I have.

I have a red KL1 and it is so bright that it almost hurts my eyes when shined on a white wall at night.

Hoghead:

Which would you say is brighter: the X5T or the red KL1?

The KL1 is much brighter!

FWIW, the L1 on high will be about the same as the KL1.

IMHO if you want a bright red Luxeon the Surefire L1 would be "da bomb". You would have a dim red LED for saving your night adapted vision and a bright LED when you want it. I think the low beam would get the most use.

LEDMuseum just posted a beam comparison under another topic between an Inova X5 and a KL1 (white). The KL1 is indeed much brighter. I wonder if the comparison with red LEDs would show about the same difference?

I also have the KL1 and X5T with white LEDs and the difference is similar.

Though it's pricey, the Surefire L1 not only is brighter than anything else I've seen, but it has a virtually flawless beam as well. . . bright central spot and good spill. I liked it so much, I bought a second one for use outside with my telescope.

You can get an red Everled and drop it into a Maglite. If it's not too whiz-blast for ya.

The 3 LED NightCutter is very well made and at $30, it's a lot of light for the money. The LEDs are 626nm and the advertized battery life from (2) 123s is 400 hours, whatever that means. It's kind of bright, but I actually bought mine to run down used 123s.

I really like it. It is small. NightCutters are truly 'pets for the hands'. I have two of them with four different heads.

sorry to butt in....

one of the more common uses of RED lights is to help preserve true Scotopic night vision.

Our flashaholic pursuit of the BRIGHTEST Red LED, although interesting, may actually be counter-productive - at least for night vision preservation.

The eyes' Rods may be insensitive to Red above about 650nm -
BUT one that is too bright for the purpose will flood the Cones of the eyes and leave one temporarily dazzled/blinded with after-images, when the light is switched off - even if it's Red.

So for people who are "serious" about preserving their true Scotopic (rods only) night vision, like astronomers in observatories - a DIM red light is more suitable.

As such the Rigel System's StarLite - purpose built for astronomers - 2 Red LEDs with continuously variable intensity might be considered "better" - as one can slowly increase the intensity until the objects to be viewed are just visible - hence re-assuring oneself that the least amount of red light is being used.

Rigel Systems also have a SkyLite - which is switchable between 2 white and 2 Red LED's - continuously variable - for more general use and versatility.

Rigel Systems Flashlights

For night vision preservation - brighter probably is not better.

refs:
Preserving Night Vision - Colors?

Human Night Vision Preservation

....carry on, please /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

SF L1-RED is subjectively twice as bright in bot high and low than SF L1-WT. I assume a different technology goes to red LEDs so there are not available in luxIII.
Ref. Lumileds.com

Thanks for the info so far, everyone. It's been considerably helpful. As an update, I doctored up a couple old Streamlight Batonlite's with a disk of colored plastic (one red and one amber) inside the lens. Both have really quite nice soft but broad beams almost perfect for preserving night vision. The amber actually appears significantly brighter but still dimly but clearly lights up almost the whole wall I'm shining it at (when my vision is night adapted).

While in Fry's today in Manhattan Beach, I also picked up a red LED Inova X5T for $29 which is very bright, even with some frosty scotch tape over the LED's. Tonight I'll get a chance to compare it with my doctored Batonlites. I was also fairly amazed to discover the Inova 24/7 on sale there for $19 (most places around here have them for about $39). Incidentally, this is a great light with 3 colors of LED's (white, red and amber) which are quite bright, and one low-level setting for the white LED's. It has one whale of a trippy 3-color "distress strobe" mode. Instead of springing for the red LED Lumamax L1, I picked up the X5T and the 24/7 for less than half the cost. I do believe though, as UnknownVT suggests, that both the X5T and the 24/7 are going to be a bit bright to preserve true scotopic night vision.

If you really want something with a bit of class, try a www.inretech.com mc 660 2 cell mag adaptor.
I kinda took a dump on it and sent mine back, but I did notice it's night vision potential.
They also have a bunch of other red led kits that will definitely work in 2 cell gaglights and in some cases 3 cell as well.
Good luck.

Excellent comment, Vincent. Our early tests proved what Vincent states as it relates to night vision. Our tests were conducted by charter boat captains and two pilots. The first pass prototypes of the red NightCutters turned out to be "way too bright" in the words of one customer. Therefore, we throttled back the current and used 3 LEDs instead of 5. The result was a nice compact package with very, very long battery life.

As it relates to pilots, if they lose their instrument lights during a night flight and accidently turn on a white light inside the cockpit it could reduce their night vision to the point where it may be fatal.

The 626nm was selected because of its interaction with the print on navigational charts. The colors used for the print on these charts are specifically selected so they can be viewed with red light.

Thanks again for the insightful comment, Vincent.

Vin

Tried my 3 lights last night (two Streamlight Batonlites, one with an amber/orange filter installed and one with a red filter installed), and my new red X5T with frosty scotch tape over the LED's. Actually, I thought the X5T would be too bright once my eyes were night adapted, but it was not (at least for distance work). Nice reasonably bright flood beam, and very deep red. The light that was the "best" I would say for comfortable viewing and preserving my night vision, was the softish very broad beam from the amber/orange Batonlite. It would not be too bright for upclose work, whereas the X5T probably would be.