New LED light spotted at Walmart

This weekend I spotted a new (for me) light at Walmart - in the tool section of all places. And even more surprising - made by Stanley tools. It's a tripod work light. Each leg holds 3xAA batteries, but the light will run with batteries in only one leg (any leg).

Push the button on the back and the legs pop open. There is a 4 position button on the top that cycles through 3 brightness levels and off.

Here's the link to the Stanley site.

Saw that on a site before,
looks really cool and useful.

Never seen them locally though,
How much was it?
Could you checkout the beam?

~John

There's a little lens over each LED to add some throw, but to me that destroys the beauty of a 5mm array.

Interesting product they have. Will have to check that one out. . .

That's a nifty design.

Quite a while back when I was watching Don and the Skunks using Tripods I thought that was a great idea. So my vintage McLux is mounted on a little silver tripod and gets used pretty frequently.

The ad mentioned "run-time" and "useful light". I wonder how many engineers are logged on to CPF doing research right now. Yep, the work of the Modders and builders here is replicated all over the world. Now our CPF lingo is in the ads.

Regulated LEDs are everywhere.

Next we'll see HotWires. Who knows? Maybe it will start out by Radio Shack realizing that pizzaman found the magical XPR103 and offer four cell lanterns and torches using that lamp. Then a Dorcy11, PelicanROP, Streamlight66, Brinkman85 and a SureFire js. Stranger things have happened and I'm way off topic.

Cool looking light, Jim. Might be a good power outage light?

wow, that's pretty interesting..i'll have to check that out.

Looks interesting

I was going to head to Sams this weekend to check out their Element light but now have to stop at Walmart also.

Looks like a Maxlife 369 but with an angle head so the battery compartment hangs straight down when it is placed upright on its tripod legs.

Craig,

I think the batts in this on go IN the legs of this one.

~John

Pretty nifty. Looks like a flashlight, untill it transforms into the tri-pod. I wonder how good the brightness is, like for workign on stuff wiht the lights still on. Of course you could always throw in Nichia CS leds for a bump in output.

My local Walmart has had them for about a month... Started to pick one up when I first saw it, but thought I'd check CPF to see if anyone had one yet, and a search didn't turn anything up.

Then today, I decided to pick one up to play with. And now I run across this thread and one other on it.

I'm thinking of replacing one of the 5mm leds with a Luxeon III if it is practical to do so, but as I haven't even opened the package yet, I have no idea if it is practical or even possible.

Anyway, it looks fun and useful as is, if somewhat bulky for the amount of light.

I'll at least try to do some LUX readings and beamshots and post them over the next couple of days if someone doesn't beat me to it.

Re: New LED light spotted at Walmart (Stanley tripod)

Well, I opened'er up , inserted batteries.... And was not impressed.
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While the concept is neat, the execution IMHO leaves much to be desired. Here is what I found:

With one leg filled (3AAs) Lux readings @ 1 meter:
1 LED : 26 LUX
3 LED : 61 LUX
6 LED : 121 LUX

All three legs filled: (9AAs)
1 LED : 26 LUX
3 LED : 65 LUX
6 LED : 135 LUX

So, contrary to the blurb on the package, it is a little brighter with all the batteries with 3 & 6 LEDS, the 1 LED is the same.

Throw?
One LED / about 10-12 ft of useful brightness... Enough to get around the house in a blackout, or walk slowly through the woods. Three LEDs not much more throw, a little more brightness though.

With all 6 LEDS running maybe 30 ft of useful throw.

I don't even know how to describe the beam. I don't like it myself, but other people may.

Here are some beamshots: The light is one meter from a 20X30 inch white foam board with the dot grid on 2 inch squares, and the words RED GREEN BLUE written in those colors with a Sharpie felt pen of the appropriate color. The camera is about 1.5 meters from the target, with F stop 2.8 and exposure length 1/60th second for each shot. The images should be pretty close to reality, depending on your monitor settings. All done with a full 9 fresh AA alkaline cells operating.

The first shot is with one LED on:



The next is with three LEDs operating:



And this one is with all 6 LEDS on:


And this one, the light is about one foot away from the target to show the kind of weird beam pattern, with six LEDs operating:


As you can see there are a lot of artifacts that may or may not be distracting to you.

As a worklight, ... say for wrenching on your car, the the 3 LED setting is barely, barely adequate for non-detail work. 6 LEDS almost adequate, but leaves much to be desired. My Petzl Myo 5 headlamp with the 5 LED beam is better.

It isn't a positive mechanical latch that holds the tripod legs in when you are using it as a handheld. Just a couple of small magnets,,, and they don't hold very securely. the "open" button just slides the little rod that the magnets are on out away from the little steel buttons on the tripod legs. All in all, that setup is a waste of materials and manufacturing steps IMO. Coulda just used solid mounted magnets if that is the way they wanted to go... I suppose a mechanical latch would have either had to been more bulky or would have been to delicate for extensive use. so I don't know which would be preferable in the long run.

In the hand, it feels like holding a M*G 3D, except a little softer grip due to the rubber center. Length is about an inch shorter then the 3D, so, about halfway between the 3D and the 2 D.

The lens/optical assembly is held on with a rubber? bezel and three small TORX screws. I think a #4... This may be important, as this light is just begging for a modification. I'm not sure what LEDs are in it, but the new 18,000 MCD Nichias should be one way to improve it....

I just opened up the head... Man, there is a lot of electronics in there.... Considering the battery configuration, I don't see the point. Ten transistors two ICs and assorted capacitors and resistors. wow.

I'll cross post this over on the original Stanley thread, and do additional updates on that thread since it has the name of the light in the title and be easier to find since "New LED Light at Walmart is not a real uncommon title. I have some shots of the electronics of this light... I have to work on them a bit, but they should be on the other thread in a while.
ORIGINAL STANLEY TRIPOD THREAD