Noir, I used to be a fan of HDS when they were $99 and appropriate output for the times.
The reason they are so low output by today’s standards is that they guarantee 1hr runtime on high on a cr123 battery ((IIRC). The things they did 10 yrs ago were way beyond what the consumer level lights were capable of. They’ve made some changes, but it’s a one-man operation, maybe two now, and they don’t respond to market pressure that tries to change their philosophy. The circuit limits current, each light is adjusted to a maximum output that will let it reach its 1hr guarantee. I’ll dig around and find the info on the component that is affected by magnets. Maybe Hall effect? Will PM links.
It seems like the lack of a poor mans zebralight in the market should be a signal to light makers that there is an underserved community for $50-$60 lights.
The Emisar is a step in the right direction but they too are a smallish company.
I think many fans of zebralight prefer their usually compact size and UI, they’re not flashy and often are unexciting compared to the ultrabright models we see here.
Flashlights are a frustrating hobby for a poor man!
I will keep that in mind. Thank you. I highly doubt I will get one. I am sure the prices will remain too high for me to buy it. I just went onto the HDS site and configured a rotary with 18650 body, CR123 is completely useless to me and my needs, and a pocket clip. $430!!! That is $1.32 per lumen. Nope, not me. I don’t care what it does. I know it doesn’t get $430 out of my pocket.
Well since this post is jumping around all over the place and has gone way off-topic at this point, I’ll offer some thoughts on HDS, in no particular order:
They’re not hall-effect controlled lights. Magnets won’t affect them. The Rotary tail has metal fingers that travel over a set of contact pads, its a fully electric connection for controlling output.
HDS lights aren’t fancy, far from it in fact. If you want pocket jewelry look elsewhere. That said, however, they’re not usually machined that badly. Anything can slip through so I’m not doubting the report of rough burrs and whatnot, but just wanted to say that that’s not common. In fact I’d call it very unlikely. On that same note there is zero detectable latency in any of my Rotaries. None. Someone in this thread got one bad light and I’m sorry for that, I hope HDS made it right. But that is not the common experience.
Ramping UIs are great but calling it better than a rotating piece of hardware is simply personal preference. For me I find a knob much more intuitive and easier/faster to use than a ramping button. But that’s also my opinion.
Lumens/dollar is a terrible way to judge the “quality” of a flashlight. HDS is miles from being a “budget” light so forgive me if anyone finds this offensive, but this probably isn’t the right community for collecting opinions about them. I doubt very many folks need to spend that much on a flashlight, and yes there are many cheaper alternatives, some very good ones, so if all you need is a light that makes a few hundred lumens look elsewhere. But some of us find value in other factors.
Yes I have several HDS lights, and several Zebralights and other brands/makers as well. No I’m not a shill, since that’s been thrown around heavily in this thread for some reason. I’d be happy to answer questions about my experiences and opinions though, if it’ll help.
Their response was that their lights are workmen’s tools, not jewelry, a racist tirade about the Chinese being slave labor and that I was unreasonable to expect a finish that didn’t scrape the skin off my hands for $400+.
Here’s an enlarged photo of the machining on the knob, which was fine:
Here’s the machining on the head, rough and with burrs:
As for the latency, it was immediately noticeable, along with some backlash on the knob. Perhaps they had to change suppliers since the lights you purchased.
I agree, which is why I mentioned the Surefire T1A, which does it right. My point is a correctly implemented ramping UI is still preferable to a terribly laggy rotary one.
That’s a clicky, not a Rotary. And if it were a Rotary the “control” mechanism would be in the tail, not the head. I’m not sure what we’re seeing in that video but it’s not the result of a hall effect sensor.
I’m sorry you had that experience and I really wasn’t trying to downplay it, only offer my experience which does not mirror yours. Mine aren’t hand-finished works of art but they’re definitely not skin-shredders. And they have zero lag. You got a bad one. That’s unfortunate.
Ah, I saw the discussion about hall effects and keyed in on that, guess I was confused. I know there’s an inductor coil in that head, they’re regulated lights, so I guess the magnetic field is throwing off the regulation. I wonder if most regulated lights would do that? I don’t know.
There is one sure-fire way to make an HDS brighter — a more efficient LED. HDS doesn’t use the most efficient and newest emitters. I know some of this was covered earlier, but they’re all 1-amp lights. 1-amp max, that’s what they’re regulated at, because according to the spec, that’s the safe discharge level for a primary CR123. I agree that’s unfortunately low, I don’t use primaries in mine either and would rather have a bit more power for my 16340s, but we can still take advantage of that fact. All we need are emitters that are more efficient at 1 amp. My brightest HDS is a Samsung LH351d that does 360 lumens OTF in my sphere, a pretty good increase from the factory 200 lumen rating. These lights will never be barn-burners though, that’s not what they’re designed for. If you work search-n-rescue for a living maybe look elsewhere. But for general edc use I find my HDS lights quite capable.
That’s like limiting a vehicle to 45 mph to achieve a self-imposed fuel efficiency promise. While I like such efficiency I also want the ability to go faster/brighter. Otherwise, it can become a hindrance to meet a spec sheet.
Well ok, but everything has limits for some reason. The vehicle in your analogy may be naturally limited by physics, especially if its in drive. But sitting at idle and pegging the gas will result in it quickly hitting the rev-limiter, which is there to keep it from throwing a rod or something equally dramatic. An engine without a rev limiter has to be handled with very much care. Most flashlights have some limits built in too, either heat or power or something. HDS chooses a limit based on the safety of a CR123 cell, because nobody wants to overheat a lithium cell. Maybe its too cautious for you, hell its probably more cautious than I’d be too, but its their design choices at play. Reliability and longevity above sheer output.
Regarding the poor mans zebra: a friend gave me a budget friendly Wuben E05 and I’d definitely put this on the short list.
Amazing value, very nice build, great features, and it’s smaller than it looks in pictures.
Plus it has the ability to use primaries if need be. 14500 lights used to kinda be able to use li-ion batteries but many would burn up because that wasn’t their main focus. The E05 seems to be made for lithium but can boost lower voltage batteries if li-ion is not handy.
Will post back after I’ve given it some more use.
I grew up in the incan Maglite era, when everyone seemed to want those. I spent many nights camping or hunting with a huge multi-D-cell maglite hanging off my belt, banging against my leg. I thought I was something, because I thought those lights were something. And they did a great job really, compared to its contemporaries. But really, they’re like what? 50-60 lumens I think? Now here we are discussing whether 200 is enough. The night hasn’t gotten any darker…
But I do think the “problem” for a brand like HDS (ignoring the price of course…) is its contemporaries. When you can buy 10x the lumens for 1/10th the price, its hard not to be tempted by that. But like I said in an earlier comment, $/lumen is really a pretty bad indicator of a flashlight’s quality unless lumens is all you care about.
We must be in same generation. I spent a summer job check on a Brinkman 5D. that could be a 3D or 2D also. Greatest light ever I still like lights that will lego.
I use a HDS rotary daily for inspecting welds where having just enough light is very important so it’s a perfect light for my needs. If you want an all around edc that does everything well including overpowering city light pollution the Zebralight or Emisars are pretty sweet for pocket size off the shelf lights.
To bring this full-circle back to the original topic, my personal opinion is that Zebralight sits at that “magical” intersection between value/reliability/performance. You can get a brighter light, you can get a cheaper light, you can get a more rugged light. But for something that “ticks all the boxes” in a well-balanced way — very tough and well made, with lots of output and maybe the best power/thermal regulation on the market, while maintaining a reasonable price, all in a tiny package — I think Zebralight is really hard to beat. And I say that as a true die-hard fan of what HDS offers. Those two brands together make up a sizeable portion of my collection and I like it that way.
Yes but, when the quality has surpassed it usefulness to most people, there is nothing left to judge it’s merits. Quality be damned, you leave out a great deal of people who actually need that extra brightness. Not all of us walk around inside our houses looking for stuff that isn’t lost.
Some years ago I bought a HDS light when they first started using Nichia emitters, it was a 170 lm Clicky model (I think it used a 219B sw45 R85). It took about 6 months to arrive, but a long wait was expected as I preordered it (just before a price increase). When it finally arrived I was pretty disappointed by the beam which was ugly with rings. Quite disappointing that they deemed such a ugly beam to be ok or good enough, especially considering its not a cheap light (I believe they fixed this issue in later batches with a different (or differently adjusted) reflector).
The low brightness and bulk was expected as I've read the specs beforehand, but reading the specs and actually handling the light are of course different things. While the build, bulk and weight instill confidence as to the durability of the light I found that it is, at least for my taste and my edc usage, a bit overbuilt and too bulky/large, especially considering the battery it uses.
I got my SC62w shortly after I got my HDS. The SC62w is a completely different animal: similar in length (and much more appropriately sized compared to the battery it uses), slimmer and lighter (even with a battery) and therefore more pocket friendly, much higher brightness and much better runtimes (due to higher efficiency and bigger battery). I sold my HDS fairly quickly, mainly due to the disappointing beam.
While it is great to see that HDS is now offering several nice nw and high CRI LED options, there are also several aspects that keep me from buying one again. The high price and the use of CR123A/16340 batteries are not particularly attractive, plus the driver (and in fact the whole design) is showing its age a bit (there are of course the 18650 and 2x AA battery tubes, but they make the light too big for edc usage IMO). Sure the firmware has been updated, but the electronics themselves are, as far as I know, still pretty much the same as they have been for decades and they are not the most efficient, especially the rotary on low levels.
What simply baffles me is that they still don't offer a 18350 tube (its also the main thing that keeps me from buying one). There are simply no downsides, its the same length and people can still use CR123A/16340 batteries (perhaps a sleeve is needed to prevent rattle, but those are cheap), you get 50% more runtime with a 18350 compared to a 16340 and the slightly bigger diameter of the tube is no problem (and doesn't make the light bulkier) since the tail and head is bigger still.
All a bit off topic, I know, but I would love to see something new from HDS, at least a 18350 tube, maybe even something completely new.
I agree completely, it is the combination (i.e. being very good at many things at the same time) that makes Zebralights so attractive.
Some time ago there was an Eco series of lights on the Zebralight spreadsheet. It was intended to be a cheaper entry-level series. The available information on the spreadsheet was: three headlamps (H3, H5, H6) and three flashlights (F3, F5, F6) with black anodization, TIR optics (both unusual for Zebralight), XP-L2, simplified/reduced UI with 5 modes and prices starting at just below 40 $ (if memory serves me).
The H3 and F3 (CR123A/16340 models) were removed fairly quickly, the others remained on the spreadsheet for some time, but never materialized and were at some point removed again.
I think the reason why this entry-level series was scraped, is because Zebralight realized that it is simpler/cheaper to keep producing older generation lights and selling them at a discounted price instead of developing and making a completely seperate series of lights.
Take the SC62 for example, the SC63 was introduced in December 2015 at which point the SC62 was "discontinued" and sold at a discounted price, yet more than three years on it is still available and in stock. It is highly doubtful that they are still selling off remaining stock, it is much more likely that they are still intentionally producing them (I have also seen some of the older models on "back order" and at a later point in time they were back "in stock"). They only seem to actually discontinue a light if there is either no demand for it any more or they run out of parts (e.g. the "w" models that use a XM-L2 have been discontinued for quite some time, likely because Zebralight can't get their hands on the correct bin of XM-L2 LEDs).
In conclusion: the best option for the "poor mans Zebralight" is probably simply a discounted older generation Zebralight.
I’m new to flashlights and new to this forum, and from what I see this forum is no different from a gun forum, to a bow and arrow forum, to a knife forum …
This is always the direction this world is headed in. Everybody’s trying to one-up the next guy with the next best thing that comes out on the market. Or with a new modification.
I belong to three different gun forums.
And I hear the same darn things from every single one of them.
Things like, did you see the new——- they are coming out with, I can’t wait to get my hands on that one.
OR… I can’t believe they even thought of building something like that that’s ridiculous….
OR… how do you modify that? you have a video for that showing how you did that? Where did you buy the parts? Do you think if I did XXXX , it would make it better, stronger , faster, more powerful…
OR… I’m not doing that to mine I’m just leaving mine OEM.
But anyway guys thanks for being here,
I’ve learned a lot about flashlights.
JMHO DOC
I still like lights that will lego.