Yeah, there’s a calculation for it. You have to define first how much light you want reflected back from the distance you’re trying to measure. That sounds complicated, but it just means that you decide how much light is enough to say you ‘reached’ a certain distance. Most guys around here use 1/4 lux as the minimum, and the calculation for that is the square root of the total candela, multiplied then by 2.
Depends. First you need the LED on MCPCB. I would not recommend to dedome a XP-L since its not easy. I would rather buy a XP-L HI, it comes without dome from factory, about 7$ on MCPCB at Int-Outdoor, maybe cheaper at Kaidomain.
Do you want more than one brightness level? If not, you don’t even need a driver, you could just bridge the original driver and drive the LED directly. FET+1 drivers are available for a couple of dollars at Banggood. But as I said, this light has a forward clicky, which is not nice to use with this driver.
I don’t really need much more brightness its probably not a big enough increase to notice, once you get to 1000 lumens going up just a little bit really isn’t worth it, and $7 aint bad at all, now all I need to do is look into batteries
Maybe you could look at some of the 4AA lights. Sofirn SF11 is an inexpensive option. There are several brands to choose from and they have Decient throw for the money you are willing to spend. Sure some of the others here can guide you to the other options.
They will all come with battery extension. Mountain Electronics will probably be quicker delivery to Idaho plus you can buy a couple of batteries at the same time. Banggood you can probably find a coupon code by going through some of the deals here http://budgetlightforum.com/forum/marketplace/commercial/liaisons and save $10 but delivery will be 2-3 weeks plus challenging customer service if something goes wrong. Get a 3A-3B or 4B-4C tint.
I would def check out the Lumintop GT Mini, for a light its size it is a little beast. If you shop around you can find it for around $40 for the quality of the light I don’t think it can be beat at that price point.
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i would recommend a non-thrower for a 1st light
you will find a thrower to be not good for around the house work
which is probably more common than “what is that in the yard 200 feet away at night?” type queries
way more common is “where is that #$%%ing thing that rolled under the sofa?”