1xCR123 suggestions?

Forgive me as I am going to be posting this in the AA section as well.

I'm looking for either a 1xcr123 or 1xAA back up light for my tk15. I have read for the last 3 days through here and CPF trying to find some good "budget" lights and have found things such as the romisens, ITP sa1 and sc1, ultrafire, akoray k-106/109, Trustfire f20 that all look promising.

Requirements for the 1xcr123 light: (prob wont be using rcr123's)

-Reliable

-3 modes: high-170+lm, med-35-50lm, low->5lm...that general guideline

-Run time of at very least 1hr on high

-70/30 throw to spill, or close.

-dont care either way about strobe/SOS

-Forward clicky tail

-Price: $40 or under, get the most for my money.

Ideally I'd like to have both the cr123 and AA, and eventually probably will, but I'm leaning towards one of the ITP lights ($40), in which case I will get a "budget" light of the one I dont get (AA or cr123). I feel like the ITP's are going to be the best quality in this price range, am I wrong?

Basically I'm asking, what is the BEST budget 1xcr123 out right now? Thanks in advance!

BTW, here are my 1xAA requirements: (prob will use energizer e2 lithiums)

-Reliable

-3 modes: High-120+lm, med-35lm, low->5lm...or close to those #'s

-2+hrs on high with e2 lithiums

-70/30 throw/spill...or close

-Forward clicky tail

-Price: $40 or under

You might have to scale back your expectations a bit, or more likely increase your budget. Your runtime and output requirements are extreme for a "budget" oriented flashlight.

ITP EOS A1 is interesting but twisty switch http://www.lightake.com/detail.do/sku.iTP_A1_EOS_Cree_XP_E_Q5_LED_190_Lumen_LED_Flashlight_Black-27672

MrLite MX4 with superlow, low, mid, high with clicky switch http://www.lightake.com/detail.do/sku.MrLite_MX4_XR_E_R2_4_Mode_180_Lumens_LED_Flashlight_Black_(1xCR123)-33125

I thought my expectations were minimal as all the lights I posted meet the requirements for the most part, including price.

I have no experience with any of these lights, and I would be afraid to count on a budget light when I needed it without first getting some feedback and testing it out for myself. I've heard mostly good things about all the lights above, with the exception of occassional duds, and I would imagine brands like trustfire etc could easily break dropping it on concrete and prob use cheap components? I would say the ITP is the highest quality of the bunch from what I've read, followed by romisen, then the rest being about equal. But I don't know that for a fact, so I was hoping someone else might?

The Mrlite lights look interesting, I'll have to look more into them bc I've never heard of them before...

All the "budget" manufacturers (including Mr Lite and Akoray) are posting their max lumens numbers based off of 14500 batteries, not NiMhs/Alkalines/Lithium primaries, so outside of maybe the SA1, you're really, really, REALLY going to be hard-pressed to find a budget light that'll last 2+ hours on high at 120+ lumens on lithiums. Especially for the Mr Lite flashlights, chop the stated output in half and you'll get output on lithium primaries (though runtime will be ~2 hours or a little more).

If you're set on your above requirements and want "quality", spend the $65 or so and get an ITP C7T and ITP SA1 off of Shiningbeam. If you can do without a clicky, you can replace one or the other with an A-series and save $5.

The Aurora SH-034 would be worth a look. It will give the sort of output you want with an RCR, it won't with a primary cell. 168/50/6 measured lumens though my numbers are probably a little high.

You are not going to get an hour on high at 150+ lumens with a single rechargeable nor are you going to get a forward clicky (Which I personally find less than useful on a multimode light) for that budget. :(

+1 It's my personal fave.

http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.33813

I guess I should clarify a bit, to me, all of the above "budget" lights, run times and lm output are acceptable. I don't consider the ITP a true budget light, but what I'm trying to say is that whichever light (AA or CR123) I choose has to have those requirements. Then the budget light i pick up in addition to whichever I choose, I want it to have as close to those requirements as possible. I know most true budget lights wont meet that strict of a criteria, whether it be low light output, fwd clicky, run time, etc, but I think it's possible to get most of it or atleast a good compromise. And that's what I came here to find out, is there anything better than the itp sc1/sa1 for the money?

Don, I saw your review of the aurora sh-034 and I think it has to be up there on the list, esp with the build quality. how about the k109? I like the idea of programmable modes.

I don't have a K-109, the K-106 is now hard (or impossible) to find in the programmable version. Neither do momentary on as far as I know. There are a couple of forward clicky switches available from Shiningbeam which would allow this. Someone around here will have put one into various lights.

The only forward clickies I own are on a couple of Maglites and a Solarforce one that lives on a single mode light. I've not had to signal with lights since 1983.

A lot of RCR123A lights wont power up on a CR123A Primary 3v Cell .

http://www.lightake.com/products.do/category.Wholesale_iTP-189 Lightake has a decent choice of ITP lights at competitive prices .

http://www.lightake.com/detail.do/sku.TrustFire_F21_Flashlight-27972 The Trustfire F21 should run on primaries

http://www.lightake.com/detail.do/sku.TrustFire_F20_Cree_XR_E_Q5_5_Mode_100_Lumen_LED_Flashlight-27739 F20 is AA 14500 , and I run mine on AA's

You have to us great care choosing a 16340 light , as many wont run primaries .. But there are many rebranded versions of the F21 out there , I have the KD version myself .

http://www.kaidomain.com/SearchResult.aspx?SearchKey=Akoray&CategoryId=-1&SiteId=1 Akoray on KD ... just click the link

I like momentary on incase I want to spot light something quickly, not so much for any type of signaling.

I saw the k106 on KD, says in stock...is that not the programmable one?

I didnt know that a lot of the "budget" lights were meant to use only rcr123's, that's interesting. I just thought after seeing lights like fenix, jetbeam, etc be able to use both in most of their lights, that for the most part, most other flashlights did the same. I'm glad you pointed that out!

Goinggear.com has the older C series lights on sale for $29, and the newer S series for ?$39.99, plus CPF 10% discount code.

I think I'm leaning towards picking up the ITP sc1, i have quite a few cr123's saved as my tk15 and all my other weapons lights use cr123's, and it seems you have to use 14500's in order to get the same output as well as buy the batteries and charger. I like the shelf life of the cr123's also, but to be fair I don't know much about the 14500 batteries.

That leaves me with finding a good budget AA...back to the AA thread!

For the AAs, look at Lightake's or Manafont's Ultrafire C3 stainless steel lights. Both will perform pretty well on alkaline/NiMH and will scorch retinas with 14500s. There are quite a few variants on the theme and several of them are not very good. Lightake and Manafont are selling good ones.

The aluminium Ultrafire C3's are a whole different kettle of fish. I like them but then I used to use a Ducati 250 Desmo that was nearly my own age as daily transport. Reliability optional....

The EastwardYJ J09 of you can get one with an R5 in it and no strobes, DX claim to sell them but it is a lottery what you will get from them, is a superb performer with primary cells/NiMH. Unfortunately it seems to be a lottery what you actually get. I have a 3-mode with an XP-E in it and 3 modes, high, not so high and flashing. It is still a nice little light.

My experience with primary lithium cells leaves me unimpressed - I'd far rather use Eneloops every time. Get a bunch of them and a decent charger and then never look back.

Take a look at my sig for links to a spreadsheet of all the lights I've got around to measuring.

http://www.kaidomain.com/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductId=6671

This light will fill most of your requirements except for the fact it has reverse clicky not forward.

This light is 3 mode programmable and can use AA or RCR123's