1-click strobe? for pedestrian crosswalk safety

I use several lights for nighttime city walking — so I turn the light to strobe before venturing into a crosswalk/traffic.
Then OFF as I walk a block and back ON at the next intersection.

I know this is the opposite of what most of us prefer (hidden strobes that would take several clicks to attain, each time turned on)

I’d appreciate pointers to lights that always begin at strobe or, when set to strobe, will retain that memory.

Pointers welcome if there are any, for this nighttime safety use.

They’re probably in your ’annoying UI” drawer.

So far I have only one little angle-head AA light that does this, but it’s barely bright enough to wake up people asleep at the wheel.

Otherwise I have to triple-click, or double-then-long-click, or whatever is required.

I use bicycle tail lights for that purpose, on my daily commute. I find that they are the brightest and best strobes for that purpose. I currently use one from Cygolite. It works very well and is rechargeable.

The lights I normally use for night walks are Olight Warrior Mini, or Olight M2R Warrior or Klarus XT1C precisely because of the momentary strobe by using a simple “press and hold”, which I (can) use for instant signaling. Apart from that, they also gave instant access to Turbo, just in case.
Another nice light for that is the Brinyte PT18 Pro Oathkeeper, but I normally don’t carry it for being too big.

All of these provide momentary strobes, so they only work while pressing the button.

I also used the D4 modded with Anduril 2 and the strobe “locked” (5C from Off for momentary modes). :+1:

I belive you can also use the H17F driver (from MTN) to have that option only , but I am not 100% sure of this

Interestingly I have a small pocket/clip light that I’ve designated for this very purpose, primarily because I wasn’t happy with it as a main EDC and strobe mode can be memorized - the Jaxmnve E18.

It’s relatively bright for a small light, the clip is relatively sturdy but the On/Off is “long-press” (which is why it’s not my pocket EDC).

I did a short review of it here, but doesn’t seem to be generally available any more.

I’ve Nitecore for that, but for me it’s the instant acces turbo but they can memorise strobe or similary instant strobe acces from off.
All of P series have instant or capability to instant access strobe, and generaly light with “Strobe ready” capability ( a tail cup with 2 button one dédicated to Strobe and/or turbo.
Need to check for each light but generaly have mode memory

I’ve TM03, P10v2, P20iX and TM9K.

All have memory function if you activate strobe and you turn them off.

P10 v2 and P20iX have only strobe from off if you press mode button
TM9K Double click on mode button from off to activate strobe, long press turbo, after double click from off tu activate turbo only way to remove, short and no full press on On/Off button, if full press light enter to normal lightning mode with various output :smiley:
TM03 configurable 2 mode
One mode , continued press on button mode activate turbo and go off at release, two press for strobe double press again for turn off strobe and normale lightning or on/off button
Seconde mode, the reverse
One mode , continued press on button mode activate strobe and go off at release, two press for turbo double press again for turn off turbo and normal lightning or on/off button.

P10v2 1000 lumens at strobe
P20iX 4000 lumens at strobe
TM03 2800 lumens at strobe
TM9K 9000 lumens at strobe

TM9K and P20iX will awaken very well :smiley: and good light for illuminate your feet and “enclosed places” around 50 meter Flood/wall light beam type

No budget light but i don’t have other light for this type of use to offer you

I’ll bet Richard at MTN could do a custom firmware just like that for you.

I can confirm that the H17F driver from MTN allows to configure the flashlight to have only blinky modes (in case one wants strobes and blinkies only, or only 1 kind of strobe :wink:
Choosin the 2nd group, one can add several blinkies in different brightness levels, just as “non-blinky” modes !!

Here ya go. Sofirn TF84.
One click to strobe with a button just for that purpose.
Disable the side e-switch and the UI is dead simple.
I did a review here.

All the Best,
Jeff

I can understand why some people might think a strobe makes them safer. And in some situations it may make them safer. I think alot depends on how much other light is around from street lights, signs and buildings and other things. In some cases I think this would be more of a distraction and cause other issues for drivers that are not necessarily near you. Or they may be near you and they’re still not going to slow down. The most important thing is to assume that no matter what you’re wearing or how many flashlights you have that you are not being seen. You need to pay attention to traffic. When I see pedestrians carrying a flashlight that is on steady and pointed towards the ground with thier arm swinging while walking they are very visible and it is easy to judge where they are and where they’re going. I don’t think adding a strobe is going to make things better. And again if you are relying on the light to keep you safe rather than watching and looking in both directions before you cross then you have already made a serious error.

…me too,for safety reasons.

Yep, seconded on the TF84 with the dual tailswitch.

My Tiny Monstor has a dual tailswitch that can be configged to turbo or strobe. I have mine set so that the regular switch is last-mode and the mode-switch is turbo, but you can set that to strobe instead (and still keep regular functionality). Gotta do something weird like unscrew, press the button, screw back, keep holding the button 10sec, something like that.

I think the ED20-T does similarly, but it’s discontinued. Well worth getting one if you can find one, though.

My 80 year old neighbor who uses a walker to get around the neighborhood has four or five lights on it, some steady and some flashing. Plus an illuminated hat and generally a handheld flashlight as well.

In my experience the strobe definitely makes visibility better, and I wave the strobing light around if the driver isn’t noticing it, that’s usually enough to get his/her attention.

Notice whether or not you become more quickly aware of bicyclists when you’re driving and why — around here, mostly bicycle riders use flashing lights both front and rear.

Your mileage, of course, may differ.

Nobody around here expects drivers to notice them in crosswalks — they don’t look up from their damned phones often enough. I’ve been thinking of getting an airhorn to carry.

But anyhow, I asked the question starting this topic to find a light that goes to strobe on the first click. I appreciate the suggestions — more welcome.

PS — these European-spec reflectors are also a good safety tool in my experience, they’re much better than the cheap ones:

I agree with this! But my perspective is when drivers are not paying attention to pedestrians and think that the road is all for them, even in crosswalks and non-marked streets.

That’s the reason why I always carry any of the flashlights I mentioned above.

Some weeks ago I avoided that 2 cars crossed in a narrow-street-where-it-only-fits-one-car by signaling with strobe to one side of the road, preventing in car from entering it before the other went out.

BTW, since the beams of the flashlights are “directional” (to the ground or, in the worst case, to the eyes of someone) sometimes I use a diffuser to make the light and my position more “visible” without pointing it to the eyes.

I also recently “found” that I could use one of my RovyVon keychain lights (A5R, A8U, A8X) as “rear” light, since they have the blinking red leds. A co-worker that rides a bike forgot her rear light and asked me if I had a “bike light”. My answer was no, but then I remembered of the RovyVon and lend it to her for the way. She hanged it on the backpack and worked perfectly.

Blinking is different than strobe. Don’t assume everyone can see as well as you can. There are plenty of cars out there with scratched, pitted, dirty windshields with bad wipers. A strobe is not going to make your exact location easier to determine. So they may pass where they think they are giving you plenty of room but the strobe makes things harder to judge. I think lighting the ground immediately around you is a better way to go about it if you’re on foot. When a driver can see where the object is in relation to the edge of the road they can better judge how far away they should be. A bicycle is a different issue. Again all situations are going to be different depending on how much additional light is around you, how narrow things are, what kind of speeds are involved, weather, age of driver, how much of a hurry they are in, etc.

Wear reflective jacket. Much better.

Mike

The Convoy 12 mode groups driver will memorize all the blinkies, if you turn memory on. I don’t know about the current ones, but it works on ones i have.

TrustFire T11R does memorize strobe besides being a great outdoor light with fully regulated driver and ATR.

Even though you’re telling us that you’re convinced that the strobe is better than steady light you think that they are not seeing it. Where are you generally pointing this strobe in normal use? There’s no way that you can tell if a driver is seeing that strobe light. So at some point when you perceive that they don’t see it, you start waving it around and shining it at them???

Personally, I would not walk in downtown Berkeley at night since traffic is crazy. Anyway, I carry my D4Svn W2 with a diffuser and when a car approaches I shine it on the appropriate side of my leg and the ground. If they steer clear of me, I reduce the brightness. But the important thing is that everyone does what is best to keep themselves safe. Happy holidays!