Energizer lanterns are excellent.
One 2 star review complained about needing a screwdriver to change the batteries. This could be a downside. Better from the construction perspective, but maybe not very good if you are in the dark with no tools… Is this true?
I don’t have a recommendation for an ideal “dummy proof” light.
Being defined as elderly does not make one incapable of handling a flashlight in a dark place. I do that every night. Some would lump me into the catchall ‘eldery’ category. At age 76 I admit to being older than many, but not incapable of negotiating safe passage from room to room, between car and garage, etc in a power outage. I know people half my age who should probably not be trusted with candles or fuel burning lights.
Physical health and mobility and dexterity would be a better criteria to use than age.
For the large 4D version here are two of the old style, use a quarter (or screwdriver) to unscrew for the battery replacement, the smaller one you just unscrew the base with your hand.
Surely your parents won’t be doing things in the dark, will they?
I have little AAA lights that I hang in places where I might need a little extra light, or at stations for blackouts.
For blackouts, I save the lanterns for if people are over or when doing something like cooking or repairing something, and when by myself I hang a AAA light from my neck and wear a 1-AA headlamp.
For a sustained blackout, I put rechargeable batteries in these and set them around the house, and in the morning set them in a southern window to recharge.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01ETHG0JO/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Another lepro option here. These hanging bulbs/lanterns are great because you can clip them just about anywhere and are simple to use. These do require AAA batteries. However in an outage, you may want to be using a primary cell lantern anyways. Your usual USB charger may not be available. 10+ hours of run time.
PN: lepro 330030-4
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B083TXB5QY/ref=emc_b_5_i
my favorite energizer lantern:
- a 1000 lumen spotlight with a 3D printed diffuser.
It’s an interesting topic for me that I hadn’t considered. Of course, not all elderly are decrepit, but my late grandmother was one of those types who refused to have caretakers, but realistically couldn’t take care of herself. She loved those giant floating Eveready dolphin lights, but would always drop them, the further she aged. Her attempts to pick lights up would eventually lead her to taking a fall a couple of times and injuring herself. She passed many years ago, and we lived in a rural area at the time and didn’t have access to or even know about motion/timer activated lanterns or lights.
A couple of those can’t hurt, a flashlight by the bed and in the kitchen drawer and a lantern or two and a few of those lepros should cover the bases.
The simplest of all would be those lights that look like a light switch and operate like one.
Most old people can move around their house pretty well, so a simple flashlight should enable them to set up the lanterns and such as they like, for me the biggest deal of all is a headlamp to read a book by because blackouts can get boring.
Keeping the batteries and lamps in a rarely used closet with a motion sensor battery light (or one of those light switch lights) would be useful also.
I probably shouldn’t have mentioned elderly at all - and just posted my lantern wish list.
During a power outage, especially here in rural Australia, there are usually plenty of other things going on (trees down, flooding etc), so I was hoping to simplify the lighting situation as much as possible.
My parents are still running chainsaws and driving tractors, so they’re not quite ready for the nursing home.
They have headlamps (TH20s) and heaps of other flashlights - just not a decent lantern.
After all that, I’ll probably just get them an LT1S when they come on sale in November.
And print out a cheat sheet for the UI and stick it on the base. If they hate it, I’ll try something else and pocket the LT1S.
Anyway, thanks for the suggestions, and the animated discussion. Good to see that many of the BLF crew are 60/70+ and still fired up.
I showed my 78 year old mum this thread and she gave me the very serious I’m not elderly look.
I’d have them try an LT1S or even even an LT1 with a plate affixed to the base to add stability. I like the long run tomes of 4 of the 18650 cells.
It is not something that I need for MY parents. I am not the OP. But surely we all know that Murphy’s Laws will apply. Surely if the batteries can fail at night during a power failure, they will.
So a design that requires some kind of tool and manual dexterity to change batteries is not ideal for the stated purpose.
I have a couple of D cell lanterns where the entire base unscrews for battery changes. They too are a bit of a PIA. Getting those threads started against spring pressure can be a challenge.
Whether either is doable in what might be a stressful situation, is dependent on the capabilities of the person doing it, I guess.
Hi everyone! Did anyone ever used something like this? 淘宝网 - 淘！我喜欢 Seller stands for 5000-5600 mAH and 300 Lm max. Battery capacity looks real as he sent me this image of internals. I like the super simple UI and battery life, but what’s with usability? Is this bright enough to light a room? Is it comfortable to use on table during cooking, or LT1S will be better? Although I can get two of them for the price of LT1
Could it light a room? Depends on personal interpretation.
300 lumens is something like a 25 watt incandescent bulb. As well there is the question of how accurate is the sellers description of 300 lumens? Your guess is as good as mine. Often there is “no free lunch”.
They claim 6 hours run time from 5600 mAh. Looks like about 200-300 Lm indeed.
Only blackout I’ve experienced since the Great Eastern Seaboard Blackout was an overnighter when a tree keeled over and took out the powerlines up’n’down the block, which fried and had to be replaced.
My ol’ Zanflare lantern, the T1 or whatever, lasted all night on medium-ish power, a nice warm-white.
My AA-fed Wuben E03 (??) with diffuser lit up the catbox.
In fact, aside from ceiling-bounce, any decent flashlight with diffuser could double as a lantern in a pinch.
If it doesn’t have a decent simple UI out of the box, but has andy1 or andy2, you can set manual memory to always start on level X regardless how it might be (mis)adjusted while in use. Just off then on would reset it.
Alternatives could be those teeny little USB lights that you just stick into a powerbank, etc.
In my opinion, the most important feature for this use is an automatic turn on. Get at leas one of this simple emergency lights in every room.
It sits in a spare wall outlet and turn on automatically during power outage.
in my country you can get them for less than 10 USD in "dollar stors"
https://rechargeables.co.za/products/eurolux-6w-plug-in-3-7v-600ah-rechargeable-led-emergency-light
It is not very bright and not last many hours but you never find yourself in the dark so you can easily find your good lentern
I have three like that and have had them for years. A few years ago I noticed the actual run time of one had become very poor. I was able to open it and found it used NiMH cells, which I replaced. I swapped all three eventually.
For years I’ve considered building a light specifically for this purpose, with 4P 18650 (or 21700, nowadays), USB charging, single mode driver and a pair of 4000K emitters on passive heatsinks. I’ve never had time to find all the bits on eBay, but I don’t believe it would be challenging to solder/glue/bolt together- hardest part is probably finding a single mode, efficient driver with LVP.
How about an Olight swivel? I just gave one to my mother. She wanted to know how to charge it when it runs out and I told her it’s a usb-c cable. She sez “like my phone?” And pulled out the charger and that’s exactly right. It attaches to her walker and she walks around the house with it. Like a moped. She has it on the fridge at the moment along with the other magnets, so i see they’re getting along.
Wellp, one thing that’s overlooked are those solar-powered motion-lights. I got one downstairs by the catbox that turns on when it detects motion (me or the cats) and lights up a nice warm-white. If I turn on the overhead light, the motion-light turns off to conserve power. When it runs down (no sun to recharge it, obviously), all I do is hit it from a powerbank until it’s charged, then that last me another week or so.
I probably wouldn’t recommend keeping it hooked up to an AC-powered usb adapter, but once a week is fine, especially with the cats going there several times per day each.
And you can carry them like a regular lantern, as they just pop on the hard-mount, and can otherwise sit flat on any surface.