The trend lately after the arrival of the Xml emitter has been toward l8650 powered lights on BLF,whereas it used to be AA in the past . Are the Bigger lights now you favorites .? or is this a passing fad .
I rarely use the bigger lights ..I'm glad I have a few... but 90% of the time I pick up a AA or crl23 .
Yep, I feel the same way. I now own three 18650 lights, with one more on the way, which I think will be my last for a while. A crazy bright 18650 light is useful in many circumstances. But I'm still not sold on Li-Ion technology. It's completely unavailable here where I live, so not an option in an emergency. And since there are real dangers involved with Li-Ion batteries and chargers, I wouldn't buy just any cheap noname charger or battery to try it out, which takes away some of the fun. Additionally, because of protection circuits and minimum voltages and such limitations with Li-Ion, it's not as useful to me, since I like to run batteries down to the ground effectively squeezing out the last electron. :) In real world usage, I will always EDC a 1xAA light, and I strongly prefer alkaline and NiMH over anything else.
I need my lights to be safe at the high temperatures of summer here (sometimes rising to 45 degrees celsius in the shadow, much much higher within the metal box aka my car), and also usable by non li-ion trained people aka my family, so I'm really much more into AA/AAA, although I like the li-ions for their wow effect.
AA/AAA chargers are also much nicer than the li-ion ones.
:O :O
:Sp
Yeah, it's kind of the edge of the desert here... more than half of Israel is actually a desert (called the Negev) and the rest is just very hot non desert. :)
I like 18650 lights, because they are bright, have a long runtime (Q5, R2, R5 - not the XM-L). I have only one flashlight which uses 2x 18650 all other only one.
Flashlights with only one AA or 16340 are a little bit to small (or my hands are to big) for the normal use. I miss understand me - I like my new trustfire Z1 with one 16340, but this is a small flashlight for special work.
Normally I use my Solarforce L2 or L2p, but of course I use also AA flashlights (li-ion batteries are extremly expensive in Germany and you can get AA cheap everywhere). If you need not extrem bright lights AA is a good solution.
I use li-ion about 70% and AA 30%.
I like bigger lights.
I use AA lights in the desk to find stuff or just play with on ocassion, but 18650/2xcr123 ones are the ones I use to light up my backyard or walk the dog with.
I like lights of all size, but of the lights I have I use the 18650 ones the most. I EDC AA and smaller light, they just don't get used as much.
Has anybody tried 4xAA with the Solarforce 3-6V XM-L drop-in? You should be able to do this with a standard L2 body and two 18650 extension tubes. Here's an example of how the body pieces would be put together:
A well set up 18650 ... I have a few set up for run time , and I mean 100 Hours + on low
+ Add a few (2) 18650 extensions to a L2 and you can run 4xAA [ make sure the driver/drop in can handle that ] [ I used a well regulated Variable -ramping - drop in ]
Or add a CR123A extension so you can run 2xAA . LEGO lights are fun .
But there are lots of options to play with . If you wish , you can set up a light to run 3xAA , 4.5v which is close enough to 4.2v
Hmm... It should work regarding the voltage, but don't expect full brightness. I don't know how much a AA alkaline is able to push, but I would be surprised if it's much beyond 1 A. Using Eneloops, you could easily get 2 A, but beyond that I think it would become unhealthy... just my two cents though 
Hmm... If the DC-DC converter in the drop-in is doing what it should, it's reasonable to hope for something close to "full" brightness if the eneloops can provide 2A. Why? Let's say that "full" brightness for an XM-L is ~2.5A with a ~4V 18650. That gives us ~10W of power. Now let's consider the eneloop solution: 2A at 4.8V = 9.6 W. So, there's plenty of power available.
Hmm... If the DC-DC converter in the drop-in is doing what it should, it's reasonable to hope for something close to "full" brightness if the eneloops can provide 2A. Why? Let's say that "full" brightness for an XM-L is ~2.5A with a ~4V 18650. That gives us ~10W of power. Now let's consider the eneloop solution: 2A at 4.8V = 9.6 W. So, there's plenty of power available.
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Yeah, if it's really doing that, it would be quite good. A bit long for my taste, but definitely an alternative to 18650. Tempting...
I got interested in lights because they were another way to make use of all the AA cells I had for other hobbies. But the first light I bought that used multiple AAs - a TK45 - taught me that I didn't like big bulky lights and I didn't enjoy futzing with multiple cells in a battery carrier. Now I prefer a single cell 16340 or bigger for run time and output.
I like 18650's more now but still like the smaller bright single aaa/ 10440 lights. I like them all actually lol. I still buy aa lights but usually give them away as gifts and then end up replacing them.
My non-Lion lights sit unused most of the time. For the horsepower I want with any kind of useful run time, it has to be lion. The thing is, I want variety. I want different lights that run on all different battries.
ImslowlygettingthereFoy
I'm guess I'm interested how we limit ourselves mentally against certain things ..Small predjusticies we hold onto for no real good reason . I'm glad I dropped the anti-crl23 attitude rather quickly .It was something I saw as prevelant in CPF that I didn't understand .Why would anyone want to introduce this new battery and why a non-rechargable ? Jumping thru those small hurdles made me a better flashaholic
My least favourite are cr123 lights, mainly because the batteries are so expensive in Australia. I do have a couple and like them
Maybe there should ne more discussion about how to do this and a reveiw or two about real lego possibilities …I’ve stated before that one of solarforces biggest flaws is their ability to effectively communicate possibilities to the customer or potential customer //the true definition of sales //.I;m sure people would be happy to at least understand the possibilities with regards to the various options avaiable .
I don't understand what extentions people are talking about. and I see the descriptions of the parts and pieces from solarforce as way to vague as to what they even are.. much less what they accomplish. A conventor ?? what the hell does that even mean ? if it means converter . converts what to what ?? << this is the best way to frustrate people off and lose customers ...make them feel stupid
I agree that it's a little confusing, in part because the labeling isn't very clear on things. Here's a quick summary from memory:
Extensions below are for L2(x/p/m) only, not for L2i or L2r:
Now here's the fun part: 2 AA batteries are just a little shorter than 3 16340s, so you can put 2 AA batteries in anything that is the length of 3 16340s, e.g., an L2m body with an 18650 tube, or an L2 body with a 16340 tube, or even an L2m body with 2x16340 tubes. Note that the tubes are wider than AA batteries, so things can rattle around a bit, but it seems not enough to cause contact problems.
Using the 2xAA = 3x16340 logic above, you can do a little math and come up with other combinations. For example, 4xAA = 6x16340, which is the length of one L2 body and 2x18650 tubes, but it can be achieved with other combinations as well.
If you want to add spacers into the mix, then you have even more options. A 15mm charging spacer ($2.00 from lighthound) will make an AA about the length of an 18650. Let's say you want to do 3xAA: If you add a 15mm spacer, then you can think of your third AA as having the same length as an 18650, so you just add one 18650 extension tube to the 2xAA solution above: L2 body + 16340 tube + 18650 tube + 15mm spacer = 3xAA solution.
Perhaps another way to summarize this is to explain everything in terms of the number 16340 lengths that are provided or required.
Provides:
Requires:
To figure out combination of tubes that you need for the number of batteries you want to use, compute the number of 16340 lengths you need, add a 15mm spacer if needed to round up to whole numbers, then add the number and type of tubes needed to provide that length.
Finally, please keep in mind that the discussion above is all about size, not output. Don't forget use a drop-in that's well suited to the output from your batteries.