A question for people who use there lights for long periods at a time.

I am trying to decide between Sanyo 2600mah and Panasonic 3400. As you know the discharge curves are very different.


So I was wondering, how low do you typically run your batteries before you notice a difference in brightness to the point where you recharge them? 3.4v? 3.0v? Until the protection circuit kicks in?

I have a few lights that will step down to lower output modes when the battery is pretty drained. But on the other hand, I’ll drain till the protection circuit kicks in. On my crelant 7g5v2, I noticed no difference in brightness because it’s regulated err whatever. But on a homemade p60 dropin that has a nanjing 105c 2.8amp driver, BIG DIFFERENCE in brightness.

My multimeters cables broke because of my stupidity(left them wrapped around the multimeter with a bunch of heavy stuff on top) so I just try to remember how long I’ve been using the batteries. I basically will charge my bike light once a week because I’ll bike to the Y 5 times a week with a 25 minutes round trip (it could go longer, but the p60 gets pretty dim…still around 350 lumens probably…but I keep it on medium most of the time anyways).

I mean, the ideal situation would be to use till about 3.7 volts and recharge. But laziness will overcome that with time.

I do prefer to store batteries charged or partially charged rather than so depleted the protection circuit kicks in.

I have some 2600 sanyos and am quite impressed that they will hold a lot of brightness own to 3.0V, i can tell they are losing brightness, but not by as much as you would think

I would not run cells down to the protection cutoff. It is set to a lower voltage (around 2.4V) than most cells are rated for (2.75V).
Most of my lights have a low battery warning or cutoff, so I will run until that is reached.
I usually top up cells so I rarely start with a partial charge.

In general, the Sanyos make more sense... the panasonics do last longer, but on a $ to mAh ratio, or in terms of performance the Sanyos win out.

I do run my lights for long periods of time (instead of the reading lamp... silly I know...) but very rarely hit the cutoff for the protection circuit with either battery.

Hi. I tend to 1) Always have spare cells for expected long use. 2) change cells/ recharges before protection kicks in. Typically I’ll use an 18650 powered bike light a week (commuting) before recharging regardless of OCV.

mostly on my lights, when hit 3.7-3.8, I already notice the brightness drop. especially if I happen to turn it off and then on again…

I run until circuit on protected cells kicks in, but now always carry a small torch, me SRK went off as I was walking down a very dark path with obstacles on it, first time it happened I was lucky and did not trip so take no chances now.
On me FandyFire Uv-S5, it gets right down to just 1 led glowing so dimly it’s no use, and these are supposed to be protected cells!!
I find an appreciable difference as cells run down, but have such a vast open area it probably seems worse than it is, for closer up stuff wouldn’t be so bad.
I still prefer the CW SRK over me BTU shocker though, your arm doesn’t stretch an extra 6 inches due to weight ha ha!!
I am out for around 3-4 hours at a time, on shocker try to stay on low to conserve energy, but got some new pana’s today so may be out longer tonight, 3 nights ago I fell asleep, woke up to a snuffling/snorting noise, scared meself shitless, but it was only a muntjack ha ha.
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Hah every part of your post was hilarious. Thanks for the info and of course the awesome stories!

Did you fall asleep outside while walking around in the dark? Also, I had to google Muntjack…. Ok, so that answers my first question. Carry on!

I lay on the bench seats, well actually they are just two separate benches, no backs to them, looking at the stars, air is nice and cool and fresh, well usually nearby cow shit actually ha ha, but alone time, which suits me, I did once fall asleep.
I have just charged the BLF recommended NCR18650B cells(4) that I bought to see if they would be better than my very old AW cells, man they are, never realised just how old and weak the AW’s got, can’t wait to go out tonight, just wish they were more flashers in my area, I was a flasher years ago, but I can’t really talk about that ha ha.
Muntjack = small asian deer, loads around this area(East Anglia, UK), we also have some Stags, 1 indiginous venomous snake, the Adder, kill old people and children as well as numerous pets, loads of Big cat sightings, Puma, and Lynnx, not so much lynnx, but a farmer had one in his freezer that was talked about for over 20 years, news channel called his bluff, but sure enough deep frozen piza, no lynnx he had, in 1976 the dangerous animals act came about making it illegal to keep or won these “pets”, a lot were just let go, habitat can comfortably support them, we even have wallabies in uk, parrots, and wild boar now.
I have met several credible people who have stated they have seen it, including a vicar, 50% sure I saw it once from afar when I worked in the woods around here for 3 years clearing pingos, small naturally formed depressions/ponds.
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I often use my lights for several hours at a time… but that’s mostly just my AA-based lights, and usually at 30 lumens or less. The only Li-Ion light I leave on for that long is my ZL SC52, running overnight at 0.06 or 0.34 lumens as a night light. But it can go for months on its sub-lumen levels. I change its battery when its charge indicator gets down to 1 flash (out of 4).

Mostly though, I only use my ZL H51 and L3 L10-219 for long periods of time… like an entire evening (if nobody else is around), generally at about 3 lumens.

I also run my 1x18650 tube lights for 15 to 120 minutes at a time, but only while biking… and I recharge those well before they get low, because I never want to run out of light during a ride.

The only time I’ve ever triggered a low-voltage shut-off was when I forgot to change the 16340 battery in my JB RRT01 for like two or three months and it suddenly just cut out during use. It freaked me out a little until I got a new battery in it to make sure it wasn’t broken.