Help Needed Choosing a light and battery with charger

10+ everything unknown00101 said.
Ultrafire / _any_fire batteries are often counterfeit, poor quality, can be dangerous. Flashlight kits on ebay that include a battery & charger send the cheapest battery & charger they can get. They are often dangerous straight up. Seen several reports of the chargers dying or blowing up.

I recommend Starry Light SA-22 $24.99 - 880 Lumens, 4x AA, cree XM-L2. USA seller so you can get it quick. You can use alkaline AAs until you get ni-mh rechargables.

In li-ion only get batteries with quality protection. Panasonic NCR18650PF Protected (usa) Imho others should really not be suggesting unprotected li-ion. Mtnelectronics is run by RMM (Richard). Ships fast. Answers questions / provides suggestions on his blf sales thread. Just check that your light isn’t known to stupidly have problems fitting protected batteries. In that case IMR / Li-mn batteries would fit, they are ok unprotected. Panasonic CGR18650CH is IMR. Likely the same battery relabeled with a button top. I’d go button top.

Isn’t every battery linked unprotected, don’t you think he should be buying protected since he’s kind of new. Maybe all of the lights linked have drivers that stop at low voltage. The XinTD and Convoy are both great quality lights for the money. You will need to order from a USA company it you need it in 2 weeks or less so Fasttech is out.

Maybe a Convoy C8 from Banggood? Seems like they ship pretty fast in the US (US warehouse I guess).

At Banggood you should also be able to find some cheap (but good) protected panasonic (or other brand) batteries and a deasant charger within budget.

When ordering with any of these vendors don’t forget to checkout the commercial sellers part of this forum for coupon/discount codes.

Imho nearly everyone should get protected. Very little reason not to. Li-ions were never meant by battery manufacturers to be sold or used unprotected.

From this thread. Overdischarge protection is very important too but was talking about flashlights which had that in the driver.

Only those that want to push more amps then the overcurrent protection allows & want to risk it for the extra capacity over IMR should really be using unprotected. Need to be very experienced, knowledgeable & practice extra safety precautions. Without protection you can do internal damage making them dangerous.

Before RMM brought us his evva seiko protected panasoncs, quality protection was excessively expensive. $13-14 for one keeppower 3400? $4 extra per battery just for their name? $17 Orbtronic, $20 Xtar, $21 RediLast, $25 nitecore. All the same NCR18650B cell. At $9.75 for evva, little need to get mystery protection or unprotected anymore. Wallbuys had keeppower 3400s for $9.60 but they have raised it now. If you have family you live with, even more reason to want quality protection.

IMR / Li-mn are ok unprotected. Takes higher temperature to reach thermal runaway, aka “vent with flame” (or explosion if inside flashlight). IMR / Li-Mn 250°C vs li-ion 150°C. Doesn’t happen very often but that doesn’t help the people it does happen to. Even major brand name mobile phones & laptops with li-ions that would include quality protection have burned.

I was thinking Convoy C8 as well, but he mentioned flood>throw.

I find for close range applications like OP is involved with that a thrower beam can get kind of annoying after a while, even with an OP reflector.

I was thinking more along the lines of sticking with a zoomie for the smooth and even beam.

SK-98 Zoomie 18650
Nitecore i2 Charger

Ordering from FastTech I’ve had the vast majority of orders arrive in less than 2 weeks. Many within 8 days. Make certain to select the following shipping method “USPS First-Class via Hong Kong Post FREE (8 to 14 working days in transit typical)”. Just note that you may not have the same results as me.

Now the batteries… Definitely go with Protected.
Panasonic 3400mAh NCR18650B Protected
Edit: RMM said they’re due to arrive tuesday.

$23.28 [Flashlight & Charger] (Use Coupon at FastTech, enter when you open the cart click “have a coupon code?”, Coupon Code: BLF)
$20.89 [2x 18650]
_
$44.17 Total (Includes shipping costs).

To me keeppower charges too much for their name unless you find them on sale. Since RMM’s evva 3400 is out of stock Panasonic NCR18650PF Protected 2900mAh $8.75 seems to be the next best deal for seiko protection (same as evva 3400s) if you don’t want to wait.

Evva protection teardown & comparison with keeppower same seiko IC and 3 x AO8814 MOSFETs vs 2 for kp. Makes keeppower feel like a ripoff to me.

~ edit ~
RMM just posted that 3400s should be there Tuesday the 14th.

I suggest you use a cheapie AA torch for a while, and figure out what you need to spend to get a few good batteries (I guess 18650s) and an appropriate charger - and then find a flashlight that will serve your purposes.

You budget at the moment will cover a few good batteries and a charger, or a good flashlight - but you would be doing well to get both.

http://illuminationsupply.com/other-brands-c-28_98/starry-light-sa22-880-lumens-4-x-aa-p-901.html
http://illuminationsupply.com/chargers-c-48_51/nitecore-intellicharge-i2-p-448.html
http://illuminationsupply.com/chargers-c-48_51/nitecore-intellicharge-i4-p-225.html
http://illuminationsupply.com/convoy-c-28_92/convoy-s2-xml2-t6-neutral-white-18650-p-653.html
http://illuminationsupply.com/convoy-c-28_92/convoy-m1-xml2-t6-neutral-white-18650-p-662.html
http://illuminationsupply.com/batteries-c-48_50/18650-keeppower-2600mah-samsung-icr1865026f-protected-button-top-p-833.html

First is able to run on any AA batteries. very good price on two nitecore chargers that can be used for NiMH or lithium so if you decide on different battery chemistry this will be useful as you will only need one charger for what ever chemistry you choose. The convoy lights are a good light in the 18650 format, and a quality protected 18650 for good price. Good prices and fast shipping from quality vendor.

Choose link 2, 4, and 6 in the listing above and with shipping you are just a little over $40 and you will get it in a few days.

The only thing i am not liking about the s2 is that it overheats too quickly, the M1 is a bit better at handling heat

$57.18 with shipping. (2 batteries, shipping is very high $9, and the charger is on backorder). :frowning:

I was going with one battery and didn’t know the charger was out of stock. Have bought 2 headlamps from IS and the shipping was only about 3 dollars for me and I’m on the east coast. Buy these , sell the other 3 for $7 each to make your money back and you can use that until you save a little more money.

They want $9 for shipping to me in the midwest; checked a random zipcode in California, showing $6.

I think the SK68 14500/AA, though a great light, wouldn’t have enough run-time.

Have you considered repairing your current light, likely its one of three problems, the switch, LED or circuitry, and all are replaceable

Yes, I want to repair my old light with new components. I’m just really new to this so I need to learn the basics about drivers and emitters and how to wire them. I have been reading around but there are so many links and so many options I just don’t know where to start.

I ordered this how did I do?
I went over my budget about $20-$25 if I’m willing to spend $40 on an OK quality light I might as well spend an extra $20 for a far better light.

Thank you guys for all the great recommendations. I do plan on buying more lights and saving money ordering from china sellers. I would like to use my old light that’s broken as a donor and order parts and build my own light from scratch.

XinTD C8 V4 XM-L2 U2 1C 18650 Flashlight

Panasonic NCR18650PF 2900mAh x 2

Nitecore Intellicharger I4 V2

Now I noticed you guys talking about Protected and Un-Protected batteries. I bought Un-Protected I hope this is not bad a for a newb like me lol

I read a greatly written post on this a while back but have no clue how to find it again

The switch is easy just try a paperclip to go from battery to body and see if it lights

The LED is trickier, but if you have a multimeter with diode test try it on the LED, it will only light up with a faint glow so do it in a not very brightly lit room. You can also try a resistance check on the switch

Circuitry is harder, you can try measuring LED voltage with the light on see if its getting anything, since you only have one light you can’t try other circuits on it

Also make sure your battery is not dead, what you have now is known for being junk, you can try 3AA batteries in series, that will light the LED, just not super bright for super long (NiMH is better, alkalines don’t do high current well). You can also use 2 alkalines or 3 nimh to test just the led, wire them in series, they can’t put out enough current to damage it.

The battery voltage should indicate its charge (but those junk batteries sometimes give high voltage when they are dead), less then 2.5V get rid of the battery and never try to use it again (it could explode), 2.8-3V is dead, 3.8V is about 40% charge, and 4.2V is filly charged.

Out of what you have the battery is the weakest link, the charger is the next weakest,then the switch and circuitry, its unlikely the body would be the problem, and its highly unlikely the LED is toast, Cree LEDs are almost bulletproof

The light you bought is very throwy, the batteries are good quality and the charger is widely used by many BLFers who apparently have no problems with it
Protected would be better, if it got shorted in a toolbox it would prevent catastrophic failure, but as long as you know how to use li ion batteries safely you won’t have any problems, i have no protected and have used hundreds of li ion charges of flashlighting.
This hold an 18650 very effectively
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Coleman-Match-Holder/13848642

I think its the driver, or the switch. The LED emitter lights up when hooked up straight to the battery. The battery voltage is around 4.0v - 4.1v. Can you provide me links to where I can find replacement parts for that light?
HWAWTS UltraFire XML-T6 This is my first post with pic of the light I have.

What diameter is the driver?
17mm is the easiest to replace, some lights have 18 or 20mm.
You should be able to yank out the switch, many lights have a metal retaining ring holding it in, unscrew that and push the parts out hte front, if you can post a pic i bet someone will be able to recommend a better quality one.
Do try bypassing the switch with a paperclip to see if that is whats wrong with the light first

I’m not sure what size, the lights at work and I’m out for the next 2 days. I’ll be sure to try bypassing the switch and I’ll keep you posted. When I get the chance I’ll make another posting out with pics and questions on how to upgrade or bring back my old light from the dead.
I was also thinking of getting a really floody head lamp or any super floody light that pocketable. Do you know where I should start looking?