Sacrider,
The Convoy S2+ has a low voltage warning flasher only. It will not cut off the battery.
Please give us the link to the C8 “for under $10”. I can’t find it in Simon’s store. The brand Aliexpress is a third-party marketplace (like Amazon). It is the shell for many, many different vendors. For more information, see: My experiences with AliExpress
As to your concerns about family members and friends, I’d suggest not giving them the flashlight without instructing them on the basics:
- Lithium-ion battery safety 101
As to loaning them the flashlights, what’s the problem? Unless you’re worried that they are going to take the batteries out and start using them as nutcrackers or baking them in an oven, for a single cell flashlight, there’s little risk of fire/explosion/venting while actually using the flashlight. If they accidentally overdischarge the battery:
- They will harm the number of cycles the battery can recharge. How much harm depends on how low they discharged the battery. It could be a few cycles lost to permanently killing the battery (the battery will no longer recharge).
- They possibly may do so much damage as to set up a scenario for the battery to catch on fire/explode/vent during when recharging it. But you would be in charge of that process. You should be very careful when recharging the battery if is under 2.5V. At 2.0V, I’d recommend discarding the battery.
- Moreover, I’d conjecture that the risk of overdischarging the battery is probably fairly low to begin with because most people loan flashlights only for very short periods of time and the dimming of the flashlight will make it very obvious when the battery begins to run low.
I’ve loaned quite a few of my flashligthts out to friends and family (I’ve got a reputation as a flashaholic,so I’m the “go to” guy when they need extra flashlights). I’ve never given them any special instructions, other than not to ding some of the more expensive or cherished ones.