Hey guys,
So lately I find myself going camping on a fairly regular basis. Not super often, but about once a month.
While I'm completely set for flashlight at headlamps, one area I find to be frustrating is area lighting, specifically for picnic tables, that can be left unattended.
Right now most of the time someone ends up having a gas lantern, and I usually end up just pointing a light at a canopy to provide some more light.
Are there better alternatives? Any dedicated 18650 lanterns?
Wouldn't NiMH be better unattended? So many drivers only have low voltage warming instead of cutoff.
I've been using bike lights attached to poles and branches, and flashlights with diffuser wands.
How do you get the bikes out of the trees when it's time to leave? 
The bikes naturally fall out of the trees after they ripen.
Flashlights that can tailstand and have a diffuser are great. Or put up a string between two trees, above the camp and hang a flashlight with a diffuser, or rig up a branch. Or lash the flashlight to a stick an drive the stick into the ground.
Warm white is best. I have a few 7A flashlights just for outdoor garden lighting. Also some vintage kerosene pressure lights...
I would love to see some good diffusers with a shade, so the flashlight could be like a normal lamp with a lampshade. I have modified a wall lamp fixture for e27 bulbs, with a big opaque globe. Great for late night barbecues in the garden, but too clumsy for hiking. A small diffuser with a foldaway umbrella like shade would be great. Along with a clip-on foot that makes the flashlight tailstand a little better.
Nimh options would be great.
Part of my concern is I don't like leaving my lights unattended, since most can burn themselves out on turbo. Not an issue on non turbo levels, and I do instruct/warn people on how to use them, but I'm paranoid that one day I'll come back to the table to find a nice toasty $300 host.
Right now I'm leaning toward a couple of lantern options on amazon, to see if they would fit. Last time I ended up using my RC40, pointed up at a cover, on level 3, (or 4) at which it runs fine in terms of temperature, and for 50 hours on the lower level 15 on the higher.
D40A is nimh. I use with a silicone diffuser dome thingie. IS is having a SWM sale.
Ends today, so dont dilly dally
#new
Hmm... I have two D40A lights. One is modded, so it can't fit the role since it will overheat, but the stock one might be an option, just need the wand. Not sure how it will compete against a lantern though.
I don't think anything can match a nice propane or white gas lantern, but it's not hard to beat the LED lanterns. Hopefully the new Fenix lantern will surprise me.
The main thing with a lantern is that it reflects light back down, which is good because the mesh top of tents if terrible at reflecting light, and open sky is even worse. Diffusers don't do that, so you have to hang them upside down, although they're still useful even if you tail stand them. A silicone diffuser is dirt cheap, so I don't see any reason not to have a couple of them around.
If the thunderstorms here get worse, I might be testing out my propane lantern tonight. Unfortunately I just boxed up my white gas lanterns because I'd really like to test those too.
I know you asked for an 18650 lantern, but I can highly recommend the GE LED lantern model 17357 I got at Costco for $20.00. It runs on D-cells though. I have left it running in low for several hours and it doesn’t really even warm up. I’m still on my first set of D-cells after 3 camping trips and using it pretty heavily. It is plenty bright enough for me to do whatever I need to around the campsite within about 10 feet of it.
Also there was some discussion of a 3 AA model here:
https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/1343
If there was some reason you didn’t want to consider an actual LED lantern and I missed that somehow, sorry.
I like white gas Coleman lanterns. They are still Competitive and they remind me of my childhood and of my grandfathers story of lighting the gas lights with a spark from shuffling across the carpet. Perhaps inherently more dangerous than lithium ion but the hazards have been known for longer.
It is the same question as between gasoline and electric cars. Leds and electric motors are more efficient, but hydrocarbon fuels have more energy density.
One of main reason for us using Gas lanterns are the bugs, LED and all our other fluorescent lanterns attract bugs, we don’t use gas lanterns in a tent due to safety,
Our D40 has a home made diffuser cut from the bottom of roll on deodorant bottle.
It fits perfectly and works well when we tie it to the tent frame to shine down
Our other lanterns run off 6v Pb batteries and last forever, but attract bugs , so we place them away from us when we sit around the fire……the bugs go there like magnets.
alot of good and neat tricks offered here. i will be sure to try some on my next camping trip.
i usually do what you did with your rc 40. i found that worked the best, and dam bright. i shined my srk up and the roof of my canapy which is white. lit up the entire table below.
this:
plus this:
works well as far as good runtime and power with NiMh batteries is concerned.
For a standard 18650 P60-based flashlight conversion, which is indeed nice and versatile, I’d try this: http://www.solarforceflashlight-sales.com/product.php?sname=&s=19&t=FA
