That’s okay.
I’ve got over 24K posts, and I know that not all of them will be winners. 
2 Thanks
Thanks to @djozz for the generous giveaway. If all’s well that ends well, hopefully all the recipients will continue to reciprocate the good will they expect from others, and continue to share their knowledge and experiments with the rest of the community!
5 Thanks
You should think differently about it. Discord is mostly about real-time communication, thus nothing for Google. I’d also prefer IRC or matrix, but Discord is what the majority decided to use.
Still hope to see a significant part of this collection at the next flashlight meetup!
Oh no, then you will find out how sloppy some of my mods were. 
I thought I might as well share my side cause I basically bullied TheFliris into posting because he lives close to Amsterdam while I live all the way in Hamburg (2x 520km)
I actually once did drive all the way to Nederlands to join a meeting featuring Fliris, Reign, Bagh and Mattijs (sorry i always forget how to spell your nickname)
And all of them were thinking of visiting me for the next meetup in North Germany.
Would this thread have escalated if I called dibs first and then sent Fliris as my courier?
We’re mostly active in Discord and Reddit because for us its just nice to have everything in one place and be able to instantaneous communicate, ask for help/advice etc and even have voice calls
In the past I was way more active on classic forums, I joined TLF 2013 and BLF 2021
I still check both forums multiple times a day but I dont really have the energy or content to post anything there because it feels silly to create a thread just because I swapped a LED or a new torch arrived, so I just snap a quick picture and post it on Discord just to share the moment.
I agree that it feels slightly walled garden due to the login requirement but its also not supposed to replace a forum because its a messenger bordering a social network
I’ll support djozz in whatever decision he ends up taking, I just thought I would share my thoughts
6 Thanks
Yup, quite a few from the early years are still here.
I remember a lot of your mods, and recognize some of the items on top of the pile. Whatever else is in those boxes, it looks like a veritable goldmine of interesting and unique torches.
Many are probably not impressive any more, since tech improved and we can now buy pre-built lights with better performance than many of the old BLF custom mods… but the value of those items is more about the history than about the raw performance. I don’t know about you, but when I look at the torches I have sitting around, almost every item has a story behind it.
I hope the recipient will be willing to learn about the history behind each one and perhaps share the info here.
2 Thanks
Giveaway aside, this is very well said.
This could be the prizes for next year build/mod competition
Happy for gifter and receiver
We miss ya round here mate.
I am going to throw a spanner in the works, you could have donated some to the Old lumens contest, or start a fund for future contest/ giveaways. That would also be a lot of work, so I understand.
2 Thanks
Hi there 
Yes indeed, this is mostly flashlight history as opposed to present state-of-the-art flashlights, there are a few fairly modern flashlights in the box, but most are more than 5 years old (which is ancient in the flashlight/BLF calendar).
It is one of the reasons that I slowed down modding flashlights: in the twenty-tens we were spoilt: here on BLF we were on top of the newest best performance best light quality leds as they came out, every one much better than the one before it, and by clever tinkering managed to squeeze out much more light than any flashlight manufacturer at the time, with great home-grown interfaces as well. Nowadays, led performance increase is much less steep, and the manufacturers adapted all the tricks that we used (i.e. I still see your user interfaces but now ready to go in a new flashlight) and are making pretty great flashlights that often do not need modding at all.
Still, I really like that flashlights are still modded a lot on BLF.
4 Thanks
Thank you. And you are correct, I had a great time on BLF all those years, but at present I do not want to spend the many hours a day (!) experimenting and posting on BLF, as I used to.
Great to see ya here djozz !
Glad you’re still on the right side of the dirt like we are all trying to do 
Later,
Keith
3 Thanks
Always happy to see others spreading the joys of lights through giveaways. While I haven’t hosted any around these parts, I’ve done a few over on Reddit. I like to make sure rules are listed first and foremost, just to minimize the issues that may arise down the line. Here’s a quick copy of what I usually include. Not all are relevant to this platform, but thought others might find it helpful either way.
- US only
- Your account must be at least two months old
- Your account must have at least 100 comment karma by the end of the entry time
- Questionable accounts, such as those with the required karma but no actual comment history, will be disqualified
- Obvious use of alt accounts or other attempts by the same person to enter multiple times will result in disqualification for all involved accounts
- Only one entry per person! Please do not use alt accounts for better odds of winning!
- When replying to my comment, please specify which selection you would like. Make sure to reply, and not start a new thread. >If you do not provide a selection from the choices below, you will not be included in the drawing
- Once the winners are announced, you will have 72 hours to claim your prize or a new number/winner will be picked
- NEW RULE - If you happen to be in Hawaii or Alaska, since I’m not certified to ship lithium ion through air cargo, they’ll be shipped without batteries. Sorry
Then, once drawing time comes, I do the following.
Curious how winners are drawn?
- In MS Excel or LibreOffice Calc, create a column for each light
- Add each user’s choice under each respective light
- Check for duplicate users and flag them as naughty, and remove
- Get the final total for each light, and run it through a PowerShell command of the following format:
Get-Random -Minimum 2 -Maximum UserCountForEachLight
- Take result and see which user it equates to
- Update post with winners and contact each user for shipping information
Hopefully someone else can get some use out of this info, but either way, good luck to the winner.
6 Thanks
It was an exciting time. Things were changing really quickly, and we were at the forefront of that, cutting a new path. We (at this forum, but also enthusiasts in general) saw how things could be better, and we collectively made it happen. But now that we did most of what we set out to do, there isn’t as much remaining to be done. The low-hanging fruit is picked, and we’re running into diminishing returns, both in terms of performance and features. For a common, practical torch design, like a battery with LEDs and a button and some circuitry, further progress is much slower and more difficult now. Improvements now are smaller, harder to accomplish, and less exciting.
You made the world better. You’ll be missed, but your work here is finished and it’s time for the next adventure.
3 Thanks
Very true, but I couldn’t help imagining a lone cowboy on his horse riding off into the sunset.
5H for sunset, 5 minutes per blink.
4 Thanks
Ok, I placed together almost all lights that I keep, it is still more than I thought
. Most lights are modded, at least they have different (warmer, better CRI) leds, but also some are modded for extremer throw. It is too much to describe all those mods, so just a picture for now.
14 Thanks
Haha, I understand. My pile of lights is starting to feel a little out of hand. If I had to pick keepers they would definitely be the ones I’ve modded. Helps my remember what appeals to me about this hobby.
Thanks!
Interestingly i find the IF23 Pro is a good general purpose travel light, its the perfect mode settings that make the light, 100 lumen for 36 hours, 500 lumens for more light and a stable 1300 lumens. And turbo when you need a under a minute of full power 4000ish lumens.
100 lights?
1 Thank