If a flashlight lives on a shelf it makes little difference, but most often I carry them in pockets or bags. While that’s fine most of the time, availability heuristic makes me vividly remember times where the light failed me when I needed it because it turned on by itself and and surreptitiously exhausted the batteries.
So my question is about locks - what works, what doesn’t.
Here are a few examples I know of:
Nitecore TIKI: turns on by double clicking. This mostly works, but it also has a long press Turbo shortcut which got turned on in the pocket full of keys…
Nitecore NU25: press both buttons to lock and again to unlock. For this light I think is perfect as the buttons are small and stiff and the probability of that happening by accident is small.
Nitecore EDC33: a dedicated lock slider + single tail switch - looks promising.
Old mini Maglight: twist head lock and switch - that seemed to work fine from what I remember.
Sofirn SC21 Mini: the side switch seems quite vulnerable. Unscrewing the head a little seems to work, but it’s a little ad hoc solution. 4 presses to lock and unlock has been criticised as it seems to drain battery (how drastic is that?).
There are headlamps where the switch is physically covered by the little tab in a bracket when in retracted position this preventing pressing on it.
I’ve heard that there are autolocks - the flashlight locks on a timer an require some deliberate switch gymnastics to be turned back on.
What are some other options? What’s the smartest one?
Electronic lockout for me. I don’t like having to fumble to make a light ready to use and 3C/4C is muscle memory to the point I can do it while still picking up the light. Also faster, I can set my anduril lights to autolock in case I forget, and doesn’t let dust/water/dirt into the threads.
I mechanically lock out lights if they’re sitting on a shelf for a while, but I anticipate using soon enough again to not take the battery out, but then pocket cruft is less of a concern. If it sits for long enough I’ll just take the battery out whenever I’m rotating batteries.
I also sometimes worry about a battery reconnecting in a bag if a light is physically locked out by unscrewing. Paranoid maybe, but I’ll take it over a fire. I’ve had two pocket fire close calls I caught right before any burning, both with lights without lockout. My Zebralight SC65c HI did it while driving so basically tried to kill me on day 1 of ownership , never a single incident with an anduril light.
But how about the parasitic drain in electronic lockout. Is that exaggerated? I know nothing, but I recently asked this question in relation to Sofirn SC21 Mini (not Pro) and the consensus was that the lockout drains batteries fast somehow…
If it’s a decently designed driver, you’re talking at least months to drain a battery, for an anduril light with aux on low, more for some more basic drivers, and in general for 18650 or larger, many lights will last a year or close to it. A couple of weeks to deplete a battery if you leave the aux on high on a Wurkkos TS10 at the extreme, but also when the battery gets low enough and the aux switch off then the drain is a lot lower, and if you kept the aux off it still should last multiple months even on a 14500.
If I’m carrying a light, I’ll be checking the battery when I picked it up if I hadn’t used it for a while, and swap a fresh one in if needed, so I’ll catch a low battery then anyway. The drain of an eswitch doesn’t matter at all over even a few weeks of carry with light use on the same battery (I tend to fall into the ironic pattern that my EDC gets carried a lot more than used, because I usually have an interesting/fun/specialised light I also brought and want to try out, e.g. right now it’s probably had the same battery for a month if I was to guess and it’s still at 3.8V).
Ive never had problem with parasitic drain. Its there in all eswitch lights, but not significant. Electronic lockout doesnt get rid of the parasitic drain, it only prevents accidentally acivation. Lights with a “clicky” switch have no parasitic drain and its same as mechanical lockout: the circuit is interrupted. You can also do a mechanical lockout on most lights which involves unscrewing the battery tube or tailcap slightly, even a quarter turn. It gets rid of parasitic drain and accidental activation. Hope this hepls you.
I’ve never had a problem with parasitic drain on an eswitch, and the only light I’ve ever had problems with pocket-activation with was an Olight Baton S1 that I stopped carrying for exactly that reason. I do carry my EDC light using a pocket clip and with nothing else in the same pocket, so that may help. My previous (Zebralight SC64) and current (D4K) EDC lights both have recessed switches, although I notice that @wolfgirl42 had problems with her Zebra activating.
With clipped-in-pocket carry a tail-switch is very unlikely to get activated by accident, and as previously mentioned a clicky tail-switch has no parasitic drain. Having previously dismissed tail-switches as tacticool frippery, I have come to appreciate them for their ease of location in the dark, which makes up for the compromised ergonomics.
I’ve never felt the need to lock my lights unless they’re in a bag, then I prefer mechanical lockout using the tail-cap.
Virtually every eswitch has parasitic drain. The only one that I know of that has no drain is the Zebralight. Why, because Zebralight is a well designed and engineered light. Its not a budget light, nor are they trying to be one.
I didn’t say that they didn’t have it, I said that in my experience it’s not been a problem. After reading someone’s comment about the Convoy S21E having terrible parasitic drain I measured the tail-cap amps on mine with the aux light on low, I can’t remember the actual number but it would have taken over a year to drain the battery. This is, in my opinion, not a problem: I’m going to drain it faster than that if I’m using it regularly, and if I’m not using it regularly it doesn’t have a battery in it.
I do agree with you on Zebralight’s quality, my SC64 is extremely compact and seems to have a very efficient driver. Their decision not to sell outside the US has not endeared them to me however.