Lost power last night. Doesn’t happen but once a year around here. Finally had an chance to really use part of that growing collection of lights. Tail standed on lower the D.Q.G. Tiny 26650 on lower for about four hours in the living room. Using Keeppower 5200’s it still reads 4.18 volts this morning. Tail standed our own little BLF edition SA-22 on moon light mode in the bedroom. Roamed the house and yard with the Maxtoch DX21. Lots of lights and these have turned into the goto lights over and over. If the power had gone out before midnight I probably would have added the SolarForce and the Shadow JM07 to the mix. Full moon also helped.
At first I didn’t like the D.Q.G. Tiny 26650 it felt too light in its construction. Which I still think it sould have been built a bit heavier to handle its heat on turbo better. Overall its output and design has won me over. Maxtoch DX21 not as bright as it should have been. Built for battle, very waterproof, very sturdy, battery status built in. Tailstands or stays put when laid on its side. BLF SA-22 just a nice AA light. 30-40 lights and these are the goto’s.
I would say lucky you got to play (we’ve only lost power once in the past 5 years and it was only for about 4 hours during mid day last spring) but it probably sucks down there with no A/C, at least you weren’t in the dark tho.
Lucky you 
It was just the day before last, as I distributed a few more AA lights around the house (you know, for an emergency), I felt some regret that my neighborhood in Seattle has reliable and quickly repaired power service.
Very lucky, long enough to enjoy but not long enough to spoil the food in the fridge and freezer.
Buy a generator and you will never loose power again!Guess how I know. 
your generator broke when the power went out?
Same here, bought a generator and installed a transfer switch 10 or 12 years ago, only lost power once since then.
Funny how fellow flashaholics view you as "lucky" for having a power outage.
I guess our thinking must be at odds with the majority of the masses in the developed world who suddenly lose heating, cooling, TV, microwaves, possibly medical equipment etc.
I wonder - couldn't the same "luck" be brought about at will simply by turning off your mains switch at the breaker board? Or is it somehow more primitive and more exciting when it's forced upon you (and all of your neighbours) involuntarily?
I think I'm starting to see why others often view us as just a little peculiar! 
Best 10 grand I ever spent… 20 kW natural gas automatic backup generator. It’s only come on a couple of times since being installed (except for the weekly self-test). Before, power failures were more common here (Dallas, TX) than in Baghdad…
gadabout wrote:
nny how fellow flashaholics view you as "lucky" for having a power outage.
I guess our thinking must be at odds with the majority of the masses in the developed world who suddenly lose heating, cooling, TV, microwaves, possibly medical equipment etc.
I wonder - couldn't the same "luck" be brought about at will simply by turning off your mains switch at the breaker board? Or is it somehow more primitive and more exciting when it's forced upon you (and all of your neighbours) involuntarily?
I think I'm starting to see why others often view us as just a little peculiar!
That is funny. I wonder about that myself. I love power outages, but I don't pull the main to simulate it. Strange programming there in my head.
Separately,
I would love to have a big back up generator like texaspyro. It would give me great piece of mind especially since I'm on well water and it can get very hot here. Probably not as hot at where texaspyro is. I probably wouldn't turn it on in power outages if I could avoid it though.
Congrats on a successful outcome to a power outage Texas Shooter. My wife had a similar experience at work. They lost power for awhile and the bathrooms had no windows (pitch dark). Everyone used a 26650 tube light she keeps in her purse to go to the bathroom. She came home that day feeling quite the hero and being more fond of flashlights.
I'd love to have a power outage in winter, or during cool stormy weather, but definitely not during a heat wave. The last power outage here was that big one that took out much of southern California for a few hours. Fortunately it was towards the end of the day, so the heat wasn't that bad, but enough that I slept on a cot instead of my bed.
I helped my neighbor across the street move…all the kids his 3 and my 5 (6 but the baby girl stayed home with mamma) all ran around with the lights I had, lighting the way for us carrying stuff to the truck in the dark
My modified SK98 w/ STAR dialed down to medium held up the entire time, layed it on the runner in the truck to light the back because after loading a while covered up the dome light inside and didn’t have any light, kept running the entire time without a hitch
Funny looking outside and seeing the lights all bouncing around in the yard in the kids hands, was our own discoteca 
Got to use my headlights too, and tailstanded a few in the rooms (the guy that owns the place won’t fix any of the daggum fixtures (the fixtures and switches are bad) and was going to charge them 1/2 the price to fix them! all the while charging over $1200 a month rent for a house that shouldn’t cost more than $600-$800 a month plus a $130 a month fixed water bill when even at my house with 8 people the bill is never over $100] oh and didn’t have any insulation in the attic…electric bill for AC was well over $500 a month!))
Either way…fun time by all even those of us that wore ourselves out moving all the heavy stuff
It’s always cool to be able to use our “hobby” in real world situation ain’t it…almost justifies us having em 
I like the toilet plunger 4 batt supernight myself. I have the 15 and 5 led versions. The 5 isn’t bad with 2 or 3 26650s. The 15 I use on the farm- that thing fully charged is good deal. Need to put a side switch on her though, well someday when I’m not so busy… If your sneaked from behind at 3 in the morning they might not get your boody… It’s all theory, there’s no one out there looking for butt… But if they were
It’s better when everyone else is in the dark and I get to use my flashlights, and run my router and cable modem of my UPS, and bust out a wood gas stove
Seriously though, I don’t really need other people to suffer to enjoy it, but it is kind of nice for the streets to be dark for a change. I have a city LED streetlight out front ordinarily.
Living in La near the coast, we get bad weather & no power weekly it seems. So, I installed a solar battery rig. I also hacked a old APC UPS with a Optima blue top to run a few things.
For a cheap solar back up set up you can get a $12 solar controller, 50 feet of quality 10AWG wire, 30 or so watt panel and a deep cycle 12 volt battery. Then choose your 12 volt LED light. The configurations are endless. You can set up a decent rig for $100 and have light for days! I made a rig like this for my neighbor (he ended up using it mostly tailgating at ball games). With this you can also charge cell phones & laptops and it will power a router & modem. Especially if the sun is out!
My personal rig has grown over the years. I now have 500 watts of panels, 5 optima blue top 66 amp hour batteries, and MPPT TRACER 3215RN Solar Charge Controller 30A ultra high efficient controller. It works well and I just slowly grew it over 2 years. I don’t recommend the Optima batteries for solar use. I just happen to have 2 already for my fishing boat. So I added the others over time. But, they work well!
I back up my computer, router, modem (which is the home phone too) and I run a Nitecore I4 on it. I charge ALL of my flashlights, cellphones and laptops this way.
As you can see with the Nitecore I can always charge my 26650’s and have mood lighting all night!