after reading the reviews in this forum i orderd the fantastic Hugsby P31 from DX. Now i'm a flashaholic because this was my first LED-Flashlite. I'm now convinced that LED is the future.
Now i want to give a flashlight as a present to a friend of mine who has his birthday next month.He likes to hunt with some friends in the woods. He is mostly on the lookouts and radios when deers travel into the direction of the hunter.
These lookouts are often deep in the woods. So i need a flashlight with good light output and moderate runtime (the Hugsby P31 runtime is too short, optimal 2-4 hours).
Here in Germany NIMH AA (2500mAh) are very common and i don't want him to by special cells. Price should be max 20-25$.
It depends a bit on how much light is needed. I'd take a look at the Ultrafire WF-606A which is still hard to beat. Perhaps the Solarforce L2R with an 0.8-4.2V dropin but that would be pushing the budget.
This will be about as bright as you are going to get with 2AAs but I'm not sure of the runtime. Having checked, it is taking 1A from the cells so that would be good for up to 2.5 hours without battery changes.
For 4 or more hours, and it is very cheap but doesn't produce an enormous amount of light
The 5W claim is simply nonsense - it draws 350mA so should be good for about 6-7 hours from a pair of 2500mAh cells. Its actual power consuption is therefore about 2.8 (A fully charged NiMH is about 1.4 volts) x 0.350 = which is less than 1 watt.
The MDXL Powerlight will run for a surprisingly long time and is less than 4 euros. Review here
The Ultrafire C3 stainless steel light will run for a very long time (12.5 hours) on the lowest level but recent ones have been of much lower quality ad aren't as bright as they use an older and less efficient LED. Review here.
If your really looking for a long running light you might have to look at lights that use 18650's or tell your friend to carry spares. I have a light that will run for 3.5 hours on one 18650 but its out of your noted price range.
I don't have the Hugsby any more, but I'd say it is probably brighter. But not by much. It is drawing 1A at 2.8V - call it 3W where the Hugsby is pulling 2.46A at 1.4V about 3.5W.
But the reflector on the Solarforce is deeper and wider so ought to send more light where it is wanted. There will not be a great difference I'd expect.
I know you really want to keep it simple for usage outdoors but any way you look at it he's going to have to bring spares, since he's going to be using the light basically for hunting something as Don suggested would be nice since around here He's the King of Throwers. I get good runtime out of my Romisen RC-N3 which is about 3hrs on a fully charged Eneloop. Shiningbeam also carries the 2 mode which should be good for longer runtimes on the low mode.
He has many AA Cells (camera, etc) so i think it will be no problem for him to take a few spare cell with him (jacket,pocket). He needs a bright light and i want to show him what a led flashlight can do, too. :) He uses a 3 D Maglite at the moment.
The Romisen RC-N3 looks good and has a nice price (at dx) too. I will keep this in mind, but i will stick with the Solarforce for now.
Maybe the Hugsby P32 ? Haven't tested the runtime the low mode, but it could be up for 2-2.5 hours. On the other hand it could be too dark for his purposes. Anyway 2 reviews for the L2R in German is HERE and HERE.
Runtime on 123 (I have 80-90 mins on high with 2xAA Eneloops so the rest could also fit).
You must be loving your P32. Recommendations for everyone I do like my P31. It's a great light to own. I'm sure the low mode would be nice but I rarely use it on my other lights. The brighter the better for me
Everyone should have a P32.... your live is not complete without one... the 1xAA light with the best value/money ratio on this planet... at least until they bring out the P33 with H/M/L... one flashlight to rule them all. OK maybe I'm advertising it a little too much but I stand by my recommendation and it can be easily overlooked due to Kai's horrible web site and search engine.
My P31 and MXDL SA-28 looks like it might have came from the same factory. The o-rings look very similar and there's this gray stuff on the threads that's on both lights. I don't see the gray stuff on my other lights.