I bought the batteries here, [Illumination Supply LLC Email: support@illumn.com Website: illumn.com] that is who Hank recommended.
Jared how many spare batteries do I need for each flashlight? One spare set or?
One heck of a start! lol. The Sofirn C8F should be on the list someday too...great all around triple emitter light with good firmware (21700 cell). They have it on Amazon for a little more money, but if you order from their aliexpress store you can save a few, get it with or without the battery, and they have a few choices of emitters, too (and also a green or brown host instead of black if you want).
Illumn is a good supplier. So is Liion Wholesale. Prices on batteries are still kinda high right now, big jump earlier this year as supplies became scarce. There's been a little adoption of the much larger 26800 cells lately and the domestic source for those is an outfit called Aloft Hobbies in California...they sell a few other 18650 and 21700 cells as well and they actually have excellent prices on them with super fast and cheap shipping compared to the usual sites. Worth a look.
Tracking from China can be really weird. Every once in awhile you get a bum tracking number from some places (and some intentionally give you fakes...ugh...but not from trusted stores). More often the parcel will have two or even three numbers as it moves through various systems, but they may only give you the initial China service number (from any one of a dozen or more services), or like Banggood maybe you only get the final US Postal Service number which won't show you much at all until it arrives here and starts moving. There have been some other shenanigans lately (covid...) and now Pitney Bowes has gotten into the parcel arena and is really slowing things down where they have a hand in it.
I use these three tracking sites, in this order usually, and they're all great. Sometimes one will show information that the others don't and/or show you those alternative tracking numbers that you may not know about but will need to know later in the journey. No need to put in any personal information or to register (just ignore any of that if it pops up...it's all free and anonymous on all these sites). Then USPS or DHL sites for the domestic leg. Or you can sit back and forget about things for a few weeks until one day you're surprised...
https://postal.ninja/en
https://parcelsapp.com/en/tracking/
https://www.17track.net/en (may need to click the "English" checkbox in the lower right on the parcel results unless you can read Chinese...click it again if it still shows Chinese even though checked)
If you go directly to the major carrier sites, like China Post, etc. you often can't see much or see anything, but they do have some helpful FAQ type stuff sometimes.
You will likely find they do not want the password for your email address. Just the email address name as the customer name and a new password for their site only. If you have concerns you can just generate a throwaway hotmail account, just like for junk mailers, to keep your main email account junk-free.
Thanks for the imformation Correllux and Camaro. That will help me out a bunch for tracking! Just looking around on this site and I have come to a conclusion that Acebeam is a higher quality flashlight? Which would be called the highest quality? The Cadillac of flashlights sort of speak ?
I’m not much newer than you. One thing I’ve learned is don’t always equate price with quality, unless it is suspiciously cheap. Spend the time reading the threads and you’ll easily get to know who are thought to be good makers with good reputations.
I’m slowly dipping my toes in the water…. only a dozen or so lights so far. 
Just make sure you get good cells to run them. Makes a big difference over the one’s you usually get with the lights. Unfortunately right now they are a high price, but do you buy a race-car and put 87 octane in it?
btw, I used to own a Cadillac, that phrase is no longer what is used to be…
If you have multiple flashlights, you shouldn’t need any spares. When 1 goes down, charge the battery(s) and just use another flashlight. Unless you have a specific purpose flashlight that you need to rely on, then I can see getting a spare(s) in order to keep it going.
Welcome TN friend, I’m from KY. TN has great caves and great firework stores so I’m down there pretty often.
I’ve not ordered from them. Illumn, Kill Zone, and Going Gear are all good spots to order from in US. I’ve ordered several lights from Hank with no issues. Hank is a good 3 weeks from China but the lights are worth the wait.
Hey thanks for the advice NeutralFan. I figured it would be good to have a change of batteries for every flashlight? I’m going to try and figure out which light I want to keep in my side by side. Maybe the C8, but I think I’ll need a flood more in there in case of a flat or some type of break down.
Hey Bardo219, well I usually drive through KY a couple of times each year.
Dave……
You’ll find the lights will mostly have common battery sizes, with a few outliers. Most of the ones I have so far run on 18650, 21700 or 26650 cells. You will not need good cells for every light, just figure how many would keep you up and running, you can also use the lower quality cells as a patch while the good one’s are charging.
Also 18650 and 21700 are usually interchangeable, just need rubber rings for the width change. 21700 having more capacity so are wider.
Ditch the 6500k Sp31-pro and keep the 5000k. Also order the short 18350 tube and the magnetic tail cap. The Sp31p in short format with a pocket clip that fits (hard to find but possible) is an awesome little light, you will end up using that over the SC21. Best is to have 2 SP31-P’s, one with an 18650 & other with 18350. I have a few Sofirn lights and this one they just got ‘right’. It’s funny though, I bought 4 of them over time 3 5000k & 1 6500k which I gave to my nephew but the 5000k all have slightly different tints, 1 is particularly nice.
Thank you CR888 for putting me straight on those SC21’s. I’ll go ahead and buy another 3 and give the [6500K] to my wife. I bought the SC21 just because it was on sale, I didn’t know anything about it. Right now I’m winging it until I gather more info from this site and conversing with experienced guys such as yourself.
Thanks,
Dave……