Greetings everyone, I have found this forum a great alternative to CPF. Very informative but more laid back and friendly.
Just one question: Has anyone really ever used the “sos” setting the Chinese find necessary to incorporate in most all their flashlights?
Scott
The only use I have found is to tailstand several flashlights set to SOS mode in the living room at night.When looking from outside it appears like a thunderstorm in the house!Oh, SOS and strobe are good at annoying the wife too! J) -Rick
Yeah, I constantly find its in use as a tool to increase annoyance every time I want to cycle back from low to high and have to go through that mode. It also works quite well when letting someone play with your flashlight and have to ask the same questions inevitably: “what is this mode for?”, “why do they put SOS on a flashlight?”, “do you really need this mode?”, “how do you stop it?”. 
Welcome to BLF Homeroy. Blinky modes are an ongoing anoyance for most of us. They do have a use once in a while I'm told, but I've never found a use for one yet.
You would really enjoy my custom Sky Ray King driver. It has around a dozen blinky modes available to annoy you. Custom SkyRay King SRK Driver
If you re-compile the code, you can easily change the Morse code message to anything that you want. Hmmm, I might make “F**K YOU” one of the standard available modes…
Used the blinky mode on the SRK once to signal the lady during day light, to keep from yelling. It worked and she was over 1/4 mile away- she was in an open area and I was in a grove of trees. About the only flashlight it’s useful on sometimes are ones with an electronic switch without mode memory. It should always been a hidden mode though.
Maybe you could make "free beer" Morse code a standard feature. Every member can shine it at mars, and we will find out soon enough if there is life out there
If I had a programmable flashlight I would try to see if I could program it to attract fireflies .
Each species has an individual code , and the male and female have their own codes within the species code .
Set your flashlight up as a female firefly of the type common to your area , and attract / frustrate a lot of male fireflies .
That is what I would do .
While drinking a beer .
Yep .
I have never used the function for help, but I was in situation where it would have been very beneficial. We ran out of gas while boating one evening on Navaho Reservoir. There were two houses within view, but way to far to swim to. We had two diabetic children on the boat, but no insulin on shore after a lunch break. We tried yelling, banging sos, and later 3 gun shots. 2 of us swam to the nearest shore and went separate directions for help. No help could be found. Not until the next day did we get help waving down a passing boater.
I bet flashing sos at those houses would have eventually elicited some type of attention.
Sometime I use strobe when I forget my bicycle tail light home but, SOS never.
I use strobe only to surprise or entertain small family children who most all already know about my flashlight hobby.
In other words, it is difficult to find a use for it.
For SOS, could you imagine the chances against you actually being lost deep in the woods, and also actually happening to have a SOS light in hand. LOL.
I also have not used the SOS mode… yet… and I hope that this will not be necessary. But it is nice to know that there is such function - because you never know what can happen. If you are going somewhere outdoors, far from civilization - in an emergency, SOS mode can be very useful (if you get any troubles and you can not get home by yourself)!
Of course that if you have a typical Chinese 5-mode flashlight, than SOS and strobe modes can be annoying, and SOS mode may even be wrong. Therefore I like the branded flashlights, because they have hidden flashing modes and daily you can only switch between the different brightness levels.
Haven’t found a use for it in the lights I have. Perhaps it will come in handy one day.
I don’t mind them incorporating strobe, sos, beacon, etc. as long as they make them hidden. I’d think most people don’t need to access these modes often.
I modified my driver code to allow the user to program whatever Morse code message they want. It can handle up to 16 characters/spaces or around 60 dots/dashes/spaces.
Strobe, yes, but SOS never. I like having strobe in a tactical light but not SOS. Blinkies should always be hidden but quickly accessable.
That’s why my SRK now has a 2600 lumen “SCREW YOU” mode… J)
SOS is one of those things most of us go through a lifetime not needing. Like others, I feel it should be hidden and I can imagine being lost in the woods/mountains and wanting an SOS that would go for days if necessary. In that situation I very much hope Foy's EDC to be at least two deep.
lostinspaceFoy
I use the strobe all the time (day or night) on my bicycle commute to work/home. Better to be annoying and seen then to be another statistic. SOS isn’t as useful, too long a delay between on/off cycles to be useful on the bike although more light when on.