It needs to be pointed out, that “Current Control = Color Control”. One more “feature” LEDs share with incandescents, in addition to high heat and short runtimes, is the fact that as Current changes, so does Color. PWM is a way to achieve Dimming while maintaining Color, at the expense of Continuity of output. So again, the cogent point (to all Engineers) is this:
… and we’re all busy pulling a Needs Assessment out of the OP, so …
Back to reading…
Are you KIDDING?? Only MOST of us! :bigsmile:
In case our “actions” (of replying thoughtfully and respectfully to your post) don’t speak this loudly enough, and since I love to overstate the obvious:
WELCOME to the funny farm! You ARE among Friends here, and we’re glad you stopped by!
Dimbo the Blinky
I do 
But understand that it isn’t the only light that I have on my person/available. As an example, I would normally have the 186500/AAA light I mentioned above, a Sipik or clone, a headlamp, the small Ray O Vac LED on my keychain was well as spare batteries. This is in addition to the CREE LED lights on my bike (we normally mountain bike to a remote location. So that is another two lights). Also, I’m with my son who has a similar set up and additionally, there are several other members of the SEP forum with us with similar set ups. So if there are five of us, we probably have 20+ lights between us.
What can I say…we’re all ‘preppers’ 
Very cool and thank you again 
At the risk of wandering off into the woods, and you KNOW I love that, here’s something that Works for me:
Please don’t assume I’m suggesting anything by linking, just using quickly-available, non-affiliated links to illustrate a point, K?
When the space aliens attack and turn off our electricity, consider this for your LiIons:
If you use a Solar Charger like one of these:
… attached to a good USB-powered LiIon charger, modded if need be to touch both ends of all your LiIon batteries, your high-power current sources can VASTLY outlast those wimpy store-bought alkies.
I bought mine on the cheap, so I had to fix some stuff (welcome to my Dim world), but the concept works great. Even with the expensive Solar Chargers, the Net Cost of Ownership approaches $0.00, just a little later.
PS: JK about the space aliens. I refrained from using the “p-word” just to show I was kidding.
You’re just begging for this, aren’t you?
(To the tune of a famous commercial jingle from my misspent youth)
”
I’m a prepper you’re a prepper, he’s a prepper she’s a prepper.
Wouldn’t you like to be a prepper too?
Be a prepper, THINK like a prepper…
Be a prepper, THINK like a prepper…
Be a prepper, THINK like a prepper…
(repeat and fade into the deep forest)
”
Let’s see Raccoon City top THAT!
Dim
I have one of those Duracell solar power generators for the house which should work well for the various chargers I have. I also have an Anker Astro E5 15,000mah charger that I use for my phone while out in the woods. This has worked very well ‘in the field’ and I can fully charge a Galaxy S3 over five times with it. I did a review here:
http://s3.excoboard.com/sep/100162/1071687
7th post down. I would think that this would work well to charge batteries of flashlights as well?
I’ve really been making the effort to expand my base of rechargeable batteries, though I also have a large supply of the regular alkies from CVS and Walgreens. Can’t resist it when they have BOGO.
In regards to the aliens… :bigsmile:
I belong to three different forums on the topic of prepping. Surprising to see the range of folks, though the vast majority are very practical. Occasionally we’ll get the odd duck that has 10 million rounds of ammo…but no food or water. My wife and I got into the prepper mindset several years ago because let’s face it, I’m in Florida and we get a whole season of storms every year. And hey, if the zombies come calling I guess we’re set for that as well.
GEEEZ!!! You roll like a water buffalo! I’m more of a “leave no trace” kind of guy, but whatever works when the flag goes up is The Right Thing.
That’s not even your worst threat.
SWMBO & I are both Natives of Florida, “but that was just an accident of birth” (so sayith Jethro Tull); so we’re well familiar with BOTH seasons, “Storm” and “Tourist”. We were run off by the damnyankees uh… “persistent tourists” long ago. Zombies seem almost endearing, by comparison!
Nah, don’t get me wrong, the Duracell is just for the house. The Anker Astro however is not to much larger/thicker than a cell phone so it slips right into the backpack. Trust me, I’m into going as light as possible while still having the needs met.
I’ll have to test it out to see how well it charges batteries when I get the Nitecore charger.
Does shorting the led + to ground give direct drive or regulated single mode?
(I apologize for the off-topic question. )
On a NANJG-105c, Shorting the LED (-) to ground does bypass regulation, making it effectively a single-mode DD.
Once again DBCstm turns out to be one of the Giants, upon whose shoulders I am honored to stand.
Looks like I’m still looking for a single mode regulated solution…
Really? I thought the point was, in fact, to talk about it. Post nine in this thread has pretty persuasive proof that I’m not a Surefire fanboy and I’m not now, nor have I ever been, a member at “the other place”.
My personal bump in the night light is a Solarforce L2T with a Solarforce tactical tail cap (momentary on only button, twist for constant) with a single mode Nailbender/Customlites drop in. But again, my job isn’t to purposefully go into harms way, so…
As they say, I have no dog in the fight. I was merely trying to provide some grist for the mill.
dimbo, there is a board floating around here that is nothing but 7135 regulator pads. No mcu, so therefore only single mode.
Hmm? I like reverse clickies. It lets me half-press like a camera shutter when I want to change modes, instead of having to do two full clicks.
I generally like electronic switches or twisties better though.
The only light I’ve used where I like a forward clicky is my 1-mode UV light. It’s nice to be able to flash quickly to avoid eye strain and overheating, and to extend battery life.
Current control can be nice though, since it tends to be a lot more efficient than PWM. More lumen-hours per cell, and no annoying strobe effect. Also, human eyes don’t see color very well at moonlight levels anyway.
I may be a little biased though, since I see PWM as fast as 4.5 kHz even when I’m not looking for it — it’s distracting. The fast qlite PWM (18kHz?) is okay though; finally fast enough that it doesn’t distract me.
In any case, I really like the 4-mode L3 L10-219. Good modes, great tint, small size, twisty, waterproof, inexpensive. The only thing about it I dislike is that it there isn’t a good clip available for it.
I never stood a chance. :party:
True, but that implies you already have the light on. I was thinking in terms of the OP’s likely context, that of a LEO on the job (prejudiced by a family full of them). A light is just an attractive target (nevermind the clicking noise) when armed-and-ready bad guys might be around the next corner…
Exactly. And adding the one feature of No Mode Memory, you can have modes in a light you can EDC for a long time w/o worrying about battery changes. In a truly desperate situation, I wouldn’t really want to have a light ‘clicked on’, since most of the time you don’t actually need it fully ON other than to make someone in the group feel safe. That’s what I’m there for.
Yes, I do know how strange I am… J)
I concur and agree, although I never measured Frequency. To me, “blinkies” are just Very Slow PWM; and just as annoying. Likewise, the “persistence of vision” effect doesn’t work when you’re illuminating a moving object. And TBH, LED colors don’t change colors nearly as much as incans when the current drops.