jtc says it best up above
for the ultra cheap light there’s no love
once you add up the cost
of the features you’ve lost
the low end of the budget gets a shove
That’s being frugal. Lots of folks think frugal means cheap or being a tightwad, and maybe it is. But I’m frugal and I see it as getting the most bang for the buck. I have NEVER found merely cheap to be at all frugal. It either doesn’t last and another needs to be purchased again or is frustrating to use. Phooey on that! Life is too short to buy things that are merely inexpensive. I don’t mind spending money, but when I do I want the item to last and I want something of value for what I spend.
Case in point… 8 years ago we bought a new Frigidaire built in oven. It was frustrating to use almost immediately after it was installed. The door wasn’t right and even after getting it fixed once it soon reverted back to being a PITA. Then finally one night when we had guests over for dinner the door froze in place neither open nor closed and the food ready and the oven at 450°F. We were ready to eat, the food was ready but I couldn’t remove the food. That was the end of that oven. I destroyed the door because I just kept putting more and more pressure on it until I destroyed it. So I went online to find it’s replacement and found only one that would fit in the space and be of suitable quality to last. I was NOT going to buy another piece of junk that would only last for 7 years. The wife wanted to go to the same dealer and we did. But he showed me oven after oven that he could get, and all of them were built EXACTLY the same way as the hated Frigidaire. We finally wound up asking if he could get the Bluestar and service it for us if/when it required it. They could. It was 2x the price of the piece of garbage, but it works and it’s built like a tank; and it will last much longer than I will live. Which was the better buy?
My most expensive light was the TM16GT
Closely followed by a 18six50 modified SP03
But my favourite torch is my BLF A6 5a I love the rosy tint even more than my S41 nichia
The BLF 348 in my opinion looks great and works great for the cost.
However my most used light ( daily at work) is a beaten up Zuesray with BLF A6 driver and
XPL-Hi 3c. The first batch of Zuesray were great for $8
I have really enjoyed the lower-priced group buys. I am pretty sure they are a real factor for the growth of forum membership.
It is fun to follow the debates pro and con about the design.
It is especially amusing when some members get a little over zealous in promoting their own particular agenda.
But in the end it is all good entertainment, and the best part is the very special flashlight that (usually) gets produced.
Every time I use one of the BLF lights, I am reminded how folks pulled together to make it happen. That is the spirit of BLF.
Heh, as far as I’m concerned, every thing I own can break the day I die.
I was thinking of asking Hoop if it’d be possible to make a better pill for the $2.98 “#3 zoomie” .
That’s #3 on this collection:
Under $10, 1x AA/ AAA/ 10440/ 14500 flashlight reference …
That’s the spirit!
When you get older you suddenly realize, Lifetime warranty only really means my lifetime, not the product and That is a great feeling!
Eff them kids today, all my junk is their problem, serves them right:)
LOL
Yeah, I’m getting close to the age where even the cheapest junk comes with a lifetime warranty!
I ordered 20-30 cheap sub $10 lights from around the web last Christmas, they were supposed to be gifts.
After they came in though I realized that I simply could not give them as gifts to those I was hoping, the quality was just that bad. Sure they turned on and made light but the beams were purple, the lumens were laughable and the quality was dismal.
I ended up giving most of those to kids and for people to use as “throw away lights” because well, thats all they were good for.
I even tried modding a few and frankly even if I took the time to do it right it would still have ended up at half the quality and performance of a basic Convoy and cost the same or more all said and done.
THAT is why I now only buy lights that are quality.
that said the most expensive lights I have ever purchased are the S70 / L6 and I love them both, WELL worth the price but it would take something truly amazing to make me spend that much again on a single light that was not a mod gone crazy setup.
Sometimes spending a little more truly is worth the extra money, sometimes it is a waste of money. The $15-$40 range is the magic point for flashlights IMHO. Below that and it is a rare find that is actually good enough to be worth the purchase.
Although I did grab a few of the ultrafire MT-12 recently on sale and have to say, I am very impressed with the quality and overall design. I look forward to modding them once I get my 22mm Drivers in.
i think most of the review are TPA third party advertising smae as on youtube most lights are provided for free and therefore they write a review. the guy who write review for a 3usd lights are rare and only a handfull guys here i read reviews of them buy then themselves.
for me if i read a USER review that means for me someone bought the light with their own money and put this light in to USE for more then a few days and after that report about his real life experience with that light. i guess thats how it really all started and then companies offered free lights for reviews so they guys started to make more reviews then using lights in real life as they got lights for free plus affiliate links plus point and other benefits and goodies from the companies but of corse this is nto what th user should know of because its still should look and feel like a real world real user review.
but still still can think for our-self and make our own pic of the situation.
Whenever there are two or more men, they start comparing. In the (very) old days when people owned next to nothing, it became a pissing contest. Later on it was the best spear, the biggest gun, the fastest horse, et cetera. And #2 wanted to achieve at least the same as what #1 had, so you get a horse-race, or an arms race. Lets translate this to flashlights. When A claims he can get 300 lumens out of an SK68, B will try to outdo him, and so on. Boys grow up, as do their toys. Except for the purists, who want to keep on modding SK68’s, there will be a tendency to migrate to bigger platforms. And bigger platforms, and/or more capable platforms, are more expensive.
There was a time when everybody wanted to mod an SK68, now we are talking quadruplets in a pure copper light about the size of an SK68. When the power of the S41 is the new standard, so is the price. Let’s face it. The good old SK68 was made in a third world country, under abysmal working conditions. Much has changed. It is unreasonable to expect that you can still buy the same light with the same quality for the same price.
So the lights have become more powerful, and more expensive. But what has happened with what you get for your money, the bang-for-the-buck. I would not be surprised if it turned out that the bang-for-the-buck is about the same, or even lower, as it used to be. And if the bang-for-the-buck for lights, common in the BLF community is significantly lower than that of the lights, common in “the other” community, we could still call it a budget-light? Final remark: the words bang-for-the-buck, value for money, are a little out of place in the peaceful BLF community. It would be more appropriate to call it the Old-Lumens-Index, or OLI (X). To remember us that the B in BLF is there for a reason.
Wow you are really an old-timer in BLF by looking at your joined date! But your number of posts say you are a quiet person lol!
And did I mention that we are from the same country too? 
Make BLF cheap again?
There are still plenty of low-budget lights that are decently built and may be worth a review or at least a short presentation here at BLF.
Some examples of lights I’ve ordered recently to check them out:
KINFIRE KF-11 (http://www.dx.com/p/kinfire-kf-11-cree-xm-l2-led-580lm-5-mode-white-light-flashlight-black-1-x-18650-26650-337631#.V7dZxVNhzQQ) or http://www.gearbest.com/led-flashlights/pp_212655.html)
LIXADA X1 (United Palight/Tomtop origin) (http://de.aliexpress.com/item/LIXADA-X1-Portable-Handheld-XML-T6-LED-Flashlight-Torch-Lamp-1000LM-5-Modes-IPX8-Waterproof-with/32588160837.html)
JAXMNVE M18 (http://www.banggood.com/JAXMNVE-M18-CREE-XP-L-V6-1A-700lumens-EDC-LED-Flashlight-18650-p-1068675.html)
All of them have decent or better quality for a budget price. There are downsides as well (e.g. next mode memory or blinky modes) but I think such lights are still worth to be mentioned and scrutinized. Each of them has the potential to be a very useful light.
The JAXMNVE M18 was a little disappointment - the feature I was interested in (“2.Double click the switch turn to limitless modes (1–100)”) doesn’t exist! Only high low strobe, at least it has proper mode memory.
JAXMNVE M18: The mode is there. Fish for it. When you triple press from H/L hold it. The switch will light up red. It will go up then reverse until you stop it. It has last mode mem. It is different. Then it’s level1, blinky, level2. Best I can tell when using custom modes the switch stays lit red.
BLF where BUDGET LIGHTS MATTER :!!!:
I blame Convoy. Cause you know you are getting a GOOD light with a genuine emitter at a price that is hard to beat and not worth modding a low cost light to what you wanted in the first place. Convoy certainly has raised the bar on quality standards for for what I consider a “budget” or affordable light.
I have been very unhappy with my last few WF502B purchases. Bad threads, got a couple with plastic reflectors and aluminum pills which were gold anodized to look brass. Honestly I have Wasted enough money over the years to make me wish I had just bought a few more Convoys and been done. Some of the sub $4 lights I have bought can not be modded easily or cheaply if at all.
If you look at it from economic standpoint it kinda makes sense. $4 light 10 years ago may have been decent. Today a $4 light is going to have corners cut to save weight and materials. Thin wires, hollow pills, fake emitters, plastic lenses and reflectors. Why bother when you can get an S-series Convoy for $14 shipped to your door and you know you will be happy.
For me $50 is about all I can afford to spend on a light & consider that to be an expensive light in my collection. But my last 2 $50ish lights have been disappointments in one way or another. Spending more don’t necessarily make them better has been my experience. Last 2 were Astrolux… SS has the wonky driver that gets stupid after its remotely warm and the S41 that lost domes on 2 emitters in 2 weeks (nichia). They just need more money to get happy.
A lot of my friends have been drown in the streamlight Kool-aide. Most have over-paid for the already expensive junk off the “tool truck”. That, I never fell for. I have given away a few WF502B’s with laptop pulls and cheap chargers to get them away from that junk. Look… this was under $10 and way brighter AND a glass lens that doesn’t get frosted with brake cleaner. Let me know if you break or lose it.
I have been buying the Hugsby xp1 at ebay for about $4 per light. They have made great gifts.
Jerry
All this retrospection is giving me a headache. I had a hard time spending $100 on two incredibly sweet custom BLF lights but on the other hand I don’t have much use for bad switches, threads, or cheap ano. I like inexpensive but there has to be something of value I can use from the light or want to invest the effort of a mod. If it’s too expensive I don’t want it. Like Justin I enjoy modding more than having.
Well spoken and agree!