Are LED lights becoming more popular?

golok

golok

Joined
Oct 20, 2000
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I could be one of the few who is beginning to like LED flashlights quitea bit.

For a start, LED lights are longer lasting. It is not intrusive, if I may be allowed to use that word and it is pleasant to the eyes.

Your batteries are not toasted in a hurry and it is great to use in a crowd. It doesn't send even the old grannies into a mild shock when you switch it on.

More and more companies are beginning to develop their own five-watt version LED lights. It is an interesting thought and I am certainly looking forward to those five-watters, provided they don't burn my wallet into crisp! :D :)
 
I have bought 6 lights in the last month and 3 are LED ,one is the 5 watt luxeon and is the 2nd highest lumen output at 60 lumen. Right now my hightest lumen light is a SF G2/P61 at 120 lumen. Led lights are frugal on batteries compared to incandescents but currently leds are the hot ticket if for no other reason than they are on the cutting edge(knives and lights tie-in) of technology.The wow factor.Prices right now are heavily skewed in favor of incandescents my SF/120 lumen incan $50, my SF/60 lumen LED $175.Runtimes tell the story 120 lumens incand 20 min,60 lumen LED 4 hours of useful light.The best part is after the batteries are for all practical purpose dead in the incancescent flashlight you may then swap them out and put the "dead" batteries in a LED light and run them quite a bit more.
 
In terms of runtime per set of batteries, The current 5W from SureFire are shorter runtime compared to the bulb version (KL4 vs E2e).
However, the KL4 is regulated so that the output is constant throughout the runtime unlike the unregulated bulb of the E2e.
This gives me better quality light for longer as bright white light is what I'm after.

In the high end of the market, LEDs are the way to go and certainly from SureFire, since the MA02 was created for the A2, there have been no new bulbs created and released - only LEDs. "LEDs" as the term used for non-bulb light sources are the future.

At the mass-market end of the market, the 5mm LED is still trying to break in to the bulb market of the $0-$15 flashlights. LEDs will take years to filter down and if anything will be pushed forward by Maglite if that's the game they want to play.

I think that bulbs still have an important part to play in the 200-500 Lumen range of long-throw beams. There is no currently released LED product that can beat the SureFire M6 for example.

Al
 
I've been an LED light booster for well over two years now. It started for me when I found how incredibly useful a Photon micro light was after putting one on my key ring and using it far more often than I would have expected. I’ve now also added an ARC AAA to my key ring and changed the Photon from a white light to a yellow one. The yellow Photon provides a softer light and works fine for me. The main reason I still have the Photon on my key ring in addition the ARC AAA is that I can easily use it for short duration tasks with one hand. I view the ARC AAA as my emergency light. It is waterproof, rugged and reliable with an easy-to-change and inexpensive AAA battery that will provide more than a couple of hours of bright usable light.

I also have several other LED flashlights, and a few of the 1 and 5 watt Luxeon flashlights that have hit the market recently. I’ll freely admit that I’m just enamored with the technology here and have more LED lights than I need.

I would say the best practical features of LED lights are longer battery run times and that LEDs don’t burn out like an incandescent lamps; additionally, the more advanced LED lights also have a regulated circuit that provides for a fairly constant level of brightness over an extended time. The new 5 watt Luxeons are incredibility bright but still rather expensive. As the market develops, the prices will drop and powerful, bright LED flashlights will become more available and affordable.
 
Yes! Although leds do not in fact give longer runtime than a xenon bulb of the same power, they are available in lower power and lower power flashlights and headlamps using white Nichia leds (like the ARC AAA, Dorcy AAA, CMG Ultra, etc.) are tremendously useful. For short-range purposes like reading and walking at night that's all the power I want; more just dazzles and destroys night vision.

The real advantages of leds are whiter light, more even beam, and reliability. The reliability advantage is very significant -- bulbs always blow eventually and there's no predicting when they'll blow, and they can't take much shock. Even if you carry a spare bulb or spare flashlight a blown bulb is at best an inconvenience and can be a lot worse than that depending on the circumstances. If you carry a good tough led light and make a habit of swapping or charging the batteries before they die you can be damn sure it'll work even if you drop it off a cliff. Even if you run the batteries to death the light will fade gradually and give you plenty of warning, unlike the way incandescents suddenly flicker and die on you just when it's most inconvenient.

Right now leds can't compete for long throw and are expensive for middle throw. That's changing rapidly; a led is just a diode and just like other semiconductor technology performance is improving and cost is falling, year by year. I predict in a few years the only incandescent flashlights for sale will be dollar store junk, and in a few more years they'll be antiques, no longer made. Before long high-power leds will cost a few cents to manufacture, less than a xenon bulb or even a vacuum bulb. By then leds really will give longer runtime than xenon of the same power -- there is a lot of potential for efficiency improvement.

For now, buy only leds for short-range uses, and buy leds for middle-range too if you can afford it; the reliability and nice white even beam are worth the cost. Continue to buy xenon for long range and high power and don't hesitate to invest a lot of money in a high-grade xenon flashlight; you'll be able to replace the bulb with a high-power led later.
 
I like LED lights a lot, I think they are a revolution in light sources, expecting to see LEDs replacing regular lightbulbs soon, and the coming out of light fuxtures designed to be permanent (no bulbs to change) embeded in ceilings or walls, inside cars. LED lights built into other things like knives, key holders, jewelry, eyeglasses, watches, magnifyers, even clothing. It´s started already and will continue.
 
I carry an Arc AAA everyday and my Inova X5T sees far more use than my SF E2e. LEDs have come a long way in the last few years. I can't wait to see what the next few bring.

Paul
 
Originally posted by Screehopper
I'm a member of CPF also. :D
Click to expand...

I though all of us were also Candlepower forum members! For some weird reason, it seems that knives and flashlights go together...

Guy
 
I guess that there are some people who don't like their pockets to be empty and need to have useful stuff that is also cool to fill them.
These people also tend to have empty wallets although I don't know how this is related to the stuff we put in our pockets.

Al :rolleyes:
 
I used to see the utility of LED lights as lower-powered, longer-runtime lights. Yeah, there were LED lights that slapped 20 Nichias together to reach mid-powered lights, but they were way big and I never really saw much utility in them. The advent of Luxeon Star 1 Watters makes LEDs not just good in mid-powered lights (say, 15-30 lumens), but in my mind, a better choice than incandescents. The 5 Watters compete well even with higher-powered incandescent handhelds ... once someone figures out how to tighten the beam up a bit, 5W LSes will be the lamp of choice for 60-12 lumens.

Joe
 
I have noticed that Led lights do not attract insects at night, we put a propane lantern on one picnick table, and an led lantern on another about 20 feet apart, no bugs on the led, but the propane lantern, was covered in them, how strange!
 
I'm a huge fan of LEDs, and along with giving out over a dozen Photon IIs for Christmas before last, about ten SL 4AA7LEDs last year, a couple more SLs and a few PT Attitudes in between, all my recent purchases for myself have been LED lights. Been sold on them for a couple of years, now.
Last week, I got a SL 3AA LS Task Light to screw around with, and keep me from switching heads on my E2E as much, a Petzl Tikka for camping, and another Attitude for a friend's kid. Will have a SL Septor on Wednesday, that I was originally going to switch the SL 3AA for. Getting that one for work, and got the hardhat strap in addition to the cloth one. Some of our maintenance guys are using them (and love them), plus I really wanted to try a couple of headlamps.
I really like the "standard" Nichia LEDs, since their color is always good, from perfect white to white with a tinge of blue.
Luxeon Stars are a constant source of disappointment for me, though.
My KL1 is by far the best of the four LSs I've owned. It has some blue and red, which actually is great for use outdoors, as it makes details really stand out.
My two Inretech adapters for AA Mags were both horribly green (put it close to a wall, and it looked like a lime). Gave them both away. My new SL 3AA is also green/yellow, though it isn't "real bad". I started to send it back, but was impressed enough with its brightness, throw, and spill light to keep it.
These would all be outstanding lights if not for the color problems, and I look forward to owning more LSs in the future-hopefully with white white LEDs.
A regulated 5W is tempting, but I'd like to see them with a tighter focus, more like this 3AA Streamlight, than the wide beams I've read about like Streamlight's 3x123 5watter (haven't actually seen one in person). That would be :cool: 1 watters are plenty for close-up flood, IMO, so I'd want something that could compete with an incandescent in the throw department before plunking down the cash for a 5w that eats batteries at a faster rate...

This flashlight stuff is sooo much fun. I look for, or even try to create, opportunities to use lights, just like I do knives:o
 
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