Monty, meet monkey.

I'd have to disagree. My Surefire M4 has been mounted on my 12 Gauge many times and survived repeated 12GA slug blasts without any problems.

The 2006 tactical catalog lists all the lights compatible with hand guns and machine guns as well as all thier supressors and lasers. Quite a few lights avaialble for weapons mounting. single cell LED's to Hellfire for tanks and everywhere in between. I'm guessing the website only lists data for civilian versions commercially available.

The only problem I've had with L2 outdoorsman and M4 Surefires so far is they are too damn bright. You can easily blind yourself in snow and glancing off a car window is downright painful to night eyes. Bought the U2 and problem solved. Just wish they offered the combat bezel or at least a synthetic less expensive version.

I found out the hard and expensive way rechargable CR123's will burn out bulbs in most standard CR123 lights due to thier higher voltage at peak charge. Feel free to try it but the bulbs cost a heck of a lot more than standard CR's.

Sure, they certainly can be mounted on a weapon. My post was misleading, sorry about that. My point was that the crenellated bezel is not solely intended for weapons use.

Thanks for all the links and info, I've been doing a lot of reading up and the new Cree LED sounds extremely promissing. It's too bad only the Chinese are in the game. I was tempted, but I'm going to hold off.

Speaking of surefire, the flashlight I'm really lusting after is the U2 Ultra. 5w, but 6 selectable brightnesses from 100 to 6 lums. That light would be absolutely perfect for me and if it wasn't for the new cree X-Led being so much better, I'd probably order one today.

I guess I'll just have to wait and see what Surefire comes out with with the new Cree XR-E. I think I'll spend my money with them. Even though my wallet will be lighter. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/patriot.gif" alt="" />

So, back to the question at hand...

For a nice, bright rechargeable flashlight with selectable beam, a/c and d/c chargers, ability to be left on the charger all it's life and extreme durability (not to mention a good price);

Streamlight Stinger.

That IS my final answer <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/lol.gif" alt="" />

Robinhood,

I have a quick question about LEDs that's confused me. I'm guessing there's is not a direct corolation between wattage and lums output? The reason I ask is that I look at my Streamlight with a 3 watt bulb, but rated at 77lums, while the Surefire U2 is a 5 watt bulb rate at between 80-100lums. So, a 60% increase in wattage, but only a 30% in lums, if you happen to get a good LED with the full 100 lums?

I did notice that the life of the 3 watt Streamline LED is only 20,000 hours, which seems less than other LEDs. Does that mean Streamline "overclocks" that LED or something to achieve more output?

The other interesting thing how the different lights could use the same two CR123 batteries, but produce such widely variable lums/runtime rates. With some models producing lots of lums and lots of runtime and others the exact oppisite.

I guess there's a lot of variation, even with the same manufacture.

I was just browsing the CSX Company Store and found this light that looks like it could be pretty handy:

Its got a 10 ft. cord, and a magnetic base.



http://www.csxstore.com/detail.aspx?ID=374

It never ceases to amaze me how much nerdiness us 4wheelers have in common... My non-wheeling friends always roll their eyes at my "toys", and how seriously I research something before buying... but my wheeling friends, amongst whom I count you guys, are guaranteed to have trumped my geekiness in any area, such as flashlights. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" />

I just got a new one for Christmas: Black Diamond Cosmo headlamp. Had to do rear brake pads last night in the dark (just moved, and garage is a ways off...), and this light was awesome.

Otherwise, I have the usual compliment of Mags: a 4D, two AA mags, and a Solitaire (single AAA). Problem up here is you can't really leave anything in the truck this time of year, since the cold quickly sucks the batteries down. Come springtime, I leave my 4D in the truck, like the rest of you.

LED conversion sounds great. I'll have to check into it. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" />

Ah, you're starting to ask questions that I'm still learning about, hahah. You are correct that different flashlights are driven differently. Some are overdriven at the expense of heat and lifespan. The drivers can be very simple or very sophisticated. An example of a driver can be a simple resister in series with the LED or it can be a pulse modulated IC to provide varying output. The varying sophistication of the drivers can also dictate the efficiency of the circuit. A lot of the drivers will regulate the current to the LED to maintain the brightness level despite the dropping output of the battery.

Speaking of drivers, I came up with a simple driver for my LED rocklights based on some articles I found on the web. Basically these are the same things as the roundeyes LEDs but at a 1/8 of the cost. web page

I didn't see on the SF website where it said the U2 output varies from 80-100 lumens. I doubt you'll get a bad LED from SF. Luxeon categorizes their LEDs into Bins according to color and output quality. I think SF would only get the best.

You might want to look into HDS lights, they're pretty popular among the CPF crowd.

Phil, you'd fit right in over at candlepower. I'm not nearly as serious about flashlights as those guys. They have get togethers and mod days, just like us wheelers. But you are correct, there's a lot of wheelers into flashlights. There's a thread about them over on ih8mud right now.