Spec me an LED Torch

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buy direct (be aware of P&P) and you'll get a free AAA powered torch - https://uk.olight.com/store/free-gift
You need to register and you can get vouchers/free P&P etc but it might work out well.

As for the torch, for a tool kit backup it seems 'fine', the i1R 2 Pro is only £17.59 though and is brighter and has an in built (bigger) battery with USB C charging (but no magnet)
 
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Are Fenix still a good brand to go for? My Fenix TK12 lasted 13/14 years and is still going, but the tail switch seems a bit dodgy. I took it apart to clean it and was hoping it would be an easily available part, but I looked everywhere and couldn't find anything. Its just two solder joints, so would have been easy to replace if they were available.

A while back I accidentally bought a 21700 battery, so I'm thinking of getting the TK17 to replace my TK12.

The specs seem off though as my TK12 is apparently max 280 lumens and the TK17 is 3600 :eek: That can't be right shirley?
 
TrojanWhore said:
Searched LED torch on amazon and found this.... half a million lumens! Wouldn't that be about enough to fry bacon?!
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It's something you need to get used to.

Cheap and not cheap torches are made in huge numbers in china. The cheapest end are somewhere between badly made tat and decently made modest torches but they're cheap and generally using the same important parts.

And there's thousands of resellers on the marketplaces aimed at foreigners. Absurd performance claims and complete BS edited or misleading photographs are rife. Funnily enough if you find a seller who is a front for a factory making torches there won't be weird number claims. It's the resellers trying to one up each other.

Anyway since we don't produce cheap torches here, UK resellers get them off aliexpress to sell here or the Chinese resellers send a container of cheap torches over for Amazon to "fulfil" orders on their behalf. Complete with the same BS advertisments they use everywhere else.

Once you know roughly what parts get used and what's impossible it's pretty easy to filter out the nonsense.
 
Hotwired said:
It's something you need to get used to.

Cheap and not cheap torches are made in huge numbers in china. The cheapest end are somewhere between badly made tat and decently made modest torches but they're cheap and generally using the same important parts.

And there's thousands of resellers on the marketplaces aimed at foreigners. Absurd performance claims and complete BS edited or misleading photographs are rife. Funnily enough if you find a seller who is a front for a factory making torches there won't be weird number claims. It's the resellers trying to one up each other.

Anyway since we don't produce cheap torches here, UK resellers get them off aliexpress to sell here or the Chinese resellers send a container of cheap torches over for Amazon to "fulfil" orders on their behalf. Complete with the same BS advertisments they use everywhere else.

Once you know roughly what parts get used and what's impossible it's pretty easy to filter out the nonsense.
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Yeah I just thought the claimed brightness was absolutely mental! Found one claiming 900k shortly after :D

edit: tbh it was the fact that the one Diddums listed being 50 lumens that made me go looking, as that seemed pretty low!
 
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TrojanWhore said:
Yeah I just thought the claimed brightness was absolutely mental! Found one claiming 900k shortly after :D
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That claim, for that price, when a reputable brand puts out 20-30k lm for several hundred quid, is not so much mental as just outright BS. It's up there with the "MTDRPIN Gamerz Graphics Card with 276Tb of video memory" sort of things...

Mark A said:
Are Fenix still a good brand to go for?
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Absolutely. They're one of my favourite brands.
The UI on some models can be somewhat annoying as it's backwards to the most common one - Rather than tap on/off and hold to cycle brightness, Fenix have hold for on/off and tap to cycle.
Other than that, they're solidly built and feel great. They also have a couple of brilliant integrations that Olight really struggle to match.

Mark A said:
The specs seem off though as my TK12 is apparently max 280 lumens and the TK17 is 3600 :eek: That can't be right shirley?
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The TK12 is ancient. Technology has advanced considerably in the past decade.
Fenix are well known for being pretty accurate in their output stats, so this really will be 3600lm.
 
Be aware that 3600 lumens is another, slightly more accepted, lie, about output.

So when the cheap chinese torch resellers put 1,000,000 lumens or some tripe, that claim has no basis in reality.

But when a "reputable" brand says 3,600 or 12,0000 lumens well, that's "true" in the sense that it can do that number. For a few seconds. Then it drastically drops output down to say 1000 lumens so it doesn't melt.

The bit which is the least palatable to accept is that when a "reputable" brand advertises runtime of their face melting output torches they advertise the runtime from on to battery flat but (for example) only 30s of the 1.5h will be at the headline face melting output and that part is, at best, in small print.
 
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Anyone got a recommendation for something under £10. Or will any of the ones on Amazon do? Don’t need super fancy but also want something which isn’t going to instantly die on me. Been camping a bunch lately and a torch would be rather useful to stick in my bag.
 
joelk2 said:
Anyone got a recommendation for something under £10. Or will any of the ones on Amazon do? Don’t need super fancy but also want something which isn’t going to instantly die on me. Been camping a bunch lately and a torch would be rather useful to stick in my bag.
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Sofirn are one of the better 'cheap' brands, offering decent build quality, decent features and pretty realistic claims about outputs, battery life, etc.
I personally favour their SC33, but there are plenty to choose from. Head-torches are good for camping, especially the kind that detatch from the band so you can clip/magnetically-attach them in other situations.
 
joelk2 said:
Anyone got a recommendation for something under £10. Or will any of the ones on Amazon do? Don’t need super fancy but also want something which isn’t going to instantly die on me. Been camping a bunch lately and a torch would be rather useful to stick in my bag.
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This one is a decent for the price:

convoylight.com

Convoy M21B MAO 21700 flashlight

Convoy M21B MAO 21700 flashlight
convoylight.com convoylight.com
 
ttaskmaster said:
Sofirn are one of the better 'cheap' brands, offering decent build quality, decent features and pretty realistic claims about outputs, battery life, etc.
I personally favour their SC33, but there are plenty to choose from. Head-torches are good for camping, especially the kind that detatch from the band so you can clip/magnetically-attach them in other situations.
Click to expand...

I love the Sofirn HS21 I have (£23 right now on https://www.sofirnlight.com/products/sofirn-hs21-led-rechargeable-red-and-white-headlamp), use it for camping, car work - just everything and it keeps the hands free. Has a good selection of modes and is pretty efficient with its buck driver. The reason i got it was it takes a standard 18650 cell which you can swap out or charge via the USB-C port. So for longer trips where you can't charge you can take a couple spare batteries. The only downside is because of that design the front end sticks out so can feel heavy to some with its solid metal construction. I get about 2 days run time on low with the higher capacity 18650's i bought.
 
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