TEG

LED bulb technology has been advancing rapidly in the past couple of years. A large community of LED flashlight fans has been forming and has been discussing all the developments, hot products, and ways to upgrade existing products. A whole slew of LED light specific terminology has emerged and there are forums abuzz.

Here are some places to get started if you are interested:

The Welcome Mat
LED Flashlights - CandlePowerForums

An example of the lengths some will go to study the new chips as they come to market:
http://www.molalla.net/~leeper/creexre.htm

A place for tinkerers to buys parts:
DealExtreme: Flashlights, Guns & Lasers (hot gadgets) (Page 1)

A shop on eBay specializing in LED products:
eBay My World - ledwholesalers_auctions

tonybelding

I wouldn't say "obsession" in my case, but I've got a small collection of flashlights. The advances of LED technology have been fun to watch.

I have a Dorcy "Metal Gear" with 3 AAA batteries that is almost my ideal flashlight.

Dorcy Metal Gear 1 Watt LED Flashlight

The body size and shape, the brightness, spot focus, light quality. . . all just about perfect for use around the house and yard. It has a button on the tail cap, which I like. It has a belt clip. The body has machined flats to keep it from rolling off the table. My only gripe is that I don't like AAAs. My ideal light has to be AA-powered.


My new favorite is the Duracell Daylite, seen here: Hands-on: Duracell's new Daylite LED flashlights | Crave, the gadget blog - CNET

It runs on 2 AA cells and it's VERY BRIGHT. However, I haven't yet tried the new MagLite that he also mentions on that page.


And finally. . . . Something very neat that I stumbled across:

LighterLight - LED Flashlight fits in your cigarette lighter

Seems like a great idea. I ordered a set of them, I'll let you know how they work.

TEG

Among a few others, I have an Inova T4 that I take camping...

SByer

Flashlights? LED Bulbs!

I bit the bullet and bought one of the earlier R38s as an experiment for the laundry room. I'm convinced. I will NEVER buy another CFL again! The light from an LED bulb is so much "happier" - a good color, a full spectrum, comes on quickly and reliably (I've had a 40% (!!!) DOA rate for the R38 CFLs).

Yes, they're a little expensive still (my understanding is that they start to make fiscal sense at around $70 per).

TEG

Yeah - I got bulbs too. My wife is very picky about color temp & brightness, and so many an LED bulb has been banished from the house to be used in the garage or for motion lights around the perimeter. Halogen is still the rule for kitchen and dining room. There are still plenty of bad LED bulbs out there with overly blue light, noisy regulators, or poor lumens.

TEG

Playing with a UV LED flashlight:

DisneylandIsHome

Check out the new Stanley 3-in-1 Tripod LED Flashlight. It has three independent LED flashlights that when attached to the tripod become one flashlight with three rotating heads.

TEG

And the Coleman Quad

vfx

Hmm, not sure how much I want to commit to here.

I'll just say that I have bought and use hundreds of LED lights.

Also, I'm a big fan of the crank and shake type LED flashlites. They are all over the house and in our cars.

__________________
.
.
.
.
.
.
The world loves to be deceived.

SByer

TEG, agreed. The quality of the LED Waves bulbs is very high. I've found that I need what everybody calls "125W equivalent" to replace the 65W miser PAR38 reflectors we use in the cans. The LED Waves lights are now that bright in that size (the "125W equivalent" CFLs in that size, do, I have to say, eventually get to that bright, but driving things that hard is probably why the DOA rate is so high - and I'm not patient enough for eventually.) I also like that the luminous efficiency of the high-end LED bulbs has crossed that of CFLs.

I've also heard good things about the CC Crane Geobulb, but haven't tried it myself personally. But I definitely stay away from the cheap looking junk you find most places online.

On flashlights, what's a reasonable lumens for them? I'm looking for comparisons with "stock" incandescents and high-end "goofy-name" bulbs.