BY Herschel Smith
10 months, 1 week ago
Outdoor Life.
A few remarks of my own. First of all, it seems like every company now, in order to compete, has to offer a 1000 lumen flashlight. Whether one needs that or not is a different story. Inside a home for regular tasks, it’s blinding. But blinding would be a good thing for a home invader, so there’s that going for it.
Second, weight matters. In front of me I have two lights, one a very old SureFire, model 6P using two 123 Batteries, and the other a very high lumen Streamlight, ProTac HL3, using three 123 batteries.
For weight shavers and gram counters, it matters which one you choose if you’re hiking 10 miles up 3- or 4-thousand feet in two days. Grams turn into Kg, Kg converts to more water you have to carry to stay hydrated, and on the vicious cycle goes. Carrying more weight because it means more lumens is not a good decision for hikers and backpackers who care about weight.
Third, I won’t have a flashlight that is rechargeable-only. In grid-down, whether more extended or simply for a few days because of storms, that matters more to me than anything else. It can be rechargeable, only as long as it can take batteries too.
Fourth, some of these considerations are malleable depending upon whether you intend on carrying a weapon-mounted light.