Here we are at over 80 posts and not a single beam shot.
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For those of us who lived it, it was easy to remember how not only were these babies able to bash a headlight of a perp trying to acost an officer and still blind dope smoking hippies later in the shift... but the beam at a distance was also an incredible advancement. So to the younger crowd who yawn at incan output or just don't get the excitement I'll show some beams from my current collection. When you push the on button in your living room they are certainly not impressive. But when it's dark out the beams look like they were shot out of a shotgun barrel.
I generally prefer the shorter versions... 2-3 cell with a couple of 4 cell lights. The 5+ were incredible.
Here's my plastic Pro-Light
It arrived without a cord to recharge the 6 volt battery so for now I have 3D cells (4.5-ish volts) and it puts out a pretty good beam as is.
Note: my neighbors garage is 297' from my back door and has been used in numerous beam shots here at CPF.
My LA Screw is set up for general use.
Currently I have a TungSol bulb in it as they provide a real nice glow with nary an artifact. That and I forgot where I stashed the Chicago Minature hoard. But the smooth Qualtech reflector also provides a nice clean beam. I showed the wall shot to give the picture of the nice beam it provides. The light is not functioning at 100% as efficient as possible because I've yet to give all metal parts a good going over.
The B-Lite pencil beam
Frankly I was shocked at how far this one throws. The LA Screw reflector provides a nice spill as well but this one threw well past the garage. It also lit the dark cat on top of the dark car near the garage but my camera would not capture what I saw.
This is using the white reflector
The stock B-Lite reflector arrived clear. 99.99999% of the reflective material had peeled off. Taking cues from antiques and some modern Elzetta/Streamlight lights I tried white background knowing it would provide a nice floody beam. Great for indoor use when kicking in doors and ID-ing good guy vs bad guys tactics are required.
Now some Maglites. All dialed to spot beam.
The fabled 4C with a CPF twist.
Up 'til I arrived here I liked the 4C in stock platform. I found a bi-pin version but absolutely hated the beam. So an old school bulb fastener was swapped in and a 3 cell krypton was used. Not a heck of a lot more lumens, but a much nicer beam that burns a lot whiter. I'm on my second set of Rayovacs and still using the same bulb. (Bi-pin setup is in the tailcap)
A 3D in stock platform
This "heavy duty" was on clearance so I bought a few. About the same length as a 4C and nearly as bright, these were some great flashlights in their day.
A CPF'd 2C
Well, I had been able to get a couple hundred lumens from the 2C ML25 incan version using solar lamp batteries and 4 cell bi-pin bulb so I thought "why not the full size?" This one has a krypton sized hole in the reflector, which provides a nice gap around the bulb. (9mm hole, 3-ish mm bulb). Using a stock reflector and lens this sucker is pretty bright.
This one is dedicated to 1pt21
About a thousand lumens here.
Yup, when the worlds brightest LED's had barely reached 300 lumens the 1000 lumen Maglites were nearly ten years old!!! When this one arrived I did not own batteries good enough to fuel it. I ordered some hi-flo Panasonics. But before they arrived my curiosity was such that I stuck 4 CR123's into the Delrin sleeve. In seconds the barrel felt warm in my hand. Not digging the idea of a lithium hand gernade exploding I quickly removed those and waited for the proper fuel cells to arrive.
(Photobucket holding the beamshots hostage ⊙▁⊙
How dare they!!) (Left broken links in as a reminder)