Thanks to green pond mike's tip I may have found my favorite budget light ever. It has a slider switch. A two stage slider switch. A 4 lumen low and 325 lumen high. And like lights with a PR bulb it has throw. Lots of throw.
The Coleman battery guard 325.
It's a triple a flashlight so if you don't dig on a triple aaa body carrier light stop reading here. If you kept reading you'll see an 18500 is too short and 18650 too long. Is it regulated? Probably not. But for camping that means no sudden lights out due to a low voltage.
The body is a fairly thin wall alluminum tube surrounded by a plastic body. Two areas expose the knurled alluminum tubing. Each end has a rubberized coating. It is about the diameter of a SureFire 6P. It's reminiscent of a Streamlight Scorpion.
It also reminds me of the Rayovac Sportsman of a few years back but with a two stage slider instead of tailcap clicky.
If you kept reading but don't like cool white beams stop reading here. It has a pretty chilly beam but no blues, greens or other strange colors were present. Not copy paper white mind you, just a hint of yellow. 5700-6000 kelvin would be my guess. I did not detect any PWM on low using a photo of a running fan method.
Speaking of beam, it has 3 distinct beams. One in the center for a pencil beam that throws well, a second one that has a nice bright wide spill. The third is a gentle spill that lights up to the edge of your peripherals while not killing your night adapted peripheral vision.
Neat trick Coleman.
The three beam trick is probably easy on the eyes in a dense forest scenario.
The low beam is really good for 8-10 meters.
That's a 36" round wrought iron fire pit in the photo.
The high beam is really good for about 100-150 meters.
If the slider switch holds up a year or two I'll be happy. It has positive detents like a vintage Bright Star but has a low/high instead of signaler/full on. And yes you can signal with this one on low. You can go from low to high if you want but that would not be ideal for stealth. The detent is stiff enough where you probably won't turn it on unless you mean to. It's likely meant for camping or an urban jungle.
No antiroll areas or provisions for a wrist strap but the rubberized head can be sanded or ground to add flat spots and the rubberized tail cap cover should be easy to drill for a lanyard.
I paid $15 at Wal Mart and will probably buy another next time I'm there. It's a 2018 product but is likely to be my favorite budget light this year thanks to the super throw beam and slider switch.
Edit: corrected lumen amount so instead of saying 250 lumens it says 325. The 250 is the distance it is said to reach in meters.
End this edit.
