Torches, Luncheons and tuckered Tugs
Dec. 18th, 2002 04:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tugrikFor those of you who can appreciate a proper lightmaker, here's the gadget of the day... the Inova X5 flashlight.
This little flashlight is a solid block of milled alluminum with 6 white LEDs mounted in one end. It takes two CR123 lithium batteries to run. While these are a bit more awkward to acquire it means the flashlight can sit for a good 5-10 years unused, and the batteries won't go bad. They have both a momentary and full-time ON switch, as well as the ability to lock off for safe storage. The LEDs themselves have a 110,000 burn-hour lifespan and are extremely shock-proof. The flashlight itself is run-it-over-with-a-car tough, and waterproof to 150' or so.
The part I like best is the colortone of the light. The Inova folks did a good job of picking their LEDs from batch; there's little if any bluetone to their light. As users of other white-LED lights already know, there's a huge difference in using a full-color white light vs. the yellow-ish cast of a normal light. If you're doing something technical with it (car repair on the roadside, or getting into a computer case under the desk) the ability to easily see color-coded wires and small written details makes becomes very important. The unit is also pretty compact, as it doesn't require focussing optics or other larger-sized components. The tradeoff here is that you only get one beam size (no changable-focus) in exchange for the unit being a solid little block that's hard to do any real damage to.
In general they're cool lights. However, all the features makes an X5 perfect for its intended use: an emergency light stowed in a toolkit. I have one in each motorcycle's toolkit, and one clipped overhead in the van. They'll burn for about 20 hours on set of batteries. Combined with the lifespan in storage, this means I'll pretty much always have a flashlight on the road when I need it. While the websites sell them from $50 to $80 each (!!), you can get 'em off the shelves at Fry's for $32 or so. Titianium-silver or anodized black bodies are available, and the LEDs themselves are available in white, green, blue, and red. White is the only really functional color. The blue is just novelty and really hard on the eyes. Green is the brightest, but gives monochrome vision. While the average person off the street will tell you that Red (and sometimes Green) flashlights are good for preserving night vision, that's only true for decently soft amounts of light. These things only have two modes: ow-that-hurts and "off". Red or white, you'll lose some night vision using them. Only get the non-white colors if you want something for goofin' with.
As an amusing note, and the reason that I put these things in the journal even though I've had one for a halfyear or so: Many high-end service providers in the IT industry send out christmas promos. They're a notch above the usual "here's a card" you get from your insurance agent, as the IT industry spends pretty intense amount of cash on these kinds of businesses. Amid the usual selections of mugs, mousepads, calculators and action figures (yay, Foundry!), my colocation provider (Hurricane Electric) sent me a package. In it was a nice card from our account rep, and a batch of silver Inova X5's with the HE logo printed on them... one for each person in our little 3-man IT team. R0xx0r. This one comes with a little holster, so I'll wear it on my belt.
I really need to look into getting that heated clothing. I just returned back from the ADVRider's Luncheon up at Alice's... only slightly annoying my boss by taking a 2.5 hour lunch to do so. It was, well... cold. The interstorm gap over the Bay Area has been caused by a rising bit of pressure, and with that comes clear overnight skies and excessively cold air. The next storm due in is riding down from an Alaskan-offshore system, so this next bit of rain is going to be colder yet, with snow in the hills around the Silicon Valley. I really like that -- but the cold at speed while on a bike is just plain stunning. Even with the windshield, heated grips, and proper riding attire I found myself stiff and core-chilled (with that light headachy sensation) once I got back into the office. The ADVRider luncheon was quite fun, even so.
It ended up being about 25 people on various bikes. Most were on BMW's, one on an LT, me on my GoldWing, and Fish in his car (he was watching his 4 year old daughter that day, and she's too young to ride on the back). It's an interesting, attitudy crew... a lot of fun to hang out with. I brought the GL to amuse them, as they've all seen my Beemer but haven't seen (and are mildly afraid of) the Hondapottamus GL. We sat outside in the cold mountain air, with the occasional light dribble, laughing like we didn't care. I took a handful of pics, which I'll post tomorrow (due to the LOTR showing, I won't have time tonight).
One of the guys there gave me a huge "BMW Big Dog" patch to add to the riding suit. I'm amused.
Overall, though I've been incredibly tired. A combination of work, play, dragonchasing, and the holiday season itself have conspired into giving me not enough sleep-time. This isn't the "hard to get in to work in the morning" tired; this is the much more insidious "just don't get around to doing things" type of tired, where one just stalls out without really noticing it at first. Napping in a chair, spacing out at the desk or simply sitting down in front of the TV and finding out hours have gone by are all symptoms. The grump-making part of that is that it leads to simply Not Caring about things as much. The biggest example of this is that I'm not seeing LOTR until tonight, having just totally gone "Eh..." to the whole midnight-before showing like all my geeky buddies did without me (shakes fist at fox for good measure, in an Ink-like gesture). At least they want to see it again and will attend tonight with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
chipotle, revar and me. With luck they won't even @fanboy at us or otherwise ruin our first-time viewings.
I think part of it is that my body has been anticipating the usual week+ I get off between Christmas and New Years, when I can just zone. The problem's that no vacation is forthcoming: I only get Christmas Day itself off, and I have things planned or visitors inbound for every weekend surrounding and a few weekends after. Either I'm going to end up taking a week off in January sometime or I'm going to have a very unique type of mental crashdown, to make up for this lost time. Most likely I'll just burn a few SAN points and walk around with a seriously dulled wit for a week or two. Last time this happened all it did was crank my 'silly' factor up terribly high.
This little flashlight is a solid block of milled alluminum with 6 white LEDs mounted in one end. It takes two CR123 lithium batteries to run. While these are a bit more awkward to acquire it means the flashlight can sit for a good 5-10 years unused, and the batteries won't go bad. They have both a momentary and full-time ON switch, as well as the ability to lock off for safe storage. The LEDs themselves have a 110,000 burn-hour lifespan and are extremely shock-proof. The flashlight itself is run-it-over-with-a-car tough, and waterproof to 150' or so. The part I like best is the colortone of the light. The Inova folks did a good job of picking their LEDs from batch; there's little if any bluetone to their light. As users of other white-LED lights already know, there's a huge difference in using a full-color white light vs. the yellow-ish cast of a normal light. If you're doing something technical with it (car repair on the roadside, or getting into a computer case under the desk) the ability to easily see color-coded wires and small written details makes becomes very important. The unit is also pretty compact, as it doesn't require focussing optics or other larger-sized components. The tradeoff here is that you only get one beam size (no changable-focus) in exchange for the unit being a solid little block that's hard to do any real damage to.
In general they're cool lights. However, all the features makes an X5 perfect for its intended use: an emergency light stowed in a toolkit. I have one in each motorcycle's toolkit, and one clipped overhead in the van. They'll burn for about 20 hours on set of batteries. Combined with the lifespan in storage, this means I'll pretty much always have a flashlight on the road when I need it. While the websites sell them from $50 to $80 each (!!), you can get 'em off the shelves at Fry's for $32 or so. Titianium-silver or anodized black bodies are available, and the LEDs themselves are available in white, green, blue, and red. White is the only really functional color. The blue is just novelty and really hard on the eyes. Green is the brightest, but gives monochrome vision. While the average person off the street will tell you that Red (and sometimes Green) flashlights are good for preserving night vision, that's only true for decently soft amounts of light. These things only have two modes: ow-that-hurts and "off". Red or white, you'll lose some night vision using them. Only get the non-white colors if you want something for goofin' with.
As an amusing note, and the reason that I put these things in the journal even though I've had one for a halfyear or so: Many high-end service providers in the IT industry send out christmas promos. They're a notch above the usual "here's a card" you get from your insurance agent, as the IT industry spends pretty intense amount of cash on these kinds of businesses. Amid the usual selections of mugs, mousepads, calculators and action figures (yay, Foundry!), my colocation provider (Hurricane Electric) sent me a package. In it was a nice card from our account rep, and a batch of silver Inova X5's with the HE logo printed on them... one for each person in our little 3-man IT team. R0xx0r. This one comes with a little holster, so I'll wear it on my belt.
I really need to look into getting that heated clothing. I just returned back from the ADVRider's Luncheon up at Alice's... only slightly annoying my boss by taking a 2.5 hour lunch to do so. It was, well... cold. The interstorm gap over the Bay Area has been caused by a rising bit of pressure, and with that comes clear overnight skies and excessively cold air. The next storm due in is riding down from an Alaskan-offshore system, so this next bit of rain is going to be colder yet, with snow in the hills around the Silicon Valley. I really like that -- but the cold at speed while on a bike is just plain stunning. Even with the windshield, heated grips, and proper riding attire I found myself stiff and core-chilled (with that light headachy sensation) once I got back into the office. The ADVRider luncheon was quite fun, even so.
It ended up being about 25 people on various bikes. Most were on BMW's, one on an LT, me on my GoldWing, and Fish in his car (he was watching his 4 year old daughter that day, and she's too young to ride on the back). It's an interesting, attitudy crew... a lot of fun to hang out with. I brought the GL to amuse them, as they've all seen my Beemer but haven't seen (and are mildly afraid of) the Hondapottamus GL. We sat outside in the cold mountain air, with the occasional light dribble, laughing like we didn't care. I took a handful of pics, which I'll post tomorrow (due to the LOTR showing, I won't have time tonight).
One of the guys there gave me a huge "BMW Big Dog" patch to add to the riding suit. I'm amused.
Overall, though I've been incredibly tired. A combination of work, play, dragonchasing, and the holiday season itself have conspired into giving me not enough sleep-time. This isn't the "hard to get in to work in the morning" tired; this is the much more insidious "just don't get around to doing things" type of tired, where one just stalls out without really noticing it at first. Napping in a chair, spacing out at the desk or simply sitting down in front of the TV and finding out hours have gone by are all symptoms. The grump-making part of that is that it leads to simply Not Caring about things as much. The biggest example of this is that I'm not seeing LOTR until tonight, having just totally gone "Eh..." to the whole midnight-before showing like all my geeky buddies did without me (shakes fist at fox for good measure, in an Ink-like gesture). At least they want to see it again and will attend tonight with
chipotle, revar and me. With luck they won't even @fanboy at us or otherwise ruin our first-time viewings.I think part of it is that my body has been anticipating the usual week+ I get off between Christmas and New Years, when I can just zone. The problem's that no vacation is forthcoming: I only get Christmas Day itself off, and I have things planned or visitors inbound for every weekend surrounding and a few weekends after. Either I'm going to end up taking a week off in January sometime or I'm going to have a very unique type of mental crashdown, to make up for this lost time. Most likely I'll just burn a few SAN points and walk around with a seriously dulled wit for a week or two. Last time this happened all it did was crank my 'silly' factor up terribly high.
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no subject
Date: 2002-12-18 05:45 pm (UTC)http://thelightsite.cruxial.com/reviews/reviews_index.htm
To anyone out there, DON'T get a Ledtronics light. The 6-LED head flickers wicked bad, and the output sucks. As an inspection light, it worked fine for up close stuff, but the beam wouldn't light much of anything further than 5 feet away.