Need advise for both primary and back up lights

[buddhasummer]

I have an MB-sub 50 can light which is awesome.

Me too, it's a great light. I own a selection of MB-sub lights. The VB-50 is my favorite local light and the X1-VB is my favorite warm water travel light, IMO it's the perfect rec travel light. I use a X1-FF as my back up. I'm the Imelda Marcos of lights. I've probably spent more on lights over the years than any other equipment. I think I've finally found my happy place with MB-sub. Michael, the owner is a very nice guy, great lights great service.

 

[Corleone]

thank you everybody, i really appreciate all the openions...

somehow i calculated the cost of the MB-sub 50 as waaaaay too much.... so i went ahead and bought the Sola 800 dive light for almost $400 which is almost double the price of the MB-Sub 50. just now i realized that. anyway i have paid for the light about 2 hours ago, in addition to the dorcy 220 as a back up.

i called the local supplayer and he said they no longer sell sola lights, they sell big blue and intova now. anyway, since im buying online, having a sealed light with internal battery is a big plus.

what i don't understand in this light as well as most of the lights in the market is when using the max output of the light, you are limited to 70 - 50 min in some lights? a lot of people say, we use the low setting and its 240 min !! i don't see the logic in such thinking. buying a ******* lumin light just to use the low setting !! if i want the low setting i will buy a cheaper light.

thinking about it now, some of the night dives i did were about 65 - 70 min, that means im going to use the low settings weither i like it or no!! if we take into consideration that charged battries lose between 10-20% of their capacity with time, hmmmmm

guess i will be waiting for this shipments with tears on my cheek lol.

 

[buddhasummer]

thank you everybody, i really appreciate all the openions...

somehow i calculated the cost of the MB-sub 50 as waaaaay too much.... so i went ahead and bought the Sola 800 dive light for almost $400 which is almost double the price of the MB-Sub 50. just now i realized that. anyway i have paid for the light about 2 hours ago, in addition to the dorcy 220 as a back up.

i called the local supplayer and he said they no longer sell sola lights, they sell big blue and intova now. anyway, since im buying online, having a sealed light with internal battery is a big plus.

what i don't understand in this light as well as most of the lights in the market is when using the max output of the light, you are limited to 70 - 50 min in some lights? a lot of people say, we use the low setting and its 240 min !! i don't see the logic in such thinking. buying a ******* lumin light just to use the low setting !! if i want the low setting i will buy a cheaper light.

thinking about it now, some of the night dives i did were about 65 - 70 min, that means im going to use the low settings weither i like it or no!! if we take into consideration that charged battries lose between 10-20% of their capacity with time, hmmmmm

guess i will be waiting for this shipments with tears on my cheek lol.

At $400 the sola is not double the MB-Sub VB-50, outside of the EU ex VAT the VB-50 will set you back almost $1200.

Yes, I'm not a big fan of rechargeable lights particularly for travel diving doing multiple dives in a day. Of course with a canister light you have many hours of output at full power but as with most things you get what you pay for and these lights are very spendy. BigBlues have a good reputation, Intova lights have had some switch problems on some of their models, happened to me too, but Intova have great customer service and will make good. Good luck.

 

[Dive-aholic]

thank you everybody, i really appreciate all the openions...

somehow i calculated the cost of the MB-sub 50 as waaaaay too much.... so i went ahead and bought the Sola 800 dive light for almost $400 which is almost double the price of the MB-Sub 50. just now i realized that. anyway i have paid for the light about 2 hours ago, in addition to the dorcy 220 as a back up.

i called the local supplayer and he said they no longer sell sola lights, they sell big blue and intova now. anyway, since im buying online, having a sealed light with internal battery is a big plus.

what i don't understand in this light as well as most of the lights in the market is when using the max output of the light, you are limited to 70 - 50 min in some lights? a lot of people say, we use the low setting and its 240 min !! i don't see the logic in such thinking. buying a ******* lumin light just to use the low setting !! if i want the low setting i will buy a cheaper light.

thinking about it now, some of the night dives i did were about 65 - 70 min, that means im going to use the low settings weither i like it or no!! if we take into consideration that charged battries lose between 10-20% of their capacity with time, hmmmmm

guess i will be waiting for this shipments with tears on my cheek lol.

The purpose of having a 50% setting is so you can get more output if you get close to the burn time on max output. For example, SEAC lights have about 2-2.5 hours of burn time at max output. At 50% output you get 70 hours on the R10, 32 hours on the R6, and 22 hours on the R2. So if you notice you are getting close to your burn time at max output just drop it down to 50% and you've given yourself several more hours of light with those batteries.

 

[DarkAbyss]

I'm also looking into cansiter lights as a primary torch. I've narrowed it down to fit my price range: Hollis LED 25 or Light For Me 4 TEC. Any experience with either of these?

 

[DarkAbyss]

I went with the Hollis LED 25, hoping to pick it up tomorrow and get it charged up for a test!

 

[Corleone]

congrats, 1250+ lumens for 8 hours !!

for the price tag, i will only consider buying such light if im doing tech diving with deco time.

yesterday i recived my dorcy 220 lumens light and wow, it is a beast. i don't remember seeing any hand held light as powerful and bright as this.
im suppose to recive my sola 800 either tommorow or the day afetr. seriously, i don't know what am i going to do with the sola now.

only thing im worried about is that the dorcy might not perform underwater as good as on the surface

 

[DarkAbyss]

congrats, 1250+ lumens for 8 hours !!

for the price tag, i will only consider buying such light if im doing tech diving with deco time.

yesterday i recived my dorcy 220 lumens light and wow, it is a beast. i don't remember seeing any hand held light as powerful and bright as this.
im suppose to recive my sola 800 either tommorow or the day afetr. seriously, i don't know what am i going to do with the sola now.

only thing im worried about is that the dorcy might not perform underwater as good as on the surface

Thanks! I'm looking forward to getting it I think it is a lot of bang for the buck, but time will show. I also got it for a reasonable price. A good torch here is alpha and omega. During winter here, most dives tend to be night dives.

Only one way to find out if the dorcy is performing... bring both the Dorcy and the Sola on your next dives, and try them out against each other in different circumstances.

 

[ams511]

6) I used the 3C cell DRIS for day dives. It also gives off plenty of light (1000 Lumen) and the batteries last many hours, so it becomes my day dive light of choice. It it however big and heavy.

It is funny how spoiled we have become. A few years ago to get that level of performance you would need a can light which is much heavier an bulkier than a 3 c-cell light.

 

[GrumpyOldGuy]

It is funny how spoiled we have become. A few years ago to get that level of performance you would need a can light which is much heavier an bulkier than a 3 c-cell light.

Yup, high output LED's have really changed the game.
I think lights have changed more and faster than any other dive product, which generally evolve rather slowly.
Video cameras probably being the other exception.