Reliable dive light?

[34109411]

Not since I had some old UK lights with C-cells modded to a Cree LED have I had reliability.

My last two D710 Orcas lasted about 75 dives or so. The latest failed last week - intermittent working, then on or flashing on/off, or on but uselessly dim. Battery seems ok.

I’m just looking for something to use occasionally during day dives, and on night dives. Looking for more than 2 years or about 150 dives.

Options?
Thanks.

i ve bought Aplos, honestly they do the jobs over 40 dives no problems could not beat the price in comparison to other that are excessive for what it's worth.

 

[DCN]

i ve bought Aplos, honestly they do the jobs over 40 dives no problems could not beat the price in comparison to other that are excessive for what it's worth.

We each have a cheap Aplos dive light (think we paid about $30 each), one of them accidentally fell out of a pocket upon exiting the water, we did not realise it had fallen out until we returned to the same dive site a week later and found it when entering the water. It had then been in +4C salt water for a week. Worked perfectly, absolutely no sign of water ingress.

Are the cheap dive lights perfect? Absolutely not, but they do light up quite well, and are sufficient for the diving we do at this point. Do we need a $1k dive light in the future? Probably not.

 

[noads99]

Ahhh.... dive lights. I've also been through this, stated out with cheapies , about £30 from Ebay thta used 2x18650 cells with mixed results - much seemed to depend on the maintance of the O rings otherwise they quickly become scrap metal!

Other units I've tried were Varilux Zoom 1000 from Northern Diver but found them to be unreliable with three replacments under warantee (lucky I had a back-up as one just failed totally on a night dive on the Thistelgorrm in Egypt). Currenmtly am using a Light and Motion Sola that has been faultless although these are expensive mananged to buy one from a colleague s/hand cheaper. I also have two Mares EOS 10RW's that I just use as backups but again they have been faultlesss.

It seems to me that we subject torches to extreme conditions and we all want not to pay very much for reliable technology and I'm not sure the two are compatible!

 

[LFMarm]

I would not go cheaper than OrcaTorch or DGX. These lights may have some QC problems looking at some of the comments here but for the most part are reliable and regularly used in technical diving where you always have 1 or 2 backups.

 

[Allen-1]

I’m happy with my Sherwoods.

 

[broncobowsher]

My old standby DRIS 1000 running on some C-cells. Treated it as a hammer, been around the world with it, bottom of Truk. The most reliable light I have ever owned, including non-dive lights.

 

[USdiver1]

Not since I had some old UK lights with C-cells modded to a Cree LED have I had reliability.

+1

Love those old UK lights, both C and D cells.

 

[noads99]

Light and motion makes a good light, but once the battery goes, you have to get rid of the light.

No,, incorrect, they are replaceable with care - now going to be more difficult tnow that L&M are ceasing production though!!

 

[FF / EMT]

No,, incorrect, they are replaceable with care - now going to be more difficult tnow that L&M are ceasing production though!!

Well shit, I wish you told me before I bought this halcyon.

 

[fred32176]

I keep an odepro wd12 clipped to my BCD as a secondary light on every dive. I've had it over two years with no problems. I have a wurkkos DL70 as a primary light and we have a wurkkos flashlight (not for diving). No problems with them either.