Dive Torch Trouble

[James Hickman]

I'm looking for a good dive torch at a reasonable price. I've got a bout £100 - £150. Any suggestions!!????

:confused:

[Matt-75]

I would say for that money, get a rechargable UK D4R (used by a number of our divers while in Malta for Wreck Pen, and bloody bright to boot), cost is around £90, and a mini Q40 as backup for around £20 (Q40 is head mountable, attached to the mask and gives decent hands-free narrow beam light).

If you just want a single solution, get the UK D8R, its 30w of serious brightness.

If you have a look on YD in the Torch Section, their was a thread about torches a while back including pictures showing the comparison between different torches. Woz can probably tell you where it was, and/or offer advice for your price range.

I personally have a C4R and two mini Q40's (non LED version), and the Q40's have had to be switched off on two night dives because they indirectly blinded divers who even glanced in my direction (lol), but for caves and boats i love them. :D

[Paul Morris]

Forget the UK torches. I had some years ago. Not bad for a lump of plastic. Bit too chunky and underpowered for my liking.

For £100-£150 you're starting to get into some very nice torches.

Personally I'm a big Kowalski fan. Fantastically well engineered torches. Solid as a rock. I've had a 1250 Speed for around 4 years now. Its done hundreds of dives with me in UK and abroad. Its still going strong. One minor problem after a rough entry in the Red Sea - bulb popped out and was rattling round. Only time I've ever had to open the casing. Plugged the bulb back in, and shock horror it worked. 50 dives later, its still going strong.

In the meantime, I've seen UK torches come and go in the club....

Service (if you ever need it) is alledgedly top notch. Kowalskis are also shinier :D

For around £100-£150 you're probably looking at something like the 620. Output is a repectable 26W (High quality 6V halogen bulb is overdriven to 7.2V to give 26W rather than 20W!)

Oh, and one day when you need a spare bulb it will cost you about a fiver.

Downside is burntime. The torch only burns at full power for about 45mins. However, they have switches to use reduced power. I think the new ones have variable dimmers down to 20% which will give you up to 3 hrs. Enough for two dives.

I think retail on the 620 is around £199 but no-one ever pays retail in the dive industry right? Should fall into your price range.

Check it out.

I think I picked up my 1250 speed for £250 at one of the dive shows. Retail its £322.

[Fred]

My preference is opposite to Paul's
I would take the UK torch in preference to the Kowalski everytime. As Paul says the Kowolski is severely limited by burn time. Our club does 20-30 night dives a year and we buddy up by torch types to maximise dive time with the Kowolskis dropping out at 35-45 mins and the UK's doing in excess of an hour with air usually being the limiting factor. My 15 year old UK800R will normally do two night dives of over a hour each before requiring a charge.

[garethwoodruff]

The battery packs with the UK rechargeable torches are old technology now, they use NiCad and the standard should really be NiMih as they have no memeory effect, so you can pop an extra hours charge into them in between dives.

I have got a UK D4 , but the non rechargeable version, which cost me £45, you then get a set of NiMih D cells and a fast charger £30 from Argos and buy the 18 watt bulb that the rechargeable version oomes with and swap the bulbs.

The result us a NiMih torch, which you can take abroad without batteries to save weight if u want and can take duracells if necessary, but has a good powerful set of batteries that are recahrageable.

All for about £80.

Mind u the metal bodied torches do look rather sexy......

[MattS]

My 15 year old UK800R will normally do two night dives of over a hour each before requiring a charge.To be honest I think the UK D range is a great example of a manufacturer breaking something they did not need to fix. They don't seem to be anything like as robust and reliable as the old UKR range.

My UK400R is in it'a 11th year of abuse and close to 1000 dives. It just works. It's still on the original batteries but the burn time is down to about 45 minutes.

[Adrian Kelland]

I used a UK600R for 16 years until it flooded and that was down to me. :(

The replacement has cost me an arm and a leg. Bloody torch arms race :D

[John_C]

UKD8R for me, 30w & 14w bulbs with 1 1/2hr & 3hr burn times respectively. You can pick one up for about £120:D

[Woz]

Look at the HID Light Cannon- they are pretty good and are about £169 online. Alternatively for £189 off eBay you can get a 21W HID Darkbuster which is incredibly bright, rechargeable, comes with all sorts of diffusers and has a 3 hr burntime.

[seapanther]

I have got a UK D4 , but the non rechargeable version, which cost me £45, you then get a set of NiMih D cells and a fast charger £30 from Argos and buy the 18 watt bulb that the rechargeable version oomes with and swap the bulbs.

+1 I did exactly the same thing get industrial rechargeables from ebay for 1/4 of street price

Still going strong after 5 years

[lightmachine]

With the improvement of torch technology in many cases the same / better performance can be acheived for much lesser money. NexTORCH have just released the NewStar dive torch with the ability to 100 metres! Super light weight (50gramms) and a decent 90m beam - money wise way under budget!!!

[Hickdive]

I think in the five years since he posted this thread the OP might have bought several torches.

[Woz]

Plus alot of the crap coming out of China these days has terrible build quality and LEDs that are so overdriven they melt a hole in your dive bag is they get knocked on accidentally. I have one on my desk that doesn't work and another that's of variable reliability.