It occurred to me, as I was wondering when this jump pack was finally going to give up, that I have a cheap little battery voltage meter sitting in the box with some gear. Let’s see what we have:
Yeah…it seems that thing is running on the battery equivalent of fumes. But…it’s been running 24-hours for the last seven days. Or, put another way, if you used it eight hours per day, youd get three weeks of use. Six hours a day (or night, really) and you’d get a month of use. Personally, I’ve seen enough. Time to unplug and recharge. I have the info I need.
I’ll plug this thing in and let it charge, and then leave it alone to await the day the power goes out and that long, cold, winter night starts looking grim.
I should also like to point out that this setup is wonderful for task lighting or whatnot, for rummaging around a darkened bunker and illuminating various rooms in an outage, I really do like the Streamlight Siege. In fact, I really need to get two or three more to round things out.
I own both the D and AA versions of the Streamlight Seige, but a friend gave me a Fenix CL25 lantern about 18 months ago and it is AWESOME. Only drawback is it costs about 2.5 times as much as the Streamlight.
It’s a paratus miracle!
A few years ago bought every house hold in my family a Seige for Christmas. They were all like WTF? Three weeks later I get a text from my sister with her whole living room & dining room lit up with it. She wrote, no power for three hours. Best present ever!
Enough said. The following Christmas I got them to take a case or two of MREs home. Funny how un-insane you become.
On request my mother, she wanted for her 70th birthday the new Super Seige. However she neglected to charge it prior to its first call to action. Luckily poop brown siege was still ready to go.
I have a seige and love it…I wish someone would make lithium D batteries…nothing like your expensive gear rendered useless by an alkaline battery leak…I started buying Fenix CL20 lanterns for extensive use in power outages…they are ridiculously small, put out plenty of light, and can take AA or CR123 batteries – ie lithium options…
Lithium d-batts exist, but they are unbelievably hard to find. Two choices: either run it with lithium AA’s inside of d-cell adapters or get the AA version of the Siege. http://amzn.to/2Be4mej.
Never heard of a d converter before…do you have a brand you’ve tried that you would recommend?
Adapter, not converter. Theyre just plastic sleeves that slide over an AA battery to give them the same physical dimensions of a D-battery. Theyre not hard to find. http://amzn.to/2zdzglj
The Goal Zero Lighthouse is also a very worthy option to consider for home emergency lanterns. They hold a charge very well, can also be crank-powered in a prolonged outage, and the stored battery power can be used to charge personal electronics via a USB port on the lantern. The legs also fold in for easy storage. The downside is the price, but like with just about any piece of gear–you get what you pay for.
http://amzn.to/2BOZJZk
Regarding the long-term battery test, it would be interesting to do another test where you fully charge it, place it into storage, and then test the remaining power once every 60 days. I’d be curious to know how efficient it is in holding stored power.
I went all ghetto a few years ago and made up a emergency light using the battery jump pack with 12v outlet, a 75w inverter, a clamp light with reflector and a 13w CFB. All things I had laying around the basement. Horribly inefficient compared to today’s tech but it sure threw out the light during a couple of power outages and a handful of car camping trips. At a full charge it ran continuously for almost 5 days.
Everyone should have a few of those AA adapters in their inventory especially for older items that take D or C batteries. I’ve changed out bulbs in Mag lites, a couple USGI Angleheads and no name lights to the LEDs now I’m able to use more common AA batteries.