That’s a 1x AAA light right? That model is called the Solitaire. The classic mini maglite used two AA’s and there was also one with two AAA’s.
The Solitaire is interesting because at 12mm it is the thinnest AAA light out there. Others are usually 14mm or more. I was just thinking about the Solitaire recently and wondering what prevents other manufacturers from making lights that thin.
Long ago there was an incandescent version of the Solitaire. I had one and it was awful. But, the modern LED versions should be much better. I might look for one so sometime.
I had one of the incandescent ones when I was a kid. They even had a spare bulb in the back and you could change the focus of the beam. Of course completely obsolete by now as every phone flashlight is much brighter but back then it was pretty cool.
They were impressively bright for a light that size in those days. The trouble with mine is it became so unreliable it was useless (flaky contacts or switch, cleaning didn’t help). I gave it to a collector who immediately recognized it as an unusual variant and was delighted, so it still made someone happy. I guess that is a win.
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It is the single AAA one! Awesome background info; I vaguely recall an incandescent version of one kicking around my dad’s garage when I was a kid… this definitely improves on that
It might not be the brightest thing but AA lights are great to keep in your car for emergencies because of the long standby times and their resistance to extreme temps
Particularly with disposable lithium batteries. It’s not the approach I take (I always have a light in my pocket), but it makes a lot of sense.
In the incan versions, lithiums blew out the bulbs faster, unfortunately. Also, Energizer has recently jacked up the prices of lithium AA/AAA cells to annoying levels. I wonder why no one else makes them. Oh well, there are still CR123A’s.
Mfgr page with specs: https://maglite.com/products/solitaire-led-flashlight
Says 47 lumens for 1.75h, a decent balance imho. I had some runtime anxiety yesterday while using my Skilhunt E3a (100lm 1 hour) to fix a car, so would have preferred less output and more runtime.
Price is competitive at $12.50, lower than I expected. At 81mm it is a bit long, but the zoom head could be useful. Thickness started is 12.7mm, oh well.
Does anyone else here use one of these? It would be nice to see a review and runtime graph.
