Talk:Flashlight

message: I removed external links that served no purpose other than advertising discussion forums.  
ParasiticToxin (talk) 07:38, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: External links

message: This Web page http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/flashlight.htm says the Cowan story is not the case. Research needed - I wonder if the 1947 New Yorker is available at my local library 'fiche collection.... --Wtshymanski (talk) 16:57, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Cowan or Hubert?

message: Could we get a reference for a flashlight that is "intrinsically safe"?  I'm not a hazardous areas expert but from what I've read an "intrinsically safe" device is one that has such low stored energy in it that it cannot ignite a flammable atmosphere.  This is different from "non-incendive" or so-called "explosion-proof" devices that are designed either so that sparks and hot spots can't form, or so that any sparks that happen can't set off an explosion outside the device.  You can, for example, get an explosion-proof motor starter but it has a heavy cover and deep threaded joints to prevent flames from escaping the enclosure when the contacts break a circuit.  It's non-incendive and explosion-proof, but not intrinsically safe.  Hmm, the article Intrinsic safety isn't too reassuring either, or maybe IS is more inclusive than I think. --Wtshymanski (talk) 04:58, 21 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It appears they do call them "intrinsically safe". --Wtshymanski (talk) 20:27, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Intrinsic safety

message: At the risk of probably flogging a long-dead argument, elsewhere in the world we use torches - things that illuminate continuously, and that don't flash. Blitterbug 22:10, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Speak for yourself.  A couple of my flashlights send Morse code (by flashing). --Wtshymanski (talk) 00:44, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: He has a point, only the Americans use 'flashlights'.  Our hand held torches flash just as well (when equipped with a suitable button). 109.153.242.10 (talk) 18:27, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

text: Even Agatha Christie knew what a flashlight was. []. --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:44, 22 March 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  ... and I (here in northern England) didn't know that they were called "torches" until I met people from further south.  We still call them flashlights.  Dbfirs 14:22, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  To clarify linguistic differences: what many of us call a 'flashlight' was first marketed as an 'electric hand torch' (hence 'torch'); the term 'flashlight' was coined because the battery contacts were very weak and caused early designs to flash on and off randomly. Frednotbob (talk) 19:58, 13 February 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Oh, dear... another US-specific article!

message: What our tagger didn't mention is the criteria that make this C class and what's missing to improve it.
The criteria read:
 The article is substantial, but is still missing important content or contains a lot of irrelevant material. The article should have references to reliable sources, but may still have significant issues or require substantial cleanup.
...
The article is better developed in style, structure and quality than Start-Class, but fails one or more of the criteria for B-Class. It may have some gaps or missing elements; need editing for clarity, balance or flow; or contain policy violations such as bias or original research. Articles on fictional topics are likely to be marked as C-Class if they are written from an in-universe perspective.
Specific guidance would be more useful than a generic tag.  What's missing?  What's biassed? What's original research? What are the vague "issues" that displeased the god-like eye? 
--Wtshymanski (talk) 23:53, 30 December 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: C class

message: Suggest merge the non-redundant contents from Solar powered flashlight here; it's a minor variation in flashlight construction. --Wtshymanski (talk) 16:52, 2 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Comment by nominator - There's very little non-redundant content at Solar powered flashlight - there's a definition (which is already here), a few platitudes about general features of flashlights, and about 3 lines particular to solar flashlights.  It's not going to break anybody's browser if it's included here, and shouldn't an encyclopedia article be comprehensive? --Wtshymanski (talk) 04:39, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: After a minor tweak to clarify what could be misunderstood to be general features of flashlights, all of the content refers specifically to solar flashlights and not general features of flashlights.Suraj T 05:53, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggest merge

message: I'd like to find a good reference for how many lumens is useful for various tasks:
*Less than 1 lumen - supplement to night-adapted vision, avoiding bumping into furniture or stepping on cat
*2-3 lumens - finding a keyhole, walking around a room with dark-adapted vision, close reading or close work
*20-30 lumens - general household flashlight purposes, walking good trails (2 D cell incandescents at lower end of this range)
*100-200 lumens - Tactical flashlights, suitable to identify a man-size target at firearms range (one lumen per yard is what I've read), but without too much backscatter
*100 or more - Outdoor, long range uses; search and rescue; inspection lights, caving
*500-1000 - Orienteering, running unfamiliar trails at night
*100-1000 - Bicycle headlights, brighter lights in urban areas
Ranges overlap considerably and personal taste dictates - but it would be useful to turn the abstract notion of "lumens" into ranges that the reader could relate to his own experience. 
I've found some advertising sites and at least one blog, but I'm really looking for better references. Not finding too many scholarly papers yet, some on miner's lamps and flashlight use in Kenya...but the Web is very wide. --Wtshymanski (talk) 14:58, 20 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: That'd be useful. Good luck.   Will Beback  talk   17:31, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

text: Someone doesn't understand what lumens are.  A 1000 lm bicycle lamp will be a very bright light source indeed. (Lumen is the measure of the total perceived light output of a light source integrated isotropically).  A bicycle lamp light source will be less than 5 lm.   Focussing the beam in a particular direction doesn't change the lumen output of the source. 109.153.242.10 (talk) 18:33, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yes, yes it would be a very bright lamp. 5 lumens doesn't cut it in the bike world any more. These folks  claim 1400 lumens for their bike light. We've come a long way from the PR2 bulb and 2 D cells. (A North American low-beam auto headlamp is somewhere around 1600 lumens.) --Wtshymanski (talk) 19:28, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: ...and it is going to be even harder to find sources that match candelas to tasks! --Wtshymanski (talk) 19:37, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Lumens for tasks

message: When I was a boy and the world was new, one unit of grade-school science classes was to teach about electricity by unscrewing the flashlight and showing the battery, bulb, and switch; maybe a little lecture on the reflector, too.  A modern flashlight would be better suited to teaching a 3rd year EE course, with converters, pulse-width modulation, microprocessor controls, etc.  (If someone has written about it, it might be a useful comment to make in the article - a flashlight may not be the simple model electrical system of years gone by.) It gets worse...we were taught pennies don't stick to a magnet but nickels do, and you can make electricity by stacking "copper" pennies and silver dimes. The first time I saw a bronze-coated steel penny cling to a magnet, a little part of my childhood died....--Wtshymanski (talk) 14:56, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Nostalgia is not what it used to be ...  In what way does this contribution seek to improve the article? - DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 16:55, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: A flashlight was the canonical simple system used to illustrate basic electrical concepts. Modern flashlights may not be a good vehicle for demonstrating these concepts. If someone has run across literature that describes that as a problem in teaching, it might be worth adding that observation to the article. --Wtshymanski (talk) 17:30, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

text: Agreed. I think this is overcomplicating the topic.  Cantaloupe2 (talk) 01:09, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Teaching grade school science is harder than it used to be

message: ANSI FL1 used 0.25 lux illuminance, based on a full moon. But we can easily see a  magnitude 0 object, it attracts attention in the night sky.  The moon is mag -12.5 or so, which makes it (2.51^12.5) about  99,000 times more illuminance than starlight; and the square root of 99,000 is 314. So, you can see a flashlight several hundred times further than the FL 1 0.25 lux "working distance" states; which is why optimistic flashlight vendors prefer to write things like "Projects a beam visible for over a mile!" instead of giving the ANSI working distance of, say, 20 feet. But I need a citation for this....--Wtshymanski (talk) 21:27, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: America only standards. Find ISO something. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 01:05, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Beam visibility

message: I am thinking this is a worthy topic for its own section.
There are multiple well visited forums where all people do is trade stories on how they upgraded their torches (flashlights). I would think it is a very strong hobby that deserves some mention.  There must be a way to add this information without it turning into an advertisement for those forums, yes?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by MarcoPolo419 (talk • contribs) 09:47, 20 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  DIY and Mod'ing of Flashlights 

message: Some vandal has apparently gone through and changed most instances of the word "flashlight" to "fleshlight." This should definitely be fixed. 68.235.179.47 (talk) 04:18, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: It was fixed about four minutes after your warning (thank you for that), and the vandal (96.42.220.214) was warned.  Dbfirs 18:31, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vandals 

message: Torch is very widespread use, and is not limited to the Commonwealth. ONE example is Ireland.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.99.189.241 (talk) 13:29, 20 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. Nor is "flashlight" limited to America.  Dbfirs 15:56, 20 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: And Ireland is a part of the british isles.  Irish can be prime minister of the UK.  Part of Ireland is in the UK (that last one I don't actually believe, honestly, the country should be the primary topic of Ireland, not the island...but that's another story for another day).. ~~ipuser 94.14.212.141 (talk) 08:12, 30 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: What are you going on about?  Dbfirs 05:56, 1 July 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Ignore him.   — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.99.189.241 (talk) 13:07, 15 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Torch

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Flashlight. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111115134858/http://www.nema.org/stds/complimentary-docs/upload/FL%201%202009%20final.pdf to http://www.nema.org/stds/complimentary-docs/upload/FL%201%202009%20final.pdf
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 03:37, 2 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: As torch is the widely used term, please move this page to Torch. Let's keep the terminology global. --27.112.120.117 (talk) 21:05, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Well the term flashlight is well-understood here in the UK, though I agree that "torch" seems to be taking over.  Usage has changed in my lifetime.  A torch suggests flames ... Dbfirs 21:34, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'm from India and I haven't heard the term flashlight at all. It's either 'torch' or 'torchlight'. 27.112.120.117 (talk)  —Preceding undated comment added 22:08, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I would have thought that Indian English would have picked up the older British usage, but apparently not.  Our article on Torch has two links to flashlight, but the disambiguation page for torchlight has no link to flashlight.  I think this usage is exclusive to Indian English, but perhaps we should add a link?  Dbfirs 00:37, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

text: Oppose rename.  In countries that have electricity, a "torch" is fire on a stick.  The battery operated pocket light is and remains a "flashlight". --Wtshymanski (talk) 06:07, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Only in the uneducated backwaters of the Americas. Here in the rest of the English speaking world both the 'fire on a stick' and the cylindrical battery powered compact light source are known as 'torches'. See here. However, the article should not be renamed because Wikipedia policy is to stick with the version of English originally used. 86.143.86.56 (talk) 17:05, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Request to movie Flashlight to Torch 

message: Does anyone know when was the first LED flashlight was made, patented or sold? Hobbists made an LED lightboxes in the 70's (may be earlier) including a 5mm red or green LED, switch, 9v battery, small plastic box and a resistor to limit current. Not very bright but it worked like a flashlight to read a book or find your way to the bathroom at night. The flashlight museum has a LED model dating to 1980.Flashlights : LED Style, FlashlightMuseum.com accessed May 28, 2020  I'm still wondering, how far back the history of a portable battery powered LED light goes? tygrus (talk) 01:36, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  LED Flashlight history 

message: I'll come back and try to fix this another day, but this article (in addition to other problems noted above) is organized around incandescent flashlights which are now (as of 2021) obsolete and of historical and collector interest only.  LED flashlights should be the main focus of the article, with incandescent flashlights an interesting historical mention, rather than the other way around. UninvitedCompany 20:26, 9 November 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: I would leave it alone. Incandescent lamps were the origin of the species, The organization should be in terms of the development, not current sales volumes. --Wtshymanski (talk) 03:20, 12 November 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article organization is out of date 

message: ...makes a LED light so powerful that in "strobe mode" it can literally stun people if used as a self defense weapon. I don't recall the exact name, so can it be mentioned? Thanks.Nuclear Sergeant (talk) 07:29, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: What does "literally stun" literally mean? HiLo48 (talk) 11:51, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Context there implies that The Big Show is a person. Really? And ads are not regards as reliable sources for our purposes.  HiLo48 (talk) 23:08, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

text: We've been reading about super-science stun rays for decades.  But any time the 0.1% feel threatened, they send their troops out with truncheons,tear gas,  and rubber bullets, not super science strobe lights. Don't count on a flashing light to save your wallet if someone really wants to take it from you. --Wtshymanski (talk) 20:39, 9 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bulbhead....