ARC AAA is back

http://www.arcflashlight.com/arc-aaa.htm

It doesn't get any smaller than this unless you go w/ photon.

Great to hear, Matt. Combine this light with the now commonly available Lithium AAA cells and you have a fine EDC light.

Matt, no doubt a quality light but rather pricey at $46 (incl. S&H). I have a couple of Garrity key ring LED's which I got at WalMart. They are well made coin cell lights measuring 2 3/8 long by 1 wide by 1/4 thick. (Imagine the thickness of two sticks of chewing gum but shorter). Momentary on switch is a little stiff on some. You can test it thru the packaging before you select one. Cost with tax: less than four dollars. It is blindingly (?) bright and never seems to diminish. The battery is replaceable if you have a small enough Phillips to remove the six screws holding it together. I'm talking TINY! <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I've managed to kill a couple coin cell lights and my wife as well. The last one we bought was a princeton tech with fell apart in her purse, so spending $5-20 every couple years plus expensive coin cell batteries adds up to the price of the $29.99 Arc AAA in a very short time. I've standardized on AA and AAA in all my gear now and avoid anything with those coin cells, the cells just don't last more than a few months.

Mine got delivered Thursday.
Unfortunately, they delivered it to my billing address, 2 hours away. (Moved recently).
Oh well, I can play with it next week or so.
Still have my LSH-P, and the 2AA body with Kroll clickie, and the belt sheath.
Glad to have Arc back in the game.

I've had a Princeton Tech Pulsar II for years. It's currently in my PSK - I just fished it out and it worked fine. I don't EDC it any more because I found the switch could lock on and run the battery down, but that's a fault of that particular model, not coin lights in general.

For EDC I now have a Photon Freedom. This has a better design - much less likely to stay on unnoticed. I usually put it into signal mode, but I'm currently experimenting with leaving it in the default mode because it is so hard to switch on accidently. I can't remember how long I've had it, many months if not over a year, and it shows no sign of falling apart or going flat.

If coin lights in general are as poor as you suggest, I doubt Doug would recommend one here .

So they're shipping now... great.. time to place my order I guess.

Eugene,
I wasn't putting the Arc light down, just pointing out an inexpensive alternative. The Garrity light I described is a quality, well made light AFAICT. Come battery replacement time, it is a question of do I replace the battery or just replace the light.
Sorry to hear about your wife. What did she do to have to pay the ultimate sacrifice? <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Yes I understand that the cost of cheaper led is attractive and for 1 arc aaa you can have 10 of the other light but...

arc aaa is better built with easier to find batteries. does it justify the cost? maybe for some... just like you can buy a sebenza for $300 or a spyderco for $50. the choice is yours and I happen to like arc products.

The thing is that old arc company came up with some really great lights that were trully inovative and way ahead of time. They went down under due to financial problems. To see them back in action makes me happy since there will be some great products comming out.

What I was meaning is that by the time you have went though 4-5 cheaper ones you might just well buy one good one. Same with tools, I went through a couple sets of cheap srenches and sockets before buying better ones. Tore up a couple front wheel drive cars before spending a bit more on a truck so it would last several years longer. My inlaws buy cheaper stuff all the time and replace their cheap stuff 3-4 times while I keep and use the same thing for many years longer and in the long run save because I paid only once.

That was my point, one $29 Arc has outlaster several $5-20 lights so I have come out ahead buying the one Arc.

Eugene, did your wife scratch the truck or take your arc?

"I've managed to kill a couple coin cell lights and my wife as well."

Where is Bounty when you need him.

Ya ya but you own a Sebenza ... oh wait me too and i WISH mine had only cost $300. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> Wait, why am I typing when I should be ordering my new Arc-AAA Premium Edition. I had one of the old Arc AAA Premiums and sold in on Ebay for a nice profit to a collector (after the company folded). I'm really looking forward to the new one. Looks like some nice, subtle imporvements have been made. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

This is incorrect, I know, but grammatically speaking, your first sentence says you've killed your wife. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> I know you mean she, too, has killed coin cell lights as you have, but that's the English language for you. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

-- Craig

Craig, I offered my condolences to Eugene about his wife in an earlier post but he ignored my poor attempt at humor. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Either I have had too many Shiner Bocks tonight (which is entirely possible) or they have removed from the website the ability to add to the shopping cart and therefore order a light. I wonder if they are backlogged already. I sure hope not.

If you're on a roll, I advise stay with Shiner Bocks and re-investigate the gear-ordering possibilities tomorrow.

Dat's some good stuff .. live large!

The English language offers you many ways to dig yourself out, but more ways to dig yourself a bigger hole. Shrug.

He indicates he is not going to take any more pre-orders until maybe August 1st.

his production must be unable to meet the current demand

Was just by there.

"We expect to start shipping existing orders by August 1st" . . . "We should be accepting new orders by August 1st"

DOH! That came out wrong <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I think that one of the problems that Peter (owner of original arc) had were too many orders and not enough items. It's a good thing he is learning on his own mistakes and tries to do the right thing. I will wait lil before I buy it since I really want the colored ones.

Doug's light is a decent compromise. Nothing wrong with it.

You know what I like best about the Arc, though? It's (almost) idiot proof. I mean, it only has one function... it's either on or off. Changing the battery is so simple my parents can do it. There are no precautions you have to give someone before they carry it. Sit on it? Well I wouldn't (owww!) but you can and it won't hurt it. Get it wet? Sure...go ahead. Drop it? No problem. I mean, you just can't hurt an Arc in any situation likely to come up. Mostly, you just hand someone an Arc and say "Twist it on, twist it off, change the battery when it gets dim. Have fun.".

I just got an email from Peter that said exactly that. That new AAA-P with the new LED is well worth the wait to me.