Small portable AAA or AA clip-on light

[matt.guitarteacher]

Starting to get into the weeds of researching this and figured there is probably someone on here who has already done a lot of this.

So, I'm looking for a reliable clip on light , maybe even a book light or something which I can throw in a bag without worrying about too much , which doesn't use some weird kind of battery. I'd prefer AA or AAA unless there is some huge benefit in efficiency with some CR type battery.

Some of these are so stinking cheap, and there are just WAY too many off them out there. I honestly don't want to go through rounds of trying to figure out which price point has any kind of reliability.

This may not be a good sub forum to post this kind of question. Please let me know.

Thanks!

[Cunamara]

I've got one of these, that kind of looks like a critter from SpongeBob SquarePants. Been reliable for ten years now.


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[JazzWhiteBelt]

This one does use a watch battery, but they are easy to find and last a long time. The light is crazy small and bright.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[marcwhy]

Mighty Bright.

[Strbender]

Mighty Bright.

I have the Duet model. It doesn't leave the house so I can't say how it would hold up, but I thing it would be fine.

[jazzkritter]

+1 mighty bright. The model with four LEDs in a row gives a nice broad beam. AAA powered, has taken a lot of abuse.

[feet]

if you're a cheapo, i'd check harbor freight or pep boys or something similar, if not home depot. mechanics always have some sort of lights with clips and danglers and magnets and what have you. you can even get the head lamp ones if you're really serious. i've used those a lot for work and they always came through. and you have a cool laser shooting out of your head, which is always a plus.

[sgosnell]

+1 Mighty Bright. I have the Hammerhead light, and I like it. It runs on 3 ea AAA batteries or 5V AC adapter, which means that if you have the proper cable or adapter, you can use any phone power bank as a power supply. It cllps perfectly on a music stand, or whatever is available.

[dconeill]

A couple of things to look for:
Light temperature:
for my aging eyes, 5000K works best. It's a very white light and I find it particularly good for reading and tasking. My workbench and desk lamps are 5000K and I've been very pleased at my ability to see what I'm doing.
3000K is a more typical temperature, but it's sort of yellow, like an old-style incandescent lamp. I find these hard to use.

Lumens:
This is a measure of how bright the lamp is. More is better, but I suppose a light could be too bright for some applications. Some lamps have selectable output levels.

Usage:
If you're using the lamp to light sheet music, it might work better to have a wide lamp head instead of a long head, because sheet music is typically wider than a book page that most portable lamps were designed for. An example of what I'm talking about can be seen at On-Stage Stands LED518 USB Rechargeable Orchestra Light | Sweetwater. (Note that I cited this particular lamp for the design of its lampholder, not because I'm endorsing it - among other things I don't know its temperature or its lumen output.) There were several other similar lamps shown at the bottom of the cited webpage, some of which are rechargeable, some of which use batteries. These music stand lamps seem to be more expensive than their read-in-bed brethren.

If it were me, I would pick one from the offerings of somebody like Sweetwater. (I'm not affiliated with Sweetwater or anybody else, I'm retired). I'd stay away from a read-in-bed lamp - I've tried those and they don't work all that well for illuminating sheet music.

[Danny W.]

My big band owns about 30 of the two-head and some of the hammerhead Mighty Brites. They’ve been working great for years. I have no idea what battery life is like since the leader maintains them.

Danny W.