Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting solar lantern review

Several years ago I used my llamas to pack out a deer for a friend. As a thank you he gave me one of these solar tent lights. Mine recharges by solar only. The newer version can also be recharged by using a USB source.
The light is inflatable. When flat, it's under 1" high. It inflates to a 5" cube which nicely diffuses the light through a tent. It weighs 5 oz. During the day, it can be tied on top of a pack to recharge. It's LED and uses very little power. I've never run it down but on full power it's supposed to run for 3 to 5 hrs on a full charge, 24 hrs on the lowest setting. My tent is light gray silnylon, 10x10' and tall enough to stand up in. The light does a good job of lighting it up. It's totally sealed from water and is very rugged. You can toss or kick it around without worrying about damaging it. It could be useful for night fishing, too.

I just got home from taking a group of boy scouts on a pack trip. There are fire restrictions in place now and campfires aren't allowed. The boys got innovative for the traditional boy scout camp fire things. They set my light on a rock and used it for a campfire.

A quick search found them at a number of sites like REI, Amazon, et al. The price seems to be fixed at 19.95. Of course some sites offer free shipping while others don't.

LUMNAID NOVA PACKLIGHT

I used a Luci light last year. It is the best backpacking addition I have added to my kit....maybe ever.

I rigged up a quick tripod with three long sticks and the hung the Luci light as a lamp. It was great to not use a head lamp to make a fire/cook/clean up after dinner. Saves headlamp battery time too. It then got double duty as a tent light.

www.amazon.com/MPOWERD-Luci-Outdoor...40208&sr=1-3&keywords=luci+light

+ 1 on the Luci light.

comparisons:
The Luci and the LuminAid appear to be almost identical except for shape.
Luminaid lists theirs at 75 lumens while Luci doesn't give a lumen number. LuminAid has 12 LEDs, Luci has 10 but that's not saying they have the same brightness per light.
LuminAid can be recharged by either solar or AC or 12V as long as you have a USB adapter to plug it in. Luci is strictly solar.
Luci has clear plastic while LuminAid is translucent. I don't know which works better for an even light.
LuminAid has 1 more brightness level but just how many are needed anyway?
The specs say that Luci will charge in 7 hours while LuminAid takes 10 but LuminAid is supposed to give 6 more hours of burn time per charge. Do you need it faster or do you need it to last longer?

As for which works better, you'd have to try them side by side. I think a guy would be very happy with either. Some the new tech is great!

I didn't mean to imply the Luci was superior or contrast with Luminaid. Just a similar product that I really enjoyed last year.

I'm just comparing them. I've never used a Luci but have found the LuminAid to be really good. They're very similar and are priced the same.

I bought two of the Luci, one lasted less than a week, the other about two months. Used them for fishing off the boat dock at night. For a solar unit, they don't take daily sunlight too well.

They are certainly similar products. Heck, they are probably made in the same plant in China.

The Luci switch has a hi and low output. I don't know how long it takes to kill the battery as it stayed outside on the tripod to charge during the day and was only used for maybe 2 hours each night.

I wasn't implying one was better either...just what I had used . Based on your review I would buy the Luminaid if I ran across one. I bought the first Luci 3 years , my son used it on probably 20 camping trips since and I've used the other 2 at elk camp with no problems so far ... of course now that I say that , all 3 will probably die ! Great concept by both brands

LED's have revolutionized outdoor lighting anyway and when they add the inflatable body to defuse the light, they've really changed late night camping. I do like the USB recharging feature of the LumenAid. If you have a phone power pack with you, you can do the light, too, if the sun isn't bright enough to get it done.

If you're camping with small kids who are afraid of the dark, either one of these will make a great night light for them. Interesting story about that....I said that I just got back from a boy scout pack trip. It wasn't backpacking, though. We used my llamas. Everyone took along a PILE of snacks. The 2d night we needed to hang a bear bag but with all the snacks plus real food, the bag must have weighed 40 lb. We couldn't find a suitable tree limb for it. I'm not a leader. I'm just a guy in the church who loves to pack and I volunteer my llamas. Packing with the scouts can be a real kick. I was standing back watching the fun with the bear bag and it wasn't going well to get it 10' in the air. I finally told them to just toss it in the middle of the llamas. I guarantee that no bear is going to bother it without the llamas raising all kinds of hell. We'd be well informed of one in the area and it was highly unlikely that a bear would make any attempt to get at it. Llamas are used as sheep guard animals for a reason.
Anyway, before the bear prevention talk was all over, 1 very young man was seriously considering the possibilities of being et by something large and pointy. Part of their scout training was to erect and sleep in a shelter and they all had them made. Before it was over, they'd combined all of their shelters into 1 large one with the 1 boy in the middle where he'd have merely been dessert instead of the main course. I didn't think of offering my light as a night light until the next day but I bet it would have greatly helped the situation. Just in case, before the next trip I think I'll get another one.

Good story. People get all freaky about things going bump in the night.

Here in the East, people think there is a bear or lion hiding behind every bush in the West. Makes me laugh. If they hear I'm going back pack hunting for elk the first question is always something to do with bears, never about 20+ hours of driving. They never stop to think that statistically the most dangerous thing they do on a given day is get in a car or have a bee fly by.

I've been backpacking and llama packing for close to 50 years. I have yet to see a bear on a pack trip although I've seen them while hunting. As a result, I get complacent about it and I might regret it some day. Putting the food near the llamas is an easy preventative, much easier than hanging a bear bag. A few years ago, I took 2 llamas on a scouting trip. It had snowed 1/2" that morning. On the way up, I went through a place where a pack of wolves had spent the morning. The snow was completely beaten out by their tracks. I went on another 1/2 mile before making camp and I kept the llamas in close that night. I don't know how a wolf would react to a llama and I didn't really want to find out.
As you say, city people would be completely freaked out by the wolves. They consider them to be cuddly pets until you have to sleep out in their backyard.

I'd much rather deal with black bears than a wolf pack! I'm actually kind of a bear magnet. I usually see one every other trip to CO. Buying a bear tag is probably sure way to avoid seeing a bear!

Walking in the dark on my last hunt my headlight spotted a set of green/yellow eyes spaced about 8 inches apart croached at the base of a tree. Yup it was a lion. I did a lot of looking over my back the rest of that morning.

Maybe I need a couple more of these lights for my own night light. You can't be too careful about boogey persons.