Reddit mentions of Streamlight 88031 ProTac 2L 350 Lumen Professional Flashlight with High/Low/Strobe w/2 x CR123A Batteries - 350 Lumens

On the left side (my EDC), we have:

• Light - Surefire E2D LED Defender Ultra
  
  
• Wallet - Georgia Brown Pickers Wallet with a newer XL version of my favorite guitar picks, the Jazz III
  
  
• Knife - T90 by Custom Knife Factory
  
  
• Pocket Tool - Atwood Crawdaddy w/ a custom "shipwrecked" finish (alternate link) in a custom sheath made by Kassinger Leather works.
  
  
• Handkerchief - Skar Hanks Voyager w/brown back (currently sold out)
  
  
  On the right (/u/thedude8102 's EDC), we have:
  
  
• Light - Streamlight ProTac 2L
  
  
• Wallet - Saddleback Front Pocket ID Wallet
  
  
• Knife - ZT 0452CF (anodized by @Tws777 on instagram with custom clip/screws/standoffs from user Gnoleb on bladeforums)
  
  
• Pocket Tool - Atwood Weevil also in a custom sheath made by Kassinger Leather works.
  
  
• Handkerchief - Skar Hanks Samurai Blocks (currently sold out)

First of all, What vehicle will you be traveling? I sure hope it is comfortable. A few years ago a few buddies and I bought a van and took a 43 day road trip around the country. Comfort is key and you will soon realize this. I would say keep the inflatable mattress even if you can't use it that often it will be a good luxury to have when you can use it after a week of sleeping on the ground.


You have to account for the hours and hours of driving, (always add at least an hour to your eta time for stopping for gas, bathroom, traffic) Plan out a rough route with POI but don't be disappointed if you don't get to see all of them. For instance, we arrived after dark at Mt. Rushmore because it didn't say on their website that they closed so we decided to drive an hour out of the way to check it out because it would look much cooler at night. We get there at about 1am and the gates are locked and you cannot see it from the road. We ended up having to drive an hour back to sleep in a truck stop parking lot because it was raining and we didn't want to set up camp anywhere. It was raining the next morning so we just got on the road and decided to drive 26 hours straight to Toronto! Moral of the story, effe Mt. Rushmore, you say there is no entrance fee but you have to pay $11 to be able to enter the park and park your car! We are still bitter about that one.



Buy The America The Beautiful Pass right now! It will save you so much money! The pass will pay for itself by the 2nd or 3rd park!



Will you have a smartphone? It is so helping when trying to find campsites, or restaurants, phone numbers. Will you have a GPS? If so, make sure the map is updated and buy an atlas and use it to double check all the gps calculated routes. Sometimes technology doesn't always know best. It lead us astray a few times but overall it was a life saver. Also make sure you have a small cooler to keep things cold, Jugs of water are also a necessity. A little propane stove and camping shovel if you plan on doing a lot of camping are both incredibly helpful. The thing is whatever we didn't bring, (like those 2 items) we were able to stop and get at Walmart. Flashlights! This is an extremely useful tool and for the price it is top-notch. Bring a camera and make sure you bring a way to backup your pictures. Also make a blog. You will be able to look back at it later and reminisce.



Also, California is a huge state! we ended up spending over a week there, which directly resulted in us skipping the Midwest to get to the East Coast. I would have probably spent less time there so we didn't have to drive 26 hours straight from Mt. Rushmore to Toronto.



Also, Mexico, I would go if you have the chance, if you post something on reddit every single person will tell you do not go to Mexico but they have not been or live in the middle of the US and only hear about the bad things in parts of Mexico. It does depend on where you go into Mexico though, Tijuana was kinda trashy and I would not go back there, seems like it could be a violent place. Nuevo Progreso near Harlingen, TX is a great place to visit Mexico. Go during the day and park on the US side, (Do not drive over) pay 25 cents to walk over the bridge and you are in a quaint little Mexico town where most people can speak english and you can use US dollars for everything. I would highly recommend Angels for lunch and drunk. 75 cent STRONG margaritas and cheap but delicious food.




Recommendations:

• Make sure you Hit Zion National Park, its beautiful. If you plan on camping in Zion go to this BLM land, it’s not listed or advertised anywhere, if you ask park employees about it they probably won’t know. If you leave out of the east coast of the park drive about 2.8 miles and you will come to a blue gate on the right side of the road. This is the entrance, if you reach the Zion Mountain Resort on your right you have gone too far. Make sure you close the gate behind you because it’s where the buffalo roam (no pun intended). You drive up the road, (kind of steep dirt road, but my friends and I did it in a conversion van so it should be no problem.) you will pass 2 cabins on your left, keep going and you will start seeing 'campsites' scattered about. You can camp anywhere out there for however long you want. There was one other car there that drove in with us at the time and we didn't see them again the whole 2 days we were there! Shortly after you start seeing the campsites the road will split, you can go straight or turn left and start heading slightly downhill following the barbwire fence. Go about 1/4 mile and you will see an opening on your right. These are generally the BLM Land guidelines at most dispersed campgrounds. Here are a few pictures I pulled up of our campsite.
  
  
• We went to the south rim of the grand canyon and unless you love hiking I would not recommend hiking down into the canyon, the best view is at the top. do the rim hike instead.
  
  
• Do Vegas, but do Vegas properly for 1 night, that is all you need. I would recommend The Venetian (we got an amazing room for for just over 200, i signed up for the mailing list and get emails now for rooms at about $129 now. )
  
  
• Hoover Dam is cool but not worth the money to go inside
  
  
• In Vegas stop at the Heart Attack Grill and take a picture a for me. When I tried to go it was closed for renovations.
  
  
• Make a stop at Yosemite National Park in Cali, its beautiful. Take route 108 through Yosemite National Park. At the time they had 4x as much snow pack as they usually do at that time of year. We were driving through 10ft snow walls on either side of us, climbing to 10,000 ft and beautiful snow covered mountains. (In mid June)
  
  
• Take Highway 101 up the west coast through northern Cali and Oregon into Washington. It is supposedly beautiful, we ran out of time to take that route and that is one of our main regrets we didn't get to do.
  
  
• Redwood national park, if you like camping we did a 5mile hike to the shore through the redwood forest, it was amazing!
  
  
• Stop in Seattle, its a nice place, go to the Public Market (the place where they throw fish and the first Starbucks was born)
  
  
  Let me know if you have any more questions, I would love to help!
  
  Edit: Formatting, and our blog website does not exist anymore :/

Sum up the light in a few words:

Name | Battery (type and quantity) | Lumens and mode | battery life (in order of lumens mode) | length | price (rounded up to full dollar)

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The simple one mode guy:

• Coast PX25 | 3x AAA | 208 Lumens | 6.25 hrs | 4.7" | $28 Prime
  
  
  Maybe another setting would be nice:
  
  
• Coast HP7 | 4x AAA | 251/58 Lumens | 5.75/10 hrs | 5.6" | $44
  
  
  ...Or like 30 settings:
  
  
• Fenix LD10 | 1x AA | 120/94/47/9/SOS/Strobe Lumens | 1.5/2.2/6/34/varies hrs | 3.4" | $39 Prime
  
  
  Simple and I hate AAAs:
  
  
• Fenix E21 | 2x AA | 170/54 Lumens | 2.25/11 hrs | 6.5" | $31 Prime
  
  
  I like a sleek slim light with a lot of settings. I don't mind that its twist on:
  
  
• Foursevens P2 | 2x AAA | 160/?/2/SOS/beacon/strobe Lumens | 1/?/23/varies hrs | 5" | $45 Prime
  
  
  ...That and CR123As are my kind of battery:
  
  
• Foursevens Mini | 1x CR123A | 189/40/3/SOS/beacon/strobe Lumens | 1.2/8/150/varies hrs | 2.3" | $35 Prime
  
  
  Tail button FTW:
  
  
• Streamlight ProTAC | 2x AAA | 80/10/strobe Lumens | 1.5/30/5 hrs | 5.6" | $29 Prime
  
  
  
  Tail button and AAs FTW:
  
  
• Streamlight ProTAC | 1x AA | 50/6/strobe Lumens | 1.75/22/4 hrs | 3.9" | $33 Prime
  
  
  
  A little longer gets you 2x the brightness:
  
  
• Streamlight ProTAC | 2x AA | 120/14/strobe Lumens | 1.75/21/4 hrs | 5.9" | $36 Prime
  
  
  Okay lets face it. CR123As are kinda cool:
  
  
  
• Streamlight ProTAC | 2x CR123A | 180/10/strobe Lumens | 2.5/50/6 hrs | 4.7" | $40 Prime
  
  
  
  
  
  Hope that helps!! I have a couple Streamlights and I am happy with them. On a budget (sub $50-80) they are great lights. A lot of people (non-tactical) like Foursevens. Never used one. If you aren't afraid of loosing it they seem like fantastic lights. If you can afford it and you are in tactical or just rugged situations Surefire makes unbelievably good flashlights... but they cost a lot.
  
  EDIT: Formatting.
  

Ruger LC9

Glock 26 (Gen 4), also picked up a extension grip for the mag

Glock 19 (Gen 4)


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I sold my Glock 19 RTF2 for $830 to a guy in Georgia. I posted it up online as joke to a few buddies of mine for $950. Next thing I knew, I was getting FLOODED with emails about this gun. Emails from Alaska, Nevada, California, Florida, Indiana, Georgia, and Michigan as well. I had no idea you could not find a Glock 19 RTF2 with curved serration (fish-gills) anywhere. I had guys offering me nice AR's, pistols, etc. I remember a year ago, you couldn't get rid of these things. But I guess the market is right. I figured whoever seemed the most legit. Had an older guy from Georgia offer me a little less than what I posted, but he seemed to be the most serious. So I went ahead and made the deal with him. I loved my G19 RTF2, but I know I wouldn't get offers like that again anytime soon.

I also picked up a Streamlight ProTac 2L for $50. VERY nice light and very small.

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I would also like to add, I picked these up at C.M.P. Distributors in Charlotte Michigan. Recently I made a post here about Flint Police selling their Sig 226's for $381. They get some in slowly, but they are gone FAST. So I suggest if you are serious about it, talk with them.

The Streamlight Protac 2-L is amazing for the price. This has been in my EDC rotation for almost a year and it's still going strong.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00396S1Q2/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Hopefully you've tried contacting your target to ask them about their collections, their uses, stuff they want, and stuff they wouldn't like. Feel free to drop as many Phone Booth references as possible. You should be able to get some ideas.

If you can't find anything specific, the stuff you've mentioned will never go amiss. Some other stuff I could think of:

• Targets, be they paper, adhesive, or metal
  
  
• Gun bags, belts, storage and transportation solutions, either generic or tailored to what you know of their collection
  
  
• Magazines (specific to their gun and of legal capacity; you can never have too many)
  
  
• Some ear or eye pro
  
  
• Gift certificates or range memberships for businesses in their area
  
  
• Action movies with gun porn (anything with a long-ass entry on IMFDB)
  
  
• A nice coffee table book
  
  
• Generic tools, like a pocket knife, multitool, or tacticool flashlight
  
  
• If they're a gun-toting gamer, stalk their Steam/Xbox Live/Playstation accounts and pick out a game they'd like (reloaders will particularly enjoy Fallout New Vegas)
  
  
• Beef jerky

http://www.amazon.ca/Streamlight-88031-Tactical-Flashlight-Batteries/dp/B00396S1Q2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1346378398&sr=8-1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=dYmI9wj62Mc#t=60s


Legal and can temporarily blind someone at night. Great for anyone walking alone at night, male or female. Can be used as a simple blunt weapon as well. Plus you have a reason to have it already in your hand before you get attacked. Do you really think you would have time to find your mace and use it before an assailant got to you?

I'm a fan of Streamlight. I have the microstream, it's great for the size.

Streamlight 66318 MicroStream C4 LED Pen Light https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00143JZ08/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_YWiMybHXT6QV1

If you don't mind the extra bulk you could go with something with a little more power.

Streamlight 88031 ProTac 2L High Performance Lithium Flashlight with White LED, 2-Lithium Batteries and Nylon Holster, Black https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00396S1Q2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_a0iMybC9QF49Z

I have a couple streamlight PollyTac lights that have worked well for me. The downside of the polymer body is that if you over tighten the mount the light can be stuck in the "on" position until you lossen it a little. https://www.amazon.com/Streamlight-88850-PolyTac-Flashlight-Batteries/dp/B001S0IN46/ref=sr_1_16?ie=UTF8&qid=1473949936&sr=8-16&keywords=protac

If I was do do-over I would get one of the aluminum ProTac lights for $10 more. I think they are the same diameter. https://www.amazon.com/Streamlight-88031-Tactical-Flashlight-Batteries/dp/B00396S1Q2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473949936&sr=8-1&keywords=protac

I carry a Preon P2 (2xAA) as my daily because it's small enough to fit comfortably in my pocket, but if you're looking for something more powerful, the Streamlight 88031 (2xCR123) is a fine light.

I know it's above your price point, but I have to mention the Fenix PD35 (2xCR123) as well. Of the ~10 lights I own, it's my favorite by a mile.

Both the 88031 and the PD35 come with a pair of batteries and a holster.

There are some decent AA lights out there as well; I can recommend a couple if you're interested. It's important to note that CR123 lights are generally better because the batteries are more suited to the high current required for a bright LED; if battery cost is an issue, look into rechargeable batteries for the CR123 lights.

TLDR: See links; CR123 lights are brighter and last longer; get rechargeable batteries if CR123 is an issue.

I carry this every day and love it. It used to be my backup light for when my duty light at work would run out of power.

Protac 2L

http://www.amazon.com/Streamlight-88031-Tactical-Flashlight-Batteries/dp/B00396S1Q2/ref=sr_1_2?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1372923971&sr=1-2&keywords=Streamlight+protac+strobe

Stream light. It takes cr123 batteries though. Not AA

I'd love this light, I work the night shift at a club and it's scary walking home sometimes, I've always wanted a flashlight for self defense but could never find the extra money to buy one,thanks!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00396S1Q2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_zkdDCbM58MZ4M

This. Its simple, light, BRIGHT and relatively cheap. I love it.
In case you are interested, this is the video that turned me on to it. 11:00ish. Hope it helps friend!

I'm an advocate for a good flashlight. This one is concealable, is bright enough to flash blind a person, and can be used as an impact weapon in case someone gets too close.