SunNight Solar provides BoGo solar flashlights for good
By Susan Wilson
How many people in the industrialized world have solar flashlights? Probably very few. Local hardware stores, Wal-Marts, grocery stores, and dime stores carry everything from battery powered flashlights to crank flashlights, but I have never seen a solar flashlight on any store shelf.
SunNight Solar offers solar flashlights in a BoGo(Buy one Give one) package that allows you to provide a solar flashlight to one of 76 nonprofits worldwide. You can choose the particular nonprofit you want to receive a flashlight or you can choose one of the following categories: education, health, U.S. military, environmental, faith based, or nonprofit developing world.
Solar flashlights are important in many places worldwide because they provide the only alternative to costly oil lamps where electricity is scarce or sporadic, or the only lighting at night. For children in developing countries, this may be the only light by which they can read and study after dark.
Why solar flashlights and not just regular flashlights? Well, if you can’t afford to keep paying for batteries, a solar flashlight with renewable batteries is the way to go. Charging a solar flashlight is easy. Simply set it on a windowsill in the sunlight when you leave for work and it is charged when you get get home.
SunNight Solar provides yet another reason:
Our rechargeable batteries last for 750 to 1,000 individual nights of use, with each night a user enjoying on average six to eight hours of use. Compare this to a single use battery flashlight, with a maximum of fifteen hours of ever diminishing light prior to the batteries being thrown away and replaced.
SunNight Solar has two different types of solar flashlight - the Sunlight SL-1 and the Sunlight SL-2. Both SunNight solar flashlights have a nightglow strip, charge in eight hours, and contain a clip to allow the flashlight to be hung on a belt loop, backpack or purse. Both are built of ABS plastic, use LEDs (Light Emitting Diodes) and are water and shock resistant. The solar panels on the sides of these flashlights should last for 20 years.
The SL-1 will provide five to six hours of light. It requires three NiMH AA batteries to store the charge from the solar panel on the side of the flashlight. This flashlight also has six energy sipping LEDs.
The SL-2 has a high efficiency, boost converter and constant current LED drive, a printed circuit board and one transistor per LED. This light has nine LEDs that provide two different types of adjustable light. This flashlight also uses three NiMH AA batteries.
The three LEDs that run down the middle of the head provide light for the entire room and the six LEDs around the head provide normal light. Each set of LEDs can be set at low, medium, or high. Needless to say, the low setting uses the least amount of energy and will yield the longest battery life/number of hours of use. The power settings allow for five to six hours of light on high, six to eight hours on medium, and eight to ten hours on low.
The NiMH AA batteries are provided with each flashlight so that the recipients of the free light don’t need to purchase the first set. Although rechargeable NiMH batteries might be more expensive than alkaline batteries, they last much longer and ultimately cost less over time.
As part of a promotion, I submitted an entry to win one of the limited edition SunNight Solar SL-2s. It works wonderfully. Most of my other flashlights are hard to find in the dark and go through batteries even when not in use.
Even though these flashlights are more expensive than those you will find stocking the shelves of your local Wal-Mart, they work longer, are easier to find in the dark and under the BoGo program will provide light to people and households that would otherwise either not have lighting at night or have to pay a high price for oil or electricity.
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