Magnet-Adorned LED Caltrop May Come In Handy

lightTell me this baby wouldn’t come in handy when trying to work on a Vespa smallframe carburetor. You could be right. But I’m imagining being caught on the side of the road in the rain and tossing this little bugger down the hole and heading in after it. A must for the metal-bodied aficionado? Or is holding a mini-maglite between your teeth more comfortable for you? Note to Striker: Send me one and I’ll write another post reviewing it.

8 thoughts on “Magnet-Adorned LED Caltrop May Come In Handy”

  1. I have 2 of these on the way and got them specially for keeping in the scooter!

    I figure I’d keep one there and one in the house for who-knows-what. I am a flashlight freak and having light = good.

  2. Isn’t a caltrop one of those spiky things that a spy can drop out of a secret panel in his Aston-Martin to puncture the tires of a car that’s chasing him?

    That thing is a Katamari.

  3. When you leave it laying around and then step on it without shoes on it will be a caltrop. If I don’t hear from Striker, I’ll order some from their Chinese knock off producer in a week.

  4. I didnt even think of the Katamari thing until you said something! And it makese sense. If you roll it around in a land of metal washers, screws, paperclips, etc. :D

    Still waiting for mine to ship.

  5. I’ve been under the weather, so I’ve not done a proper review yet.

    However, I have used the 2 lights I got already several times and they are damn handy. Esp since my Stella has lots of metal body parts, it was very easy to find a place to stick them.

    Here is a bit more now that I’ve used them a few times…

    First off, they are tiny, like so tiny I think without the lanyard you might drop and lose them. I think putting them onto a bit longer lanyard connecting two together would be nice.

    The quality is questionable in spots, in particular the sketchy ‘on/off’ switch comes to mind. It feels cheap and is a bit hard to switch on 1 of the 2 I purchased. Also, some of my magnets have glue around them coming out of the little holes, others are fine. But, they are solid and honestly I don’t think the blue bits are an issue really.

    The next thing you notice is the magnets. They are very powerful. In one of the photos I took, I hung it off the screw on a light switch in my bathroom. Then, I hung the 2nd one off that one, no problems. These things aren’t going anywhere when they are stuck to something. And 1 single magnet stuck firmly to a surface is more than enough to hold it into place without question.

    The light itself is powerful for a single LED. However, I wish it had something a bit brighter like one of those luxor hyper white LEDs. A small wish and nothing more. Otherwise, I have no complaints about the brightness as long as you need light in a small concentrated area. These lights are not for having great visibility while changing a flat at night.

    My first real world use was in my garage. I had some work to do on my carb, so I stuck one right above the carb shining down into the area I was working on, and the other off to the side to illuminate the carb more. I left all the lights in the garage off, and the door was closed, and they did a great job of showing me exactly what I pointed them at.

    They have 3 little “hearing aid” style batteries in them, and I have no idea what kind of battery life they get. But they appear to just pop open to replace the batteries. I’ve not tried to open one yet to find out what kind of batteries they are. I figure if I have 2 in my glovebox, one dies, I am covered.

    I think the real focus of these things, feature wise, is most definitely the magnets and the way they are arranged. At first, it seems wierd to have all these magnets everywhere. You think to yourself, “Why not just put some on 2 or 3 sides of a cube?” but when you actually use them, stick them to something, you “GET IT”. You see why they chose the placement they did. And it works. You literally have a huge combination of ways you can affix them to any magnetic friendly metal surface. Like I said, it only takes 1 to stick it to something, but that’s the beauty, if you can only get one to stick due to a small amount of surface available, that is just fine. But you can also do more if you have the area.

    I found that it was very easy to find a perfect location for each for almost all the work I did using them. Not once I did I think I needed a better place to put it and aim at the spot I was working.

    And the price is right. They are under $10 each, which to me is a good thing. I’d like to see them sold in pairs, since 2 or more is better, but buying 2 still keeps you well under $20. And I’ve wasted far more money on useless crap before, so their value here is obvious.

    I am planning on purchasing 2 more of them now that I’ve used them. I want to keep two in my shop for use around the garage and house, and 2 in the scooter for emergencies.

    The only thing missing is the lack of a pulse/flash mode for emergencies at night. But that is a minor thing to an otherwise very useful and interesting product.

    To summarize, these Striker LED magnet lights are a very nice and affordable addition to anyone’s tool set. And I can easily recommend them to anyone who needs to do work in dark places on their scooter.

    And it beats holding your flashlight in your teeth! :D

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