Reviewed by: CAPT. MIKE SCHOONVELD
Almost every Great Lakes fishing trip for me starts in the dark. I’ve installed lights in my boat to help me negotiate at the helm or on the back deck when I’m setting lines and I have mounted an LED floodlight on the stern to light up the “action zone” where salmon or walleye are reeled in close enough to net from the otherwise black waters. Those lights take care of what’s going on in the boat and in the immediate vicinity, but what’s happening 10 yards away or 100 yards or more?
I used to keep a Q-Beam spotlight on board I could plug into my boat’s cigarette lighter outlet. It would shoot a brilliant light at distant items, like nav buoys, pierheads or bonehead kayakers with only a dim firefly of a nightlight showing. It would brighten up these or perhaps unknown things 20 yards or perhaps 200 yards ahead. It worked, but it’s an antique these days of flashlights that don’t have to be hardwired or portable lights that eat non-rechargeable batteries.
All the “regular” flashlights I use these days are rechargeable, including the headlight I strap on to give me hands-free lighting down to small “pen” lights that shine brighter and longer than the D cell lights I used to employ.
I own several NEBO lights and their quality and function are top shelf. NEBO is a company that produces rechargeable lights from keychain size up to spotlight models, probably brighter than my old Q-Beam.
The small one I use most is a NEBO SLIM+ 1200. I reviewed it for GLA a couple years ago and you can now see that review at: www.fishgear.reviews/2022/07/24/nebo-slim-1200-flashlight/
As the name implies, it’s a 1200 lumen model, almost blindingly bright. When I got the news release from NEBO about their Davinci line of “super-bright” flashlights, with models up to 12,000 Lumens, I was intrigued. “If a 1200 lumen is bright, a 12000 lumen must be blazing,” I thought.
I got one and it instantly retired my old Q-Beam. The Davinci is more compact than the Q-Beam (or other super bright flashlights) and there’s no wired plug-in for power. It’s similar in size to a Maglite 3D that cops often carry as a light and a weapon to bonk the bad guys. I’m sure the Davinci could double as a billy-club in a pinch, weighing two pounds and with a stout, sturdy construction.
More important (at least for fishermen) it turns night into day out to an amazing distance when the adjustable beam is tightened from wide angle to narrow with a twist of the knurled ring just behind the light. A different ring-dial dims the light to five lesser settings all the way down to 300 lumens. Dialing down extends the battery life to 12 hours.
If you would like to check out or purchase the Davinci 12000 light or other models and sizes of rechargeable lights go to: www.nebo.agcbrands.com.
FISHING TOYS 