A few years ago I decided to put in some landscape lighting and decided to make it into something that would be useful for emergencies as well by getting solar-powered lights. I didn't want any of those dim lights that didn't do much other than act as a marker. I wanted some that could actually, you know, light areas up! After doing some searching, I ended up buying some lights from InnoGear (https://a.co/d/iq7VQje). It's been about 5 years now, so there might be some better ones on the market, but I've stuck with these since they're reasonably priced and I can get lights that roughly match the others.
The big draws for me were: lithium-ion batteries (I believe the internal batteries are 18650 with about 2000mah of capacity), high/low output setting (around 150-200 lumen on low and 400-600 on high), and both the head and solar panel are adjustable (although only in a single plane).
When I first bought them, there was someone from Florida who mentioned using these after a hurricane as indoor lighting. He'd put them outside during the day, then bring them in at night. He even posted a picture, showing them pointing up into the shades on the table lamps in his family room, so that they made it look as if the lights were on.
I really like them. The camera brightens the pictures quite a bit, but they're fairly bright (even on low mode) and last for quite a while once they're charged (obviously they last longer in the summer when there is more sunlight). And they're even fairly reasonably priced.
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I've lost a few to water intrusion, but the real problem is that Mother Nature appears to hate them! Four of them have been smashed by falling branches (seriously, they only take up like .001% of the square footage of my property, how is that even possible?). But the latest broken one appears to have been the victim of a cat / woodchuck / dog / skunk / raccoon / woolly mammoth (no idea what was involved, just a bunch of footprint-blobs all around a broken off light).
Apparently Mother Nature is now outsourcing her destruction to the animals of the world! Not cool, Ma, not cool!
Anyway, just wanted to throw this out as a possible prep idea.
I had a whole collection of dead lights (turns out there were 9 of them!), mainly from getting smashed by things (only two of those were outright failures, likely due to water). There's a hazmat collection day coming up this weekend and I wanted to go through these to see if I should take anything there. Yep, I definitely needed to!
Pile of old lights:
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These lights all use 18650 lithium-ion (NMC) batteries and they aren't soldered, but are in a regular battery bay. I pulled all of the batteries out from the broken lights and found that 6 of them were just fine. They were clean and when I put them on a charger they immediately started to charge. Cool!
The other three had issues. I didn't even try to charge them as all three had rust spots on the vents at the positive end. One of them had a significant spot of rust there, which means that I might've just saved my house! After all, these are batteries that can easily start fires if things go sideways. Right now, all three of those batteries are outside on my driveway (concrete) away from anything flammable. I'll toss them in with the other batteries tomorrow, but for now, I wanted them in a safe spot.
Just to be on the safe side, I did put the charger in the middle of the floor in my shop with all of the old batteries in it. If one of them is bad and shorts / catches fire, hopefully it's far enough away from anything that it would just burn out. I'd lose the charger, but that's better than the house!
Old batteries charging. The red ones are flat-top and the blue are button-top. Other than that, they're all 2200mah 18650 batteries:
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And all three of the bad batteries are on their way to battery heaven, aka, hazmat collection day! The rest of them charged up just fine and are now ready for use in any of my devices that use 18650 batteries, or if I'm able to piece together some working lights out of the dead light pile.
Had another light that went kaput, so I pulled it and opened it up. The solar on it still works, as is obvious from the battery being fully charged when I removed it. So I go to grab one of the extras that I have, only to discover ANOTHER ENTIRE BOX OF DAMAGED / DEAD ONES THAT I MISSED LAST WEEK!
Well, I guess I'll have to open all those up and pull the batteries as well. If any of them are bad, I'll have to find somewhere that will take li-ion batteries, since we won't have another hazmat collection day until spring.
ETA: Looks like both Home Depot and Lowe's have drop bins for them.
I keep a few packed with my light box kit in case I'm forced outside on the road and have to tent camp. Set them outside during the day and bring into the tent for nighttime use.
My experience with home ones has been uniformly bad. A few years back I purchased six copper tone lamp posts from Big Lots for only $40 each and placed them at the front of my driveway. They provided some small illumination but mostly they identified my driveway opening in the dark (I was quite rural at the time). They looked great. They were there for about a week and someone stole them. I thought about getting more but figured they would get swiped too
I've used cheap ones over the years but mostly if used outside all year they only last a year or maybe two. They either fill with water or get broken. I did put some fence post toppers on my pool fence that lasted a few years and kept the gate illuminated.
I had a few mounted under my eaves on the darker sides of the house that have motion sensors. They lasted about 2-3 years.
The one that lasted the longest was inside the barn and had a solar panel run outside. It had a motion sensor and was used to give light while feeding the chickens. That thing lasted about ten years, and I only changed the batteries once. They seem to last a lot longer when out of the weather.
These are pretty good and because they just take a regular 18650 in a regular battery bay (without being soldered), they could be upgraded to last longer (they come with 2200mah batteries). However, I've lost a lot of them to either water infiltration, or because Mother Nature apparently hates them and keeps trying to kill them with falling branches! These have two modes, low and high, and the high is pretty bright.
There were three more dead lights in the box that I came across today and only one of the batteries was salvageable. The other two were badly rusted. Fortunately, I was planning a grocery trip tonight anyway and Home Depot is right next door. There was a drop box just inside the entrance that had a section for rechargeable batteries. The one that was good is currently on the charger. I'll add it to the stash once it's recharged.
I did a quick tour tonight and found a number of them that weren't on. I'm not sure if the batteries are just run down, or if the lights are bad. If it's just that the batteries are low, I can certainly swap in some of the ones that I've recharged. Or I could just turn the lights off for a few days to let them get caught back up. It wouldn't surprise me if there's not quite enough sun right now to keep the batteries topped off, particularly with as degraded as some of the panels are. One of them got sprayed with deck stain last year and there's one that I accidentally hit with my string trimmer. Several others are peeling after years of being in the sun. I've still got some spares, so if any of them are truly dead, I'll swap them out. Fortunately, they were only around $10 each, so losing a few each year isn't going to bankrupt me!