New Minex Carbides?

[JoeyS]

I don't own a carbide lamp of any kind, however at SERA this weekend, one of the vendors was selling a "newly manufactured Minex" carbide lamp. Actually, he had several models, two of which looked like the typical caplamp and one that was obviously too big for a helmet. The vendor says that a company in India has taken the tradename and design and are making the working replicas. I am curious if anyone has bought one and how it works compared to the originals still out there.

I almost bought one just for messing around the camp, maybe a cave trip if it is reliable, but then thought better of it, choosing instead to blow some money on rope and other what-knots ( ). The all brass model was 55 dollars I believe, fyi..

So anyone know about these lights?

[mabercrombie]

I have a minex cap lamp that was manufactured in India by the J.D....(dont recall and dont want to dig it out at the moment) company. I used it once in Howards Waterfall. As far as a caving light it is HORRIBLE! The all brass construction makes the lamp so heavy you have a hard time keeping your helment from falling over your eyes. I ended up tightening mine so hard it actually bruised my forhead. And furthermore acetelyne will bubble up through the reservor and cause water to drip out of the hole that is in the top of the resevor cap. Its a real pretty lamp to set on a shelf, and even to take to an event for a table lamp. If I wanted a carbide lamp to take caving I would try and find an Autolight on ebay, or find the guy at the cave in who sells refurbished lamps, I think he sells them from about 60 + dollars.

[Adam Craig]

I almost bought one of the new Minex lamps but I haven't read too many good things about them. Right there's another example

There are plenty of great Auto-Lites to be had on Ebay for far less than $60... Refurbish it yourself with some new parts. IMO sells Premier parts, and most, if not all, fit the Auto-Lite just fine.

Let me know if you need any technical advice on refurbishing Auto-Lites or others. I've done a few

[cheshire]

I reviewed the lamp for an NSS News article I did a while ago. The cons of the lamp far outweigh the pros. And pretty much the main pro is that it's sturdy, and it's available.

The functionality is below the standards of a dependable light. It functions... but barely.

JK Dey & Son was actually looking into manufacturing a light based on the general strengths of the Autolite, Guy's Dropper, and Justrite. Though after examining those lamps, they determined that they could not produce the light and make it cost effective unless someone ordered 5,000 of them. No distributor is confident enough in the market to order over $200,000 worth of product.

So, in short, my advice is to stay away from the light. Find a Mike Lite if you can. A Justrite Streamlined is next on my list, as you can fit Premier parts in a Justrite Streamlined.