It’s far from the most powerful flashlight. Suffice to say, it’s not the lighting tool you’ll want to bust out when you’re conducting a search party in the woods under the clear night skies. For use around camp, though, the UCO Gear Plasma Arc Lighter & Flashlight should handle most spot lighting needs, all while pulling double duty as a lighter to jumpstart your fire-making.
At first glance, it’s nothing more than a light-duty flashlight. It’s compact enough to fit in most pockets and bright enough for most casual tasks, making it a good addition to anyone’s everyday carry. With the addition of the lighter, though, it might prove even more useful, allowing you to get dual functions without taking up too much space.
The UCO Gear Plasma Arc Lighter & Flashlight is housed in a compact shell measuring 4.2 x 1.4 x 1 inches (length x width x thickness), allowing it to fit in any pocket or spare corner of your EDC pouch. It has a clip, too, so you can secure it to the edge of your pocket or your belt for more versatile carrying options. At the business end, it houses a 100-lumen LED light that you can use for whatever spot lighting need comes up, whether you’re searching for something in the trunk, fixing up gear in your tent, or gathering tools inside an unlit shed. It’s dimmable, too, for those times you need just a bare amount of light, with a strobe mode you can activate during emergencies. And while 100 lumens isn’t the most powerful illumination out there, it should handle most tasks that won’t require long-throw spot lighting.
On the opposite end, you can flip the spring-loaded bezel to reveal the plasma lighter, which creates two arcs of highly-charged plasma that will set any flammable object it touches on fire. According to the outfit, the plasma will burn at a whopping 1400 degrees, so you can get a fire started in very short order. And since this is a plasma lighter, it’s completely wind-proof, allowing you to light things up even in the midst of the strong winds.
The UCO Gear Plasma Arc Lighter & Flashlight has a single button that can be used to control both the flashlight and the plasma lighter, making it extremely simple to operate. Both the light and the lighter nodes draw power from a built-in rechargeable 340 mAh battery, which, we imagine, should hold enough charge for a few hundred lighter currents or a few hours of flashlight use. There’s no listed endurance rating for the battery, however.
Construction is aluminum alloy for the shell, so it should be durable enough to withstand a bunch of rugged encounters, whether at home, in the field, or deep in the backcountry. It’s water-resistant, too, with an IPX4 rating, so it should withstand drizzles and splashes, although you can’t quite submerge it and take it out unscathed. The whole thing weighs a light 4.8 ounces.
Want one? The UCO Gear Plasma Arc Lighter & Flashlight is available now, priced at $19.99.