Buck Summit

The summit is a folding knife with a couple of extra tools created mainly for campers but also useful in urban environments.

The knife is a liner locking folder with a 3'' modified clip point blade, half serrated made of 420H steel. It offers thumbstuds to open and locks in a secure way. We found it good enough for normal cutting jobs with good edge retention and sharp from the factory. The grip is very good due to the shape of the handle with a generous area to rest your fingers, the inlays in the handles make the grip secure and non slippery.

At the back of the knife you will find a very generous lanyard attachment point and two small tools with their own thumbstuds. One is a can opener and bottle opener combo that can also be used to clean nails and minor cutting jobs. The second tool is a screwdriver that can work on both flat and philips screws. Both tools work very nicely and are well built.

The last tool in the Summit is a corkscrew, that in our modest opinion is a little hard to explain combined with a knife. Some other tool would have made more sense, anyway if you need a corkscrew this one works in an acceptable way.

The Summit is a good knife interesting if you go camping or as a multi use tool, it doesn't have a pocket clip and the corkscrew is not very useful, if you can deal with those problems then the rest is really very good.

You can read more from Buck's website or order from BaseGear for $55.

Surefire G2 LED

This is a new version of the Surefire G2 using a SSC P4 LED instead of the incandescent lamp in the regular Surefire G2.

With the LED the G2 can produce up to 80-90 lumen and the runtime is 12 hours, the light is not regulated so the light will get dimmer as the batteries are consumed. It uses two c123 primary batteries.

The body is made of Nitrolon polymer, extremely strong and resistant to all sorts of impacts and falls. The lens is polycarbonate with anti reflective coating.

The switch is a tactical lockout switch, you can press for momentary activation or twist for constant on, untwisting the tailcap a few turns locks the light to prevent accidental activation.

The beam is a good combination of throw and flood, the reflector is textured to make the beam of the led smooth without artifacts, this means the throw of the light is slightly compromised to make the beam more even. Compared to the incandescent version this throws less but produces more light in total output.

With a very long runtime the G2 is a good all-around flashlight that needs very little or no maintenance at all, it never needs a new bulb and can run for many hours with one set of batteries, the beam is good for indoor or outdoors use.

You can read more at Surefire's website or order from OpticsHq.

Novatac EDC 120P

The Novatac EDC is the sequel to the HDS EDC line of flashlights, the light uses a SSC P4 LED capable of up to 120 lumen and has different levels of brightness that can be programmed. It uses a single 123 battery.

The light has four modes of operation, each mode can be programmed to a selected brightness level or a signaling function. From Off you can go to primary mode pressing the tailcap switch or to max mode doing a click-press. Once on you can change primary/secondary with 2 clicks, you can go to minimum mode via 3 clicks or to maximum doing a click-press. Each of this four modes can be programmed so we call them maximum or minimum just because it is the factory default.

To program enter the mode you want to change and do a click-click-press, you will be able to change the brighness level with 22 levels available, if you continue past the maximum level you will be able to assign a disorienting strobe, emergency strobe or SOS to the mode. This means that if one of your modes is the strobe then you have only 3 brightness levels to set. Since you can program and reprogram the light on the fly quickly this is not a big problem. From an options menu you can also program a locator beacon and other settings that can be set on or off depending on your preferences. Programming is very flexible and simple to do without a manual.

The light is bright reaching 120 lumen but is not as bright as other single cell Cree LEDs in the market. It can run for about 20 minutes in maximum before dropping to a lower level, all the brightness levels are regulated so the intensity won't change as the battery gets depleted. It can use any type of C123 batteries. This is good if you find a level that is perfect for your activities since it will keep constant.

The beam is a good compromise between throw and flood, the tint of the LED in our test model was blueish / purple. The interface is very easy to use but can be a little annoying with the click, double click, triple click and click press getting confused sometimes.

The body is constructed in HA-III aluminum resitant to scratches and impacts, the lens is polycarbonate glued to a bezel with slight crenelations to know if the flashlight is on or off. The light comes with an optional pocket clip that to our taste wasn't very good, it didn't seem to be very solid and it was too bulky and protruded a lot from the light body.

We found the Novatac 120P and excellent EDC light very flexible and easy to set to your own personal preferences, the maximum brightness is not incredible and the runtime is a little short, the tint was poor and the pocket clip is not very good, for the price we think it is either a love or hate flashlight that will be very good for those that like programmable lights with many options, other users that focus more on the output and performance than a list features might be disappointed.

You can order from LightHound for $150.

EDC Magnets

Magnets can be useful in several scenarios and while it is not common to see someone carrying a magnet just in case it may be a good idea to add a few to your EDC kit.

Modern magnets today are made of rare earth aleations, mainly neodymium, they are incredibly strong and if used without care they may pinch your skin.

Magnets can be used to hold EDC items such as flashlights to metal surfaces, hollow disc magnets can be added to a pen to clip it to a metal surface, slim discs can be used as buttons with your clothes, they can also be used to attach a light to baseball cap, collect small screws and other metallic objects and a myriad of applications.

The collection featured in this picture shows a wide variety of neodymium magnets, including rods, spheres, cubes, discs and rings. As long as you keep them away from any electronic device they can be surprinsingly useful in many situations.

You can order in different shapes and sizes from Amazing Magnets.

Streamlight Sidewinder

The sidewinder is a strange looking utility flashlight, the body is shaped in a rectangular form with an articulated head that can rotate, in the head we can find a white .5W white LED and three 5mm LEDs, the 3mm LEDS are red, blue and the third one can be either green or IR depending on the model.

The light uses a rotating knob to select the LED to use and a switch to select the mode for the LED being used, it has 4 brightness levels 5%, 20%, 50% and 100% that can be rotated keeping the on/off button pressed. With a double click in the switch from Off a strobe function is activated.

The sidewinder uses two AA batteries and the runtime on maximum brightness is 7 hours for the white led, 10 for the green, 12 for blue and 14 for the red one. In minimum brightness it can go for over 100 hours. The white high mode is about 20 lumen.

The beam of the white led is a floody warm white excellent for a tasklight, the color leds have artifacts. We liked the user interface and the ability to use 4 levels or a strobe on the 4 LED colors. The body made of polycarbonate plastic is extremely strong featuring a very good clip at the back. The head can be rotated 180 degrees to point where you want if you use the light attached to a vest or pack. We found the rectangular body very compact and useful for pockets, straps and even belt carry and the light is strongly built and very useful as a tasklight or utility light.

You can read more from Streamlight's website or order for $50 from BrightGuy, available in coyote tan and olive green bodies with blue-red-IR or blue-red-green leds.

GripMaster

The Gripmaster is a small device to train the muscles in your hand and forearm increasing your strength and dexterity.

The device has individual springs for each of the four fingers in your hand excluding your thumb, since each finger is related to its own set of muscles and tendons the Grimaster ensures that all, or most of your muscles are trained.

The strength of each finger or the whole device can't be adjusted so the Gripmaster is sold in three versions offering different tensions, blue is the lightest, red medium and black the strongest.

After using the gripmaster for a while you will quickly notice a burn in your hand and forearm that means that your muscles are working, the less used to work the muscle is the sooner it will burn so with time you will be able to train for longer periods and evenatually increase your hand strength, this can be useful in several activities from sports such as golf or rock climbing to tennis and martial arts.

We found the device good to relax and discharge stress and it definitively works with your hand and arm muscles, the thumb not being used is a question mark about how the real improvementin your grip and a second criticism is that it is certainly boring to use it.

You can read more at the Official site and order for $14 from Brigade Quatermasters.

UltraPod Mini Tripod

The UltraPod is a minimalistic ultralight tripod for digital cameras and other devices with a tripod mount like some flashlights.

It has three foldable translucent polycarbonate legs with a metal cap in the end, the legs can't be adjusted in length. The head has a ball-joint adjustable camera attachment, that is used to point the camera in the right direction and angle.

The Ultrapod comes with a velcro strap that can be used to attach the tripod to a tree limb, a chair, a pole, a rock etc. The idea is that you fold the legs, attach the folded legs and then attach the folded legs to the anchor point using the velcro strap.

This is a tripod that works very well with the small digital cameras but is probably not a good idea with big SLR or SLR-like cameras, if you have one of the small and light cameras having one of these in your kit can always be a good idea for those long exposure night shots or to take a group picture without leaving someone behind.

The total size when folded is 5'' and it's extremely light, it can be carried in any bag or backpack without risk of damage since the construction is solid.

You can order from Thinkgeek for $12.

Steri Pen Water Purifier

For those that frequently camp or like to do adventure hikes water is a top priority and since you can't carry unlimited amounts of water a water purification device is an useful tool.

The SteriPen uses UV light to purify water, it destroys bacteria, viruses and protozoa making the water safe to drink without leaving any chemical residue or odor in the water.

Using the device is simple, just press the button and agitate the water with a gentle stir. 16 oz of water can be purified in less than a minute and it takes a minute and a half to purify 32 oz of water.

The device works using four AA batteries, with alkaline batteries you can purify 20 to 40 16 oz glasses of water, using lithium AA batteries this can go up to 100 glasses so lithiums are strongly recomended.

The total weight of the steri pen with batteries is 8oz (6.4 with lithiums), it comes with a carrying pouch so it's simple an easy to carry. We found it simple to use and effective and safe to carry, no chemicals involved. Since it uses UV light to purify the water needs to be clean for the steripen to be effective, if the water is not clean you have to filter the water first so you need to carry some kind of filtering device to make sure you will be able to use the steripen.

There is a kit that comes with a solar charger for long trips and camping and the company also sells a filtering device. You can read about the different models and products from the company website. The version tested here can be ordered from REI for $100.