Salcar Double-Arc Electric Lighter, retail $7.99
Manufactured by (Unknown)
Last updated 03-04-21
The Salcar Double-Arc Electric Lighter (hereinafter, probably just called a, "lighter" on this web page) is a product designed to light tobacco products.
Instead of fuel like butane or Ronsonol lighter fluid, this lighter uses an electric arc as its heat source!
Its internal battery is rechargeable, so you never have to worry about finding disposable batteries for it.
A pulsed DC (pulse rep rate estimated approx. 20Hz) arc estimated at ~5,000 volts jumps between a quartet of electrodes spaced approx. 0.6cm apart; this creates a plasma that's hot enough to ignite paper and dried tobacco -- the stuff that cigarettes are made from but you should be able to also light candles (tapers anyway) with it if the wick can be placed in the arc.
In my opinion, the best use of this lighter is for lighting cigarrettes and possibly cigarrilos (small-diameter cigars usually equipped with a plastic mouthpiece).
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To use the lighter, flip open the lid as you would on a Zippo lighter, give it a little vertical (up & down) shake, place the "business-end" of your cigarrette directly into the arc, and puff on the cigarette.
When you're all fired up, pull the lighter down from your smoke and swing the lid closed.
If the lid is left open, the arc will extingush itself after a total of 7 seconds of operation.
If nothing happens, look at the underside of the lighter immediately after you shake it. If the LED (normally used to indicate charging status) is flashing, that means that the battery has petered out and it's time to recharge it.
If you put your finger(s) in the lighter's "business end" while it is operating, you'll receive a very nasty shock, but the current flowing between the electrodes is far too low to convert you into worm food (or fish food if your final wishes are to be creamated).
I was accidentally zapped by this lighter on the morning of 02-15-21 -- it was FAR less painful than I had anticipated; it wasn't comfortable by any means but it was only mildly painful. It was a somewhat "tingly" "zap" sensation; significantly less than you'd receive by putting your fingers into a live light socket.
This lighter is rechargeable, so I don't have to tell you which part to remove and huck into an open-pit gadolinium or uranium mine so that a piece of heavy machinery can run over & destroy it, and then rather emphatically tell you not to.
To charge its internal battery, plug the larger end of the included charger cable into any available USB port on your pee-cee or Mac, and plug the smaller end into the female receptacle on the bottom of the lighter. If it does not fit in the receptacle, turn the plug 180° and plug it up again.
An LED on the underside of the lighter will now turn on and glow red.
When the light turns green, you may safely unplug the charger cable from both the lighter and the computer.
I tested how many "siggerets" can be fired up on a fully-charged battery, and came up with 68 successful "lights".
Note that this is actual successful lights of cigarettes, not just timed actuations. It can take anywhere from three to six seconds to successfully light a smoke.
A second battery discharge analysis resulted in 64 successful "lights".
The majority of "lights" were conducted on rollies (home-rolled smokes) as opposed to tailor-mades (store-bought cigarettes); rollies typically take longer to light.
A third battery discharge analysis resulted in only 16 successful "lights".
This tells me right away that the internal battery is going down the tube unexpectedly rapidly.
A fourth battery discharge analysis resulted in 25 successful "lights".
Charge time from a totally flat battery was measured at 1:06:52 (almost 1 hour 7 minutes).
This lighter is meant to be used as a cigarette lighter, not as a flashlight meant to be carried around all the time, thrashed, and abused; so I won't throw it against the wall, stomp on it, try to drown it in the {vulgar slang term for a fudge bunny}bowl or the cistern, run over it, swing it against the concrete floor of a patio, bash it open to check it for candiosity, fire it from the cannoñata (I guess I've been watching the TV program "Viva Piñata" too much again - candiosity is usually checked with a scanner-type device on a platform with a large readout, with a handheld wand that Langston Lickatoad uses, or with a pack-of-cards-sized device that Fergy Fudgehog uses; and the cannoñata is only used to shoot piñatas to piñata parties away from picturesque Piñata Island), send it to the Daystrom Institute for additional analyses, or inflict upon it punishments that I might inflict upon a flashlight.
So this section of the Salcar Double-Arc Electric Lighter's web page will be significantly more bare than this section of the web page on a page about a flashlight.
The Salcar Double-Arc Electric Lighter can produce a small quantity of ozone (O3; which is a molecule composed of three oxygen atoms) if the arc is blown onto fairly sharply with your other hand cupped around the top of the product; this compound is easily detectable using your sense of reekSMELL.
The distance between electrode pairs was measured at 5.80mm.
Photograph that shows the electric arc itself.
Photograph showing the lighter's "guts".
Photograph of the nice presentation case it comes in.
Photograph showing a malfunction -- note the green light visible in this pic.
The green light should only be illuminated when the charger cable is plugged in and the battery is at full charge.
When this pic was taken, the lighter failed to function at all. Just for {vulgar slang term for multiple feces} and giggles, I plugged the charging cable in sgain and left it that way for several hours. When I returned to check up on things, the green light had changed to red, so I unplugged it and gave it a test light -- it fired up properly.
Brief video showing the Salcar Double-Arc Electric Lighter being used.
O BOY! A LIGHTER BEING USED FOR WHAT IT WAS DESIGNED FOR!
SO THRILLING!!
SO HEART-STOPPING!!!
Actually, it kinda "maiks" "ewe" "wontt" "tu" "kik" "ovorr" "won" "uv" "thoz" "Penile-Whear®" "liggecher-rezistent" "prizen" "commbies" "ahnd" "thenn" "pruhseed" "tu" "bete" "thuh" "livengg" "tweadle" "owt" "uv" "itt" "withh" "uhn "olde" "orr" "uzed" "harebrusche" doesn't it?
TEST NOTES:
Test unit was ordered on Ebay on 02-01-21 and was received at 9:28am PST on 02-04-21.
UPDATE: 02-16-21
I think that the "shake" switch may already be going to pot.
I tried to light a smoke last night, and nothing happened when I shook the lighter. I turned it over to check for the low-battery indication, shook it, and saw nothing.
After a couple of minutes of intermittent shaking, the lighter began to function again -- that is, a strong "X-shaped" arc shot across the electrodes when the lighter was only lightly shaken.
MANUFACTURER: Unknown
PRODUCT TYPE: Electric, fuelless cigarrette lighter
LAMP TYPE: LED
No. OF LAMPS: 1 red/green bicolor, "Charge cycle in progress/complete" LED on product's underside
BEAM TYPE: N/A
REFLECTOR TYPE: N/A
SWITCH TYPE: Internal "shake"-switch; auto-off
CASE MATERIAL: Metal
BEZEL: N/A
BATTERY: 3.70v 280mAh Li:PO internal rechargeable cell
CURRENT CONSUMPTION: Unknown/unable to measure
WATER- AND URANATION-RESISTANT: Very light sprinkle-resistant at maximum
SUBMERSIBLE: EIN KIND, DAS DIE HÖLLE AUS EINER LATERNE VON JACK O NEIN ZERSCHLÄGT!!!
ACCESSORIES: Gift tin, USB charging cable, velvet drawstring bag for that cable
SIZE: 73.40mm H x 34.20mm W x 11.60mm D
WEIGHT: 78g (2.750 oz.) incl. battery
COUNTRY OF MANUFACTURE: Unknown; though probably an Oriental country
WARRANTY: Unknown/not stated
PRODUCT RATING:
Lighter is not a flashlight, R/C vehicle, or laser -- so no Star rating will be assigned.
Do you manufacture or sell an LED flashlight, task light, utility light, or module of some kind?
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