Got a light?
LcFun Arc Lighter
Why carry a lighter if you don’t smoke? I don’t really know! Just in case? I mean… Just in case is why I carry a lot of the things I do with my EDC gear. I decided I wanted to investigate getting a lighter but didn’t want to carry one with fuel. Mostly because I worried about leaks. Lots of people just carry those disposable Bic lighters which will obviously get the job done to light a cigarette, candles, start a fire, etc… Not to mention you can buy them in so many places and they are cheap.
I decided to look at the rechargeable arc lighters. This allowed me to avoid having to deal with fuel and also… It’s just another geek toy this way! They are battery powered and when lit put out a spark to create a plasma conduit between two electrodes and that arc is then maintained by the battery source. They typically burn hotter than a traditional lighter, are flameless, and windproof. But don’t mistake not having a flame as “safe” in terms of heat. You can burn something (or yourself) just as easily with one of these as you can with a regular lighter. Be careful!
LcFun Arc Lighter in lit state
I found this LcFun Arc Lighter and decided to give it a try because it had good reviews and was reasonably priced. At the time of purchase, it was around $13. I liked that this one had an LED power display to show how much charge was still left. I think that this will be especially handy for me since this is a piece of gear that I probably won’t use very often but with the battery indicator it makes it easy for me to quickly check the status of the charge.
LcFun Arc Lighter showing battery indicators
It is unclear to me if these lighters are TSA friendly and I don’t fly very often so I just don’t know for sure. The TSA site seems to indicate not for checked luggage but in some cases it’s ok for carry on (if battery can be removed or with other safety precautions available). But when I was trying to do a little searching online many people seemed to indicate that it was not ok to travel with one (carry on or checked luggage). I wouldn’t recommend trying to fly with one. It just seems like the kind of thing that would just get taken away unfortunately.
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