Improved LED Light Source for Borescope — Under $25
The standard light source for the Hawkeye Borescope works just fine. However, some users prefer a brighter light with a more pure white tint. A “whiter” light, folks have found, does a better job revealing traces of copper and small imperfections in the bore. Gradient Lens Corp. offers a high-tech Xenon “SuperNova” light source that provides ten times more light than the standard lamp. This works great, but the SuperNova lists for $225.00. Now there is a much more affordable option. Forum member Alf suggests: “I’d skip the SuperNova. Just go to Wally World and buy the $5.00 LED light upgrade for the mini-mag. Batteries last 10 times longer and the light is a whiter white, not a yellowish hue.”
Forum member Drano38 was the first to report on the inexpensive LED options for the Hawkeye Borescope: “I saw Maglite now has a 3-watt LED Mini-Maglite®, so I picked up one. The bulb bell is a little longer, and has more threads, but the thread pattern is the same. A quick comparison down the barrel showed much brighter and whiter than the Maglite shipped with the borescope. Is it worth about $24.00 for a brighter light? I think so. The LED Mini-Maglite flashlight is about 3/8″ longer than the regular, but it can still be [fitted into the borescope case].
Price Comparison: $24 for Mini-Maglite LED vs $225.00 for SuperNova Xenon
Forum member Gunamonth reports: “I’m not so concerned about brighter but whiter would make it a whole lot better. The color from the regular incandescent Mini-Maglite is kind of yellowish-orange which makes a lot of stuff seem like copper. I had considered buying the Nova light source until I saw this post by drano38 about a 3 watt LED version of a Mini-Maglite. It solves the problem of the regular incandescent bulb having a yellowish color that makes copper hard to see. The LED light is very white.
Thanks drano38. This is one of the best tips on this site. I was considering buying the Hawkeye Xenon SuperNova light to get rid of the yellow color of the standard lamp but the LED Mini-Maglite does the same thing for $200 less. Home Depot has the LED Mini-Maglite for for less than $24. Now the copper looks like copper and the stainless doesn’t.”
HOT DEAL: TylerTool.com sells 3-watt LED Mini-Maglites for just $19.35.
NOTE: While an LED MagLite does offer a brighter, whiter light, the Hawkeye SuperNova Xenon light source is even brighter yet. It is ten times brighter than the standard (non-LED) Mini-Maglite and it has a rechargeable Lithium-Ion battery. If cost is not an issue, the SuperNova is the most powerful light source for the Hawkeye.
If you already own a Mini Maglite buy a Nite Ize LED conversion for about $15 and get the same effect. I did this about a year ago and could not believe the improvement it make to your Hawkeye borescope.
Looks pretty good too – but doesn’t the hawkeye come with a maglite as standard?
I tried to get the nite ize led conversion bulb to fit my maglite but it wouldnt fit. Any useful suggestions would be appreciated. Maybe I ought to just buy the led maglite and forget about switching my hawkeye supplied maglite.
The Nite Ize will fit in the bulb style Maglite. However, the cap that has the on off switch wouldn’t work until I chucked it in the lathe and took a facing cut to remove some anodizing from where the cap sits against the unanodized part of the Maglite flashlite. If you take the lens cover off the LED mag lite, the adapter from the Hawkeye borescope will screw onto the LED version of the maglite. It will work, but it doesn’t fit on that version as well as the original Maglite.