The K3A is the most economically-priced of all the promotional Maglights. Sometimes they are on sale for only $7.94. That fits into most budgets for appreciation gifts. It does come with an alkaline battery and a carry strap. There’s no need to wrap this one up as a present. It already comes with a permanent hard plastic hinged gift box.
The other popular one has an LED bulb and 2 AA batteries. It puts out an extreme amount of light for its size. LED flashlights are often requested by business owners who want to give a high quality gift to their employees.
The first flashlight was invented in 1899 by David Misell. It contained 3 D cells
Engraved Flashlights For the Future
and an incandescent light bulb. In 120 years, we have come a long way. LED’s have replaced the bulb. Electronic circuits now provide different light levels and a strobe effect and power conservation. Recharging has become a valuable option. And now the COB (chip on board) bulbs are super bright.
The history of promotional flashlights involves different types of imprinting. Pad printing changed into laser engraving. Today engraved flashlights with your corporate logo are ubiquitous.
What can we hope for in the future? Here are some of my ideas. Do you have more? Please let me know in the comment section.
Your logo lights up when the flashlight is turned on.
Part of your logo imprint changes when you turn on the torch. This could be done with the help of liquid crystals or special circuitry.
Add this to the imprint: “If found, please return to….”
The barrel changes color depending on the temperature. LCD technology could do this.
A keylight that firmly holds your house key so it lights up the key hole as you insert your key. The original keylights would point in the opposite direction of what you wanted.
A flashlight that has a built-in battery tester. Wouldn’t it be nice to see how close you are to having to replace batteries?
A built-in beeper that allows your cell phone to find it. This would be great, as long as you know where your phone is.
If you are thinking of giving a useful gift to some of your customers, here are some ideas. These are the people who would love to get an architect scale ruler from you, with your company logo.
Architect
Kitchen Designer
City Planner
Engineer
Contractor
Builder
Draftsman
Construction Estimator
All of these people design or read blueprints in the course of their daily work. An architect scale ruler is a necessity for measuring the size of objects on the blueprint. It is used in the office and at the job site.
If your company needs to advertise to the people on this list, then you need to order architect scale rulers with your logo permanently engraved.
When business owners think about giving a Maglite engraved with their logo to their employees, here are their top questions:
Giving a Maglite Engraved With Your Logo
Can I get a Maglite in my corporate color? The K3A comes in 8 different colors. Probably one of them will correspond with your corporate color. Many other models come in colors other than the basic black, blue, gray and red.
Does it have a lifetime warranty? Maglite used to offer a lifetime warranty, but that stopped about 2019. Now it appears that they handle warranty questions one at a time on their website, using a form. They don’t have a written warranty posted on their website as of today.
Does the imprint wear off? The laser engraved imprint is permanent. Your company logo will last forever. The laser burns through the colored outer layer, and into the aluminum barrel.
What does laser engraving cost? The price of engraving is included in the price of the Maglite. There is a setup charge.
How is the flashlight packaged? Each Maglite engraved with your logo comes in a hard plastic hinged presentation box, with a velvet covered cradle. So your customer or employee will be thrilled to see their favorite flashlight in a unique gift box.
Keep it clean. If you keep sand and dirt from inhabiting your tape, it will look good longer and last longer.
Line it up straight on the pipe. If you put the tape on a little crooked, you will get an erroneously high reading.
Clean the pipe. This makes sure that surface contaminants aren’t interfering with your measurement.
Use a felt tip marker to mark common measurements directly on the tape. Don’t be a hero. This tip will make your job easier.
Put your name on it. Valuable and handy tools have a way of walking away.
Buy only the best pipe diameter tape measure. Lufkin is a trusted brand name.
Keep one in every location that you work (and leave it there). I keep one in the office, my shop, my tool box, and in all my vehicles and boat. A diameter tape doesn’t measure only diameters. The other side is a regular inch tape (or metric tape). So it comes in handy many times.
Please post your own tips in the comments here. I’d be interested in what you come up with. Thanks.
Notice that one side is probably just a regular inch tape measure.
The other side is also in inches, but it seems to be stretched out about 3 times longer than normal. It’s actually stretched out by a factor of pi (3.14159). This is the diameter tape side.
Use the diameter tape side for this lesson.
Clean off the pipe of any dirt or other debris.
Simply wrap the tape around the pipe, keeping the diameter side out, so you can read it.
Note where the zero mark lines up on the tape. That gives you the outside diameter of the pipe.
It may be hard to read the markings. They are probably not marked the same as a regular tape. They may be in 64ths of an inch or 100ths of an inch. Either way, you have just learned how to use a diameter tape!
Oilfield and gas field workers use Tally Books every hour of the day. They keep
How to Build a Better Pipe Tally Book
track of when tasks are done, the size and length of the pipes they install, and gauge readings. How can you make their pipe tally books more useful to them?
Add a vinyl pen loop, so the workers won’t loose their pen or pencil.
Design the book with spiral binding instead of stitched binding, so the book will lay flat.
Make the color of the vinyl cover bright, so it can be found easily in a pile of other items.
Print valuable information on the back cover, or on the inside of the cover. This can be phone numbers, conversion tables, decimal equivalents, etc.
Order a 3 page clear vinyl insert, so you can store business cards, printed material, and other important info.
Order a water-resistant stone pad for more durability. These amazing pads look like paper pads, but you can’t tear them, and they resist water damage.
The pipe diameter tape measure is normally used by pipeline workers and inspectors. They wrap it around the circumference of the pipe, and read the
A New Use for a Pipe Diameter Tape Measure
diameter size on the tape. Now this useful tape can take on a new use during the COVID-19 lockdown.
For those of you who are forced to stay at home every day, you may have discovered the comforting appeal of the refrigerator. It’s always there with food for when you are hungry. It’s even there when you are not hungry, but just need some comfort. If you have a bathroom scale, you may have noticed that the spring might be getting weaker this month. Or, could it be that you are actually putting on weight?
A Lufkin pipe diameter tape measure can be a fun way to try to prove that your bathroom scale might be broken. Wrap it around your waist or your arm, and see for sure if you are getting too chummy with the Frigidaire.
