Kayak Fishing Adventures on Big Water’s Edge - Promar Glow Lights Sticks...POS or ????

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Promar Glow Lights Sticks...POS or ????

1st hooping session: everything goes fine, glow sticks turn on and off with no issues.

2nd hooping session: everything goes fine during the trip, get home, dump gear in garage and call it a night. The following morning I go in my garage to get all my gear in order, for whatever reason I decide to turn on one of the new glow sticks....nada. I take the batteries our and try a different pair, light comes on so I'm thinking, maybe I left it on? No, not possible, I got home around 11pm and would have noticed if the light was on.

I go to turn the glow stick off.....nada. Now it will not turn off or switch to the flashing mode. I'm thinking maybe its the batteries so I switch the batteries, glow stick comes on but I can't shut it off. I check the batteries that the stick came with, all three batteries are dead. GREAT!!!! I bought a lemon

I stop at the store where I purchased the sticks, dude at the front counter says, 'no problem, grab another one and we'll get you going'. I go check the shelf, not a glow stick in sight. I go back to the counter, dude at counter says, 'we should have more in on Wednesday, you can swap it out then'.

Saturday comes around, go to the tackle shop......nada. Dude at the counter says, come back Wednesday...............

This past weekend I went out again, pull out the other good new glow stick....f-en thing will not turn on. I go to check it using a fresh pair of batteries.....nada

Is anyone else having the same problem? I paid about $15 for both sticks, not a lot but I'm not in the business of giving my money away. I'm going to give the tackle shop a visit and ask for my money back or store credit. After that's said and done I'll probably send Promar an email letting them know how disappointed I was with their 'new' product

marine glue is your friend

Quote:

Originally Posted by jorluivil (Post 136539)

POS, I bought three last year to use that night and one or two didn't work right out of the package. Went back to charkbait they said sorry and gave me three chemsticks. Manager told one of the staff to pull them off the floor. Guess they had other returns. :doh:

Not trying to bash Promar but they need to get it right, they should be setting the example. Anyway, I got a PM that provided info on how to get these returned, they'll send replacements as soon as the 'new' ones come in. ............. I guess they're already aware of the issue.

Check out WallyWorld, in the camping section. They have these battery powered glow sticks at the low cost of 3.50. Built in whistle and small flashlight as well. One downside is... They use the flat circle batteries. :cheers1:

Are these the new ones that have a flashing mode and straight light?

I know that the ones of last year and previous years where the batteries were enclosed in a plastic shrink tube did have issues, mainly with replacement batteries. These new ones seemed hopeful and last week when we went hooping performed flawlessly. I actually was very stoked on them.

Had an issue like that with one of mine, what I figured ot was the o-ring seal doesnt quite "seal" I put some silicone grease on it after it dried out and bang problem solved. I have several of them and have only had the issue with one so far...but YMMV....

Went with saba slayers reccommendation and sourced some replacement batteries online for much cheaper:
http://www.amazon.com/Maxell-LR44-Ba...r-44+batteries

I also have the light from wallyworld that GR6RR mentioned, haven't tried it out yet but seems even less waterproof, will test it out next trip and see how it does.

What do the new ones look like? I just bought a set that was on clearance. Wondering if it's the old or newer ones.

Old ones you powered up by twisting the end cap, this year it is a 2 stage button giving a flash pattern and also a constant light. From everything I have seen they use the same part number for new ones as the old.

Cool thanks for clearing that up. Sounds like I got the newer ones. Hope they hold up. Good to hear Promar is taking care of OP's issue.

I had this same problem Jorge. I bought 4 and 2 of them didn't work after 1 use i couldn't turn the damb things off no matter how hard i pushed the button. I tried twisting finale I just put it in a bag and let the battery run out changed the battery and tada it works correct again havent had it in the water yet i suspect thats the problem

Quote:

Originally Posted by jaws197 (Post 136553)

I also have the light from wallyworld that GR6RR mentioned, haven't tried it out yet but seems even less waterproof, will test it out next trip and see how it does.

yea, it does get wet and stops working. I normally throw it inside my makeshift float. (bottle or whatever) shines bright for low cost

Quote:

Originally Posted by jorluivil (Post 136564)

Here's what I have

http://i997.photobucket.com/albums/a...g?t=1348885826

Someone went to the seminar!

shrink tubeing works wonders for these sticks...

Quote:

Originally Posted by dorado50 (Post 136586)

shrink tubeing works wonders for these sticks...

I checked the inner parts....no water, no moisture, no rust.

This sucks bro,I remember you where stoked on trying these out. Shiznitt happens,do what you gotta do:boxing_smiley:.Maybe if they get enough complaints they'll re-engineer these things.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jorluivil (Post 70145)

So I've seen these glow sticks at Home Depot for a few months now and finally decided to buy some and see if I could modify them for hooping.

First reason to buy these is because they come with free battery replacements for life, just pay shipping and handling....I know, I know that's not exactly free but it only cost $15 to replace the batteries on 6 glow sticks. Lifegear also sends you a prepaid envelope to return the old batteries for proper disposal. Not sure how many of you know this but it is illegal to throw batteries in the trash. The last time I bought batteries for my Promar sticks I bought them at Walmart, they sell a similar set of batteries for $5.00+tax, $6 X 6 packs= $36........50% savings by going with the Lifegear brand.

Second reason to buy these is because they come with three way lighting. Orange solid, orange flashing, and a flashlight at the tip, this part of the light can be reversed and used as a solid white white on the glow stick.

First thing I did was cut off the whistle that sits at the bottom of the glow stick, you can leave it on but it just makes the glow stick that much longer and gets in the way. Once you cutoff the whistle you can attach it to your PFD, hopefully you'll never need it but it's good to have one.

Next thing was to Goop three areas of the glow stick, you want to Goop the part that has the flashlight, the on/off button and the area where the two pieces come together. Because Goop is slightly flexible once it dries it still allows you to use the on/off button after the Goop dries.

About the only downfall to these is that they have a one hour timer on them, I looked at the circuit board to see if I could bypass the time but I couldn't figure out which part of it was the timer. I figured this out the hard way, three of the glow sticks turned off minutes apart from each other while I was hopping. The way to avoid this is to simply turn them off and on each time you pull your net(s). However, because they do have a timer you'll never have to worry about them turning on after you put them away, this happens to my Promar sticks a lot, the copper contact touches the battery and.......you know the rest.

Promar makes a god product but if you can get something for less and make it work by making slight modifications why not? You can get three of these for just under $8, that's under $3 each compared to a price of $6 for each for the Promars.