New Milwaukee M18 LED Tripod Worklight and Other New M12 and M18 LED Lighting Products

At the recent Milwaukee new tool media event, one of the products that really awed me is their new M18 Stand Light, which is a collapsible tripod-based LED worklight with extending head.

The new Milwaukee M18 LED Stand Light stands at 4-feet tall when first deployed, and can be adjusted to a height of 7-feet. Milwaukee boasts that it has a 5-second setup time, and that it delivers 2,000 lumens of TrueView “high definition” color.

Update: I originally said it has a 5-second startup time. It’s actually a 5-second setup time. Once you’ve got the tripod deployed, a push of the button and the LEDs turn on instantly.

See More: All of Our Milwaukee 2015 Media Event New Tool Coverage

The other M12 and M18 LED cordless worklight were interesting too, you’ll see those discussed further down in the post.

Also: Milwaukee TrueView LED Lighting Technology Explained

Milwaukee 2130-20 M18 LED Stand Light

Like a giraffe, the M18 Stand Light has a long and slender neck. Unlike a Giraffe’s neck, this one goes straight up and down and doesn’t flex. The lamp head can pivot though, from one side to the other. It can only be aimed downwards at a slight angle, but that doesn’t seem to be a real limitation.

Here it is fully extended. There are two quick-release adjustment collars that allow for telescoping extension.

The lamp head is pretty beefy, with some creative LED positioning. There are 3 LEDs is 1 LED in each of the 6 reflector pockets, and 6 in between the reflector pockets, giving the Milwaukee M18 Stand Light a total of 24 12 LEDs.

Update: I originally zoomed in on the photo and counted 3 LEDs in each recess. But there’s only 1 in each recess! What I was seeing are the reflections of the diode in the super highly polished reflector facets!

Although the proportions are distorted and way off here, you should be able to see the two red-latched quick release collars that allow for quick extension and retraction of the LED lamp head post.

You also get two handles – one fixed horizontal carrying handle, and the sliding vertical deployment handle that has a pushbutton for unlocking and setting up the tripod.

The legs don’t just fold out, they slide down and out. This seems to give the tripod quick and sturdy stability. I guess the simple design allows allows for quick cleaning of muck, dust, and debris.

Here are the tripod legs, along with some random peoples’ legs.

The product manager gripped onto the Stand Light by the vertical sliding handle, which is pretty evident that it’s not just for deploying the tripod legs but can be used as a carrying handle. Not that the M18 Stand Light is heavy, it’s actually rather light.

Do you see that gap, between the M18 4.0Ah battery and the bottom of the battery compartment? That’s there so you could opt to use one of the new M18 High Demand 9.0Ah battery packs. It won’t make the LED worklight shine brighter, but it will extend runtime by quite a bit.

It looked to me like the Stand Light was mainly made of aluminum and plastic, with some other materials mixed in. It felt really portable. All that it seemed to be missing was a carrying strap.

Also worth mentioning is that the M18 Stand Light can be stored vertically or horizontally. It’s a little thicker than competing models (most notably the grayed-out Pelican), but far from what I’d consider bulky.

The Pelican 9420 RALS LED worklight, shown here but grayed out (check price via Amazon), is a great product. But Milwaukee’s has a more flexible battery pack. Pelican’s is proprietary and can really only be used with the worklight. But to be fair, Pelican’s replacement batteries are reasonably priced at $45 each.

Milwaukee’s M18 LED Stand Light can be extended much higher than Pelican’s tripod LED worklight, and also has a somewhat more uniform illumination beam. The color is also warmer (whiter/yellower), and fits into Milwaukee’s “TrueView” LED lighting family, which should result in accurate and mostly true-to-life colors.

The bottoms of the tripod legs have holes, presumably for fastening the light to a floor to ensure that it stays put.

I would compare the Milwaukee Stand Light to Stanley’s LED tripod worklight, if not for the Stanley’s consistently negative user reviews.

Someone at Milwaukee had fun destroying a bunch of generic halogen tripod worklights. While the halogen lights are going to be much cheaper, an LED lamp head runs cooler (but still hot, that’s why there’s a heatsink) and longer, and without having to fiddle around with finicky replacement bulbs.

I don’t remember if it was a product manager or another attendee that knocked over the M18 LED Stand Light, but I’d like to think it was a product manager saying something like look how durable it is, *push*. It went down with a bounce and didn’t even flicker.

Price: $249
ETA: Sept 2015

Buy Now(via Home Depot)

Milwaukee 2360-20 M18 TrueView LED Flood Light Worklight

The whole Milwaukee cordless TrueView LED lighting family was in attendance!

This is the new M18 adjustable high performance floodlight worklight, which has a pivoting lamp head and both M18 and AC power options. For AC power, you can attach any properly-spec’d extension cord.

It’s got a 12 LED lamp head, with each diode seated within its own reflector.

Yes, that’s quite the heatsink. While specifics aren’t available yet, or maybe I asked and forgot the answer, the floodlight worklight likely puts out a LOT of light.

There looks to be a small hotspot at the center, but the illumination pattern is surprisingly uniform, or at least more uniform than I expected.

One thing I don’t like about multi-element lights is how they can create multiple shadows in some situations. So don’t get any ideas about using these for photo or video purposes, unless maybe you add a high-temperature diffuser in front of the LED matrix.

Price: $149
ETA: Nov 2015

Buy Now(via Home Depot)

Milwaukee M12 LED Spotlight

Ooh, and an M12 high output LED spotlight too? Sweet! It’s so new that it wasn’t equipped with a proper LED. I turned it on, expecting to see an intense and highly focused beam of light. Instead, it was a weak strong yellow light. The product manager admitted that they equipped the prototype with what they had, and that the production models will surely be impressive.

I did like the design of the lens assembly, and remain optimistic that the production models will be as powerful as expected.

Price: TBA
ETA: Sept 2015

Milwaukee M18 LED Worklight

I thought I had posted about Milwaukee’s small M18 worklight before, but it seems I hadn’t. Sorry about that. It’s a tough little guy, with a hexagonal body shape and cushiony roll cage design. You get 2 light output modes, and multiple positioning options.

You can slide it onto straight conduit, hang it from a screw on the wall, hang it from the carrying handle, or adjust it on the floor. Rest it sideways, on the roll cage, however you want.

This model is $99 via Home Depot, which suggests the new adjustable LED floodlight worklight will be priced a little higher.

ETA: Available Now

First Impressions

If you couldn’t already tell, I am very, VERY excited about the new M18 LED Stand Light. The other new Milwaukee LED lighting products looked decent too.

Which of the new Milwaukee cordless LED worklights are you most interested in?