Hi Climbers

Just bought a new headlamp and flashlight by LED Lenser

Headlamp is H7, 180 lumens, upto 140m, 85h burn down to 1 lumen. R 399.00

X14 flashlight, 450 lumens, upto 350m, 10burn time down to 1 lumen R 1499.00 (thou if u can afford the X21 or X21R...WOW)

Plus got a R75 discount on total.

Tell you what if you want to be bouldering at night the H7 rocks several focal settings.

X14 great if trailing back in the dark,security around the house, live on farm or even mountain rescue, what a torch!!! plus a belt clip

X14 is super bright, plus the defence mode with the strobe on in day time and night in a attackers eyes, would put anybody off.

I am not saying they best, but they are great!!

Thought I would share some quality buys.

Wow that's a whoooooole lotta light join Cuan's rocklands weekend and you can show us ur big torch.

A month ago I also had such problem with choosing the right flashlight. I have never had the experience with ledlenser flashlights and can't share with my opinion about this company. My friend purchased Armytek Predator and likes it so much. It interested me as well In general, my thoughts about this light:
1) has a rugged matt body
2) comes with a lanyard, a holster, a clip, a rubber grip and some small details like rings
3) it really illuminates well at good distances. the light has 670 lumens
4) different types of modes like SOS, strobe, firefly, beacon and constant light.

Cool light, I' happy

Now thinking about purchasing headlamp, any suggestions

Not sure if you can get these locally, but they are excellent. They are made in far east and get badged by various people; I've seen the same lamp sold as a CREE, etc. Comes with an attachment for handlebars, headtorch or you can handhold it.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/iaMOutdoor-Lume ... 443&sr=8-1

I think you may have been suckered there Chris F...

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Happy climbing
Nic

Interesting one this... Sven does have valid (real) posts... will keep an eye on it.

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Climb ZA - Administrator

Yeah Sven's real. Also poor spamming if he didn't actually say where he bought it!

If you mean "climb" likewise poor spamming, unless he's going to insert a link later, in which case fool on me.

I have met Sven- a while ago granted- so he is real. I don't believe he worked for the distributor and I do think this is a genuine post. I would also go on to say that they sell truck loads of these torches and it is one of the most successful lighting brands in the country, and so don't need to punt their wares on a site like this.

As I am employed by a competitor to LED Lenzer I will avoid commenting or replying to the post, but to say that there are several perspectives when purchasing stuff, sometimes certain stats are more interesting to you than others, and so understanding them makes your decisions easier: Know your needs.

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If you aren't willing to solve your own problems, how can you expect others to?

Sigh....
I know Sven, he did this to try an inform people of the cool stuff he bought and his opinion on them
He is self employed, so has absolutely no vested interest in the stuff above.

Contact me if you wan/need his contact details to confirm.
P.S. I don't dig the LED Lenser headlamps. Their beam is too focused (yes, even when set to "wide") for my liking and don't give a nice halo of light to nicely see your surroundings as well as my old Petzl and new Black Diamond ones do

Cheers,
Cuan

Well seeing as Sven seems to be real, and perhaps "climb" as well, here is my 2c:

With headlamps, as with most everything, you get what you pay for. LEDLenser are cheap, but are poor quality. Black Diamond make good lights but don't seem to innovate all that much (IMO). Petzl make great lights, have awesome customer service and if you have used the Nao, you will never want to use a headlamp without the distance sensing technology.

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Happy climbing
Nic

There are much better lights available at better prices locally

Apparently, today is the day for headlamp debates - they've been raging around our office all afternoon.

Someone, here, suggested a locally available headlamp brand that is supposedly decent and very cheap but comes with a bit of a reputation of bad soldering. When buying a "cheap" headlamp, one really should consider whether the sudden death of their headlamp would be a mild inconvenience, a major inconvenience, a veritable pain in the arse or, in fact, a serious safety risk.

What are flashlights for? I've forgotten.

Flashlights are for bashing people. Thats why the big steel ones are popular.

I have the Nao & the Ledlenser H7R. The Nao has serious light, but is way too fricking complicated in every way, not super robust, too many bits that could break/go wrong & a kak on-off knob. My money is on my Ledlenser surviving in the long run. KISS (Keep it Simple Stupid) was not on Petzl's mind when the they designed the Nao.

Ledlenser is distributed by the same crowd that distribute Leatherman....so in theory the after sales backup should be the same.

Hilti make a lamp that is super cool for bouldering.

I will repeat myself: know your needs, and know what a product offers. then pair the two appropriately.

@Nic, Eiger ( Petzl) and Ram (BD) offer the same warranties on headlamps. I am not sure what you mean by not innovating, however you are most welcome to substantiate this by telling us what units haven't changed/updated in the last year, or when last they released a new model. Currently Petzl seems to be orientating their R&D to top end units, such as the Nao and many industrial units, while BD only offers recreational products across all ranges- headlamp or otherwise.

I am trying to stay out of this debate, and so please forgive me if I ask for substantiated answers, I just find it unfair to be sweeping (such as my comment above) without doing a little research first. It is a shame that neither Awesome Tools nor Eiger reply on this forum as much as me, but perhaps they no better than to open themselves up for trouble in public

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If you aren't willing to solve your own problems, how can you expect others to?

Very impressed with a BD torch that a very nice BD rep gave me in Rocklands. It way out performs the Petzls in its class.

This post should not in any way be construed as agreeing with Warren.

@WarrenG: This is based on my personal experience and is my opinion and should be seen as such.

Quality:I have never owned a BD light myself, but know several people who have and overall their experience with their lights (based on their statements to me) has not been as great as I have had with my Petzls. Their lights have always been a bit heavier/bulkier and not quite as bright. A friend of mine has on several occasions borrowed my spare Myo XP because his BD Icon died in the cold. However other than that BD lights are great.

Customer service: I have twice trashed my Petzls. Once I had my Tikka at the bottom of my pack under a 200m rope and I put it down on a sharp rock. The rock won but the light was replaced, no questions asked. I ripped the cable out of my Myo XP by picking it up without noticing that the cable was caught, Petzl replaced it with a new one, no questions asked. All very positive experiences. A friend of mine (who I will ask to comment here) had a BD Spot that broke while under warranty, she had a real mission getting it replaced (not even sure if she did).

Innovation: First headlamp: Petzl. First LED headlamp: Petzl. First lensed LED lamp: Petzl. First distance sensing light: Petzl. What have BD done that is new in the headlamp market?

For the record I do love other BD stuff, you couldn't part me from my BD pack, or my 2 BD tents, for years the C4's were the best cams around etc etc

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Happy climbing
Nic

Well Nic asked so:

The nice thing about Petzl is the "no questions asked" service. I had a Petzl Myo 3 years ago which eventually broke after some abuse in caves and the bottom of my pack. I sent it in and they sent me a replacement that looked new. I didn't have the original receipt, but they just replaced it. I really wish all brands would understand the kind of loyalty service like this buys you. My wife had the same thing with a Nalgene bladder, mouthpiece kept slipping out of the tube, emailed them = new bladder sent from the USA. Brilliant!

My wife also had a BD Spot (1st gen) headlamp. After a few years moderate use the light didn't want to switch on. It looked like a bad connection because it would go on intermittently if you pushed the door closed really hard at the right angle. I checked the connections to the batteries (new batteries) and made sure the little door was catching properly and when that seemed fine sent it in through MMO (who have always given me 5 * service btw).

So a few weeks later RAM contacted me saying they've tested the headlamp for 2 weeks and found nothing wrong with it. So they sent it back. Wife turned it on and it worked. Okay. Took it for a climbing weekend in montague, same crap. Comes on intermittently and doesn't work. At this point I probably should've taken Ram up on their offer to send it back if there are more problems with the headlamp. I didn't. Living in stellenbosch it was a mission to get it to MMO in the first place. I just didn't feel like going through the schlep only to be told "but it works" again. At this point I also got a LED lenser H7 for christmas, so I just gave that to my wife to use instead.

Basically if RAM trusted me that there was something wrong with the headlamp and did something about it I would have raved about their service like do about petzls. But they didn't and I don't, and my wife is pretty vocal about spreading her experience with BD headlamps.

Regarding headlamps in general I quite like the light output that the LED Lenser gives. But the swivel mechanism doesn't look super sturdy to me. So fine for camping and the like, but if I'm going caving I'm taking my Myo XP.

Plz before buying any flashlight do keeping in mind about the warranty of the flashlight. From my experience, choose the flashlight which has valid warranty and powerful batteries.