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Best Helmet Light for 2021

3387 Views 17 Replies 10 Participants Last post by MRMOLE, Oct 26, 2021

BmoreKen

Discussion Starter · Oct 25, 2021

With night ride season heating up, what is the go-to helmet light setup these days?
My helmet light crapped out on me on first ride. She gave me a solid 6+ years of service. GloWorm X1 with 2 cell battery pack, all mounted on the helmet - well balanced weight on the head with the lighthead towards the front of the helmet and the battery strapped on the rear. Was a great setup. Probably a short or something, I didn't feel like messing with it so I gave her away to a friend who's going to try to repair.
Seeing as some riding buddies have gone to self-contained units on their helmets, I picked up a Light and Motion VIS Pro 1000 Trail. I'm a little concerned that the runtime is not as advertised. I kept it on low and medium most of the night but was just about tapped out after a 2 hour ride. L&M claims 3 hours on medium.

The self-contained lighthead/battery option is really appealing, so maybe I just need to pick up two lights and swap mid-ride?
BTW, I have a GloWorm X3 NW on my bars, which is excellent and is my primary light - wide, good throw, and excellent color. I like to have a helmet light that is not as bright but can help see around corners, etc. If the helmet light is dimmer than the bar light, then I don't think mixing a whiter light on the helmet with the NW light on the bars will matter too much. I do LOVE the NW color, though!
What are you all using these days on your helmet?
GIF from a GoPro video from last week:

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1 - 18 of 18 Posts

patski

· #2 · Oct 25, 2021

BmoreKen said:
My helmet light crapped out on me on first ride. She gave me a solid 6+ years of service. GloWorm X1 with 2 cell battery pack, all mounted on the helmet - well
balanced weight on the head with the lighthead towards the front of the helmet and the battery strapped on the rear. Was a great setup.

Gloworm X2 with 2 cell, spare battery in your pocket. Self-contained will not do the time.

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baker

· #3 · Oct 25, 2021

Another gloworm? You can get just the light head if you want...

Gloworm Lights

www.action-led-lights.com

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znomit

· #4 · Oct 25, 2021

I love my gloworms but they are really pricy now.

Zebralight for the helmet, maybe a spare battery.

H600d Mk IV 18650 XHP50.2 5000K High CRI Headlamp-H600d Mk I

zebralight.com

patski

· #5 · Oct 25, 2021 (Edited)

baker said:
Another gloworm? You can get just the light head if you want...

Hmm, that's a good price for light head only, maybe get one for my wife...
Gloworm Alpha 1200 Lumen with Wireless Remote!

Watch Automotive lighting Light Font Automotive fog light

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MRMOLE

· #6 · Oct 25, 2021

BmoreKen said:
My helmet light crapped out on me on first ride. She gave me a solid 6+ years of service. GloWorm X1 with 2 cell battery pack, all mounted on the helmet - well balanced weight on the head with the lighthead towards the front of the helmet and the battery strapped on the rear. Was a great setup.
BTW, I have a GloWorm X3 NW on my bars, which is excellent and is my primary light - wide, good throw, and excellent color. I like to have a helmet light that is not as bright but can help see around corners, etc. If the helmet light is dimmer than the bar light, then I don't think mixing a whiter light on the helmet with the NW light on the bars will matter too much. I do LOVE the NW color, though!

From what you posted I agree with Patski's Gloworm Alpha suggestion. The Alpha is a great thrower that also draws very little current and is almost as small as your old X1. Mine run with a 5000mAh 21700 2 cell ebay battery lasts about 3hrs. @ 100% power (1300lm measured). New ones come with a wireless remote and a neutral white emitters option (+$10) + adjustable optics/preset levels/great UI that your already used to with your XS.
Mole

Bassmantweed

· #7 · Oct 25, 2021

Take a look at outbound. They are a little pricey But they are also VERY good.

www.outboundlighting.com

Bike Lights by Outbound Lighting

Incredible bike lights, professionally engineered from the ground up to be a proper bike headlight, not just a flashlight. Designed & Assembled in Chicago.

www.outboundlighting.com

BmoreKen

Discussion Starter · #8 · Oct 25, 2021

MRMOLE said:
From what you posted I agree with Patski's Gloworm Alpha suggestion. The Alpha is a great thrower that also draws very little current and is almost as small as your old X1. Mine run with a 5000mAh 21700 2 cell ebay battery lasts about 3hrs. @ 100% power (1300lm measured). New ones come with a wireless remote and a neutral white emitters option (+$10) + adjustable optics/preset levels/great UI that your already used to with your XS.
Mole

Yeah I was thinking/hoping I could find a self-contained unit this time around, just because putting the battery on/off the rear of the helmet can be a pain (depending on the design, w/ vs. w/o MIPS) unless you have a dedicated helmet. But since the Alpha w/2cell is $159, and I actually believe the runtime numbers, that looks better than the $139 L&M VIS trail 1000 that doesn't give me the runtime, nor is it neutral white. So the L&M may be getting returned.

BmoreKen

Discussion Starter · #9 · Oct 25, 2021

Bassmantweed said:
Take a look at outbound. They are a little pricey But they are also VERY good.

Bike Lights by Outbound Lighting

Incredible bike lights, professionally engineered from the ground up to be a proper bike headlight, not just a flashlight. Designed & Assembled in Chicago.

www.outboundlighting.com

I did see the lengthy thread discussing the Hangover. Looks like a great unit! But the battery runtime may not be enough - would be great if they squeezed a little more mAh in there. But i guess you could mount one and carry one, then swap mid-ride. Hmmm....

baker

· #10 · Oct 25, 2021

BmoreKen said:
I did see the lengthy thread discussing the Hangover. Looks like a great unit! But the battery runtime may not be enough - would be great if they squeezed a little more mAh in there. But i guess you could mount one and carry one, then swap mid-ride. Hmmm....

I have the Gloworm XS 2500, Alpha, and the Exposure Hangover.

The self contained aspect of the Hangover is nice, but I often find it stepping down due to lack of capacity before the end of my ride. Oh yeah, I believe you can use an external pack to supplement the Hangover capacity, but I never do that.

The Alpha is decent and light. The XS is awesome and just a bit heavier.

I generally take the XS if I'm doing fast singletrack. The Alpha suffices for slower rides or non-singletrack.

I have neck issues, so I've stopped doing the battery on the helmet thing. It just puts too much weight up there. The Alpha is my goto when my neck is pissed or I'm riding super long with the light on my helmet.

Reactions: 1

jchan417

· #11 · Oct 25, 2021

BmoreKen said:
I did see the lengthy thread discussing the Hangover. Looks like a great unit! But the battery runtime may not be enough - would be great if they squeezed a little more mAh in there. But i guess you could mount one and carry one, then swap mid-ride. Hmmm....

I have the hangover and trail edition as a combo. As a solo light, the hangover I don't think is quite bright enough for night rides alone, but works well in conjunction with a bar light (I could also be spoiled by the light from the trail edition now, so my opinion may be biased). If you're concerned with battery life though, the hangover works with the passthrough (not sure if I'm using the right term here, most likely not) from an external battery pack, so you could always keep a spare battery pack with a cable for the hangover in your pack to run with if you need to. Or just start your ride with a spare battery attached and pull it part way through the ride.

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Tom-M910

· #12 · Oct 25, 2021

NSMB's Andrew Major seems really happy with the new Blackburn Dayblazer 1500: https://nsmb.com/articles/night-riding-needs-blackburn-dayblazer-1500/

Reactions: 1

Jayem

· #13 · Oct 25, 2021

BmoreKen said:
Yeah I was thinking/hoping I could find a self-contained unit this time around, just because putting the battery on/off the rear of the helmet can be a pain (depending on the design, w/ vs. w/o MIPS) unless you have a dedicated helmet. But since the Alpha w/2cell is $159, and I actually believe the runtime numbers, that looks better than the $139 L&M VIS trail 1000 that doesn't give me the runtime, nor is it neutral white. So the L&M may be getting returned.

Self contained on my head is not optimal IME. This is the Achilles-heel of lights. Self-contained are less powerful with less run-time than non-self-contained. You want the brighter spot on your head IME, not the weaker one. You want it to follow your eye/head movements to look ahead, you need the greater amount of light for that. Another big problem I run into is these tend to go into limp mode easily in the cold, you can't keep the battery warm. You can run self-contained on your head, it's not horrible for shorter rides and lesser lumen requirements...like commuting, but IME it's not the best setup for trails. Also, more and more lights these days are using remotes, which are awesome, like droppers and I find myself changing the intensity with speed/slope quite a bit. Again, self-contained on the head just doesn't do this.

Reactions: 2

Danimal1

· #14 · Oct 25, 2021

I've had good experiences running various iterations of Exposure headlights for the past several years. I really like the light weight, small form factor

Recently, my 8 year old Diablo decided it wont hold a charge for more than 30 seconds, so I've been exploring my options.

I've been taking a close look at the Outbound Hangover, but have some concerns that it may not have enough throw far enough on faster trails. I've also been eyeing the latest options from Exposure, the Zenith and Diablo MK12, but the price is really high, and I have not see a lot of reviews on the new version.

patski

· #15 · Oct 25, 2021 (Edited)

Danimal1 said:
I've also been eyeing the latest options from Exposure, the Zenith and Diablo MK12, but the price is really high

Cheap, lightweight, runtime.. Choose two.

MRMOLE

· #16 · Oct 25, 2021

Tom-M910 said:
NSMB's Andrew Major seems really happy with the new Blackburn Dayblazer 1500: https://nsmb.com/articles/night-riding-needs-blackburn-dayblazer-1500/

Too many online reviewers will say nice things about anything as long as they profit from it and I have to wonder about the review you linked. Blackburn may have improved this light (other than the increased output claim) but of the 50+ lights I've purchased or received free for review from some of the light manufacturers the 2 Dayblazer 1100's may have been the worst. The reason I have 2 is the first one performed so poorly I was sent another one from Blackburn which unfortunately was no better. Blitz mode was unusable because of overheating and would only run about 3 min. from a cold start before stepping down to low (75°F ambient, fan cooled) when output testing and very quickly in actual use. Output was great @ startup but would degrade rapidly till its thermal protection stepped it way down. The next mode level down would run without stepping down and like Blitz started at a very high level but also degraded quickly and spent most of it runtime duration around 500 lumens. Physically I seen no changes between the 1500 and 1100 so doubtful it will have any better thermal stability, weight is listed as the same so doubtful battery capacity has increased any. I also had one of the straps tear with very little use. I hate to see people waste money on bad products so felt obligated to share my Blackburn experiences.
Mole

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Tom-M910

· #17 · Oct 26, 2021

Thanks for your real world experience with Dayblazers MRMOLE. I like to think that the guys at NSMB are truthful with their reviews but who knows? He doesn't state how many rides he did with the light so maybe he only did a handful of rides in cooler conditions and it worked great for him. Your experience with the 1100 would make me very wary of any Dayblazer if I was in the market.

MRMOLE

· #18 · Oct 26, 2021

Tom-M910 said:
Thanks for your real world experience with Dayblazers MRMOLE. I like to think that the guys at NSMB are truthful with their reviews but who knows? He doesn't state how many rides he did with the light so maybe he only did a handful of rides in cooler conditions and it worked great for him. Your experience with the 1100 would make me very wary of any Dayblazer if I was in the market.

They did comment about 7°C ride conditions and no doubt that a 30° drop in ambient temp. would positively impact the performance of a thermally sensitive light. I've seen positive reviews of the old Dayblazer 1100 but also negative ones that matched my experiences so inconsistent quality could also be an explanation. Still analyzing the light logically would 1500 lumens for 2 hours be possible from a 2 emitter light using what appears to be a single 18650 battery? Doesn't seem very likely and that reviews conclusions about the Dayblazer 1500 just seem "too good to be true". Just my opinion though.
Mole

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