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Skiing Head Lamps

Huck_It_Baby

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I'm about to buy a head lamp for making some night time turns off piste. I see a wide range of lamps with all different levels of lumens. I don't want to buy a low end light and am almost thinking of using a mountain biking light because they seem to powerful AND have USB charging but am not sure if they will hold up in the cold.

Anyone with experience in this area?
 

Hado226

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Good bike lights will give 2-3 hours of run time with more light than you need.

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Hawkshot99

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I have tried skiing at night with a lamp. I can see much better with no light. Just let my eyes adjust to the darkness and I can see great. The white snow reflects the little amount of light great.

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Nick

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I have a Petzl Tikka2 Plus headlamp, and while it is great, it is defintely insufficient for doing something at speed (like mountain biking or skiing), unless you were going to be staying at a jog pace (like 5 - 10 mph)
 

Huck_It_Baby

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I have a Petzl Tikka2 Plus headlamp, and while it is great, it is defintely insufficient for doing something at speed (like mountain biking or skiing), unless you were going to be staying at a jog pace (like 5 - 10 mph)

Right, that's why I was considering the mountain biking lights. some of the regular headlights just didn't seem to cut it.
 

Huck_It_Baby

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I have tried skiing at night with a lamp. I can see much better with no light. Just let my eyes adjust to the darkness and I can see great. The white snow reflects the little amount of light great.

Sent from my SGH-S959G using Tapatalk 2

Good point. Lots of light reflecting from the snow but if the moon isn't out I'd still like the light. I guess it depends where I go and how open the trees are.

The plan is to skin the western side of Mansfield after work at night once the snow pack fills in.
 

Hawkshot99

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I use a light on the skin up. But once I am up top I can almost never see good enough to ski with tje light. I just take a 20 min break to let my eyes adjust to tje dark and can see even better than the light. Even on a moonless night. You would be amazed at the amount of light that is out there.

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mikiecunningham86

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i mountian bike at night with a lumentek 1000 lumen light. it has a high med and low setting rechagalbe battery it works great i havent had any problems with it. it's rechargeable and lasts up to 8 hours on low. you can find it on amazon.com it was only 100 bucks cant go wrong.
 

BenedictGomez

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http://www.amazon.com/Magicshine-MJ...id=1353977633&sr=8-2&keywords=magicshine+1400


This is IMO the brightest bang for your buck, you can get a helmet strap seperately. I ride mtb at night with it and its very bright. run it low to medium on the up and full power on the down.

lol, 1,400 lumens is some serious business. Are you sure that can be mounted to a head strap (i.e. it isnt too heavy or awkwardly shaped with the 3 lenses)? Would probably be a blast for nighttime snowshoeing.

EDIT:

Here's one that's 3000 lumens (or so it claims) that comes with a headstrap. I wonder how heavy this thing is.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/3000-Lumens...567?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4abecdf8ff
 
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snoseek

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lol, 1,400 lumens is some serious business. Are you sure that can be mounted to a head strap (i.e. it isnt too heavy or awkwardly shaped with the 3 lenses)? Would probably be a blast for nighttime snowshoeing.

EDIT:

Here's one that's 3000 lumens (or so it claims) that comes with a headstrap. I wonder how heavy this thing is.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/3000-Lumens...567?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4abecdf8ff



That light looks a lot like the magicshine I have. Probably the same mount. It would be fairly simple to rig up some sort of homemade chest mount I would think. 1400 lumens is plenty sufficient for bombing singltrack @ 2am, I work nights in the summer, do this frequently. Either would be sufficient.
 

Huck_It_Baby

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I use a light on the skin up. But once I am up top I can almost never see good enough to ski with tje light. I just take a 20 min break to let my eyes adjust to tje dark and can see even better than the light. Even on a moonless night. You would be amazed at the amount of light that is out there.

Sent from my SGH-S959G using Tapatalk 2

I'll have to see how my eyes adjust. I have a bit of a hard time seeing at night when I'm driving but when out in the woods with snow everywhere I can see your point.
 

Huck_It_Baby

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There's a crop of folks who do night trips up there on a semi-regular basis. Based on the videos they post they seem to use either bike lamps or the brightest of the hiking headlamps.

Oh yeah? Anyone on this site?

Have a link to videos?
 

kingdom-tele

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check out the MTBR light reviews. some really nice info on the range and light distribution of various lamps. If your storm skiing at night you'll want a light, if your gonna be sliding through trees your gonna want a light. its not just the lumens that matter but the beam it puts out.

we've been using the old nite rider's for years. they have some cordless options now that will replace mine when it's dead.

tikka's, etc are fine for dinking with your gear and passing the flask around without blinding each other. but if your gonna ski faster than you ride a sled down the hill you'll need more juice.

all that said, skiing under the moon, purple snow is something everyone should do at least once IMO
 

SIKSKIER

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Its been a long while since I used mine,but I used to ride a lot of singletrack at night.I had two different systems,Nightsun and Nightrider.Don't know if these are still sold but both put out a ton of light.Most of us had one on the handlebars and one on the head/helmet.The light itself was the size of an egg and easily mounted to the helmet with the battery pack held on your waist.Really powerfull light that would work great for night skiing.You got me thinking about breaking that stuff out and use it if I can find it.

Here's the Nightrider:http://www.niterider.com/rechargeable-2013/
and Nightsun:http://www.night-sun.com/
 
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