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Showerthought: The $12 headlamp my buddy handed me at Philmont beat my $70 one
We were three nights into a trek at Philmont last June when my fancy headlamp died in the middle of filtering water. My buddy just pulled a cheap $12 one out of his pack and handed it over without saying anything. Used that thing the rest of the trip and it never flickered once, while two guys in our crew had their pricey ones quit on them. Now I look at gear reviews totally different, wondering how much of the price is just the name on the box. Anyone else had cheap gear outlast the expensive stuff?
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the_miles9d ago
Philmont in June is no joke, and I get why that $12 lamp feels like a legend now, but one trip doesn't tell the whole story. Cheap lights usually win on weight and price, then lose on the stuff you can't see: a week of rain, a cold snap at 10,000 feet, or a switch that wears out after 40 or 50 clicks. My $15 Amazon lamp ran great for two summers, then quit on a January trip in the Smokies when the plastic got brittle and cracked. The $60 one I replaced it with has a lock mode and a low beam that runs 200 hours, which matters when you're hiking out in the dark. So yeah, the name on the box is part of it, but so is the switch, the seal, and how the battery handles cold. You got lucky with a good cheap one, and that's real, but it's not proof that cheap always wins.
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