Venting anger over Black Diamond headlamp insanity

Gear Question
1

I bought a BD Cosmo light, which may also work with Spot and Astro models. It operated perfectly up until the battery was around 50% full. It began to automatically reduce the LED to unusable levels, making it completely useless for my purpose; I had to reset the brightness to 100% every ten to fifteen minutes because anything less would prevent me from accurately assessing the ground conditions. Why is this crazy? Does BD have contracts with battery producers to subtly pressure consumers into replacing their batteries too soon out of sheer frustration? What were the engineers thinking when they designed such a ridiculous function?

When I need the most brightness, I don’t need the power-saving economy mode until the juice runs out and I swap out the cells. To extend operating time, I don’t need a sophisticated auto-management feature; I just need the best performance possible right up until the finish! These days, it seems that every gadget needs its own life, much like the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence.

4 Likes
2

To get the best option that fits your demands and budget, it is preferable to go to r/flashlight and explain your use case.

Despite the fact that many of the suggestions are very inexpensive, the drawback is that you will most likely wind up with so many lights that you will become impoverished.

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3

I have an ancient one that has never had a problem with lithium AAAs. The bed becomes substantially dimmer during the final ten minutes of operation before the batteries totally die, but that’s about it.

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4

I wonder where mine is. If I left it with Duracells it’s probably dead.

Nitecore has such good and cheap headlamps it’s hard imagine using anything else for camping.

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5

Some stray AAAs are sliding around mine while it sits in the console of my truck. Nowadays, I only really grab the Spot when the other lights are out or when I’m bloodtrailing a deer. I use a few nitecores for almost everything.

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The same is true here. OP, there may be a problem with yours. Perhaps ask BD to replace it for you.