Petzl Ups Stakes In Lighting Arms Race

Looks like Petzl is about to up the stakes in the headtorch arms race with their new Ultra series which, the company says, 'is designed for extreme activities requiring both long distance and wide-angle lighting at the same time'.

In other words light and lots of it, in a lightweight package and aimed at people who need to move fast after dark like runners, adventure races, orienteers and so on.

We'll tell you more about the new headlamps - two of them, the Ultra and Ultra Belt - in the near future, but what we do know is that they use six high-powered LEDs to produce a maximum brightness of 350 lumens, in a small, head-mounted package. The Ultra mounts the battery on the headband, while the Ultra Belt has a remote battery pack for extreme cold weather use and to reduce head-mounted mass.

The torches have three regulated brightness levels, giving burn times from the rechargeable battery of between almost 17 hours at the lowest setting which still has a 40-metre range, through to just 90 minutes or so at the banzai 120-metre maximum level.

The Ultra weighs 345 grammes including battery, while the Ultra Belt tips the scales at 495 grammes. Power comes from a neat little, quickly detachable rechargeable battery pack complete with power level indicator while light levels are adjusted with an easy to use dial rather than sequential clicking.

Looks like it'll be seriously bright, but with a wide, useable spread of light as well. More details soon, but you can also check out the Ultra's own mini-site at en.petzl.com/ultra/