Why We Chose The Petzl Swift RL: High lumen, lightweight, reactive lighting
Based in Crolles, near Grenoble, Petzl was founded by the cave explorer Fernand Petzl in the mid-1970s. With its cave-based origins, it’s not really a surprise that the brand managed to establish itself as one of the world’s finest purveyors of headtorches. Some brands merely adopted the dark, Petzl were born in it.
Moving back up to the present day, one half of their two inclusions in this year’s Outdoor 100 comes in the form of the Swift RL headlamp – an excellent head torch with a couple of genuinely clever main features.
Who Is The Petzl Swift RL Headlamp For?
Like seeing where you’re going when you’re outdoors? You’ll appreciate what the Petzl Swift RL brings to your adventures.
“An impressive 900 lumens from a 100g item will definitely appeal to the backpackers out there.”
Digging down into it in a much more serious way, the product’s two-part construction ensures first-rate stability during dynamic and intense activities such as mountaineering, trail running and skiing. Move about as much as you want and this thing will continue to light the way for you.
It’s smart reactive lighting, which we’ll talk about more in the ‘Features’ section’, also makes it a nice bit of kit for twilight walkers and wild campers.
Features
We’ll start off the ‘Features’ section where we ended the previous one. The Swift RL’s ‘Reactive Lighting’ technology results in a longer burn time (or battery life), and requires less manual adjustment. The light sensor automatically adjusts brightness and beam pattern depending on the current level of light in the environment. This optimises battery usage and keeps the head torch going for longer. If you’d prefer something a bit more traditional, you can switch to a ‘Standard Lighting’ mode.
The Swift RL is a fine example of an ultra-bright head torch coming in a lightweight, extremely convenient, body. An impressive 900 lumens from a 100g item will definitely appeal to the backpackers out there who like keeping things fast and light (light in more ways than one).
