Ammonite System Led Solaris - universal headlight - review

Recently, Ammonite gave us a few of their products to test. One of them was the Solaris LED headlight with a 7Ah lithium battery. As is usually the case in such occasions, we wasted no time and after familiarising ourselves with the contents of the set and charging the battery we went under water to see how the whole thing would work in practice.

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A good light is as important in our Polish conditions as a bottle or flippers. We may be able to manage without it, but certainly not in the long run. Without a good main torch our dives become very limited, both in terms of time of day, depth and season.

Due to the fact that the purchase of basic lighting is not a cheap affair, it is a good idea to do some research on the products within our reach, and if there is such a possibility – to take the models we are interested in for a test dive.

The set I received is packed in a nicely made case, protecting all elements from damage during transport and storage. Inside the whole is lined with sponge with cut-outs matching the individual components of the set, which consists of:

• Solaris LED head with 4 diodes
• Accu 7Ah lithium battery
• charger
• goodman handle
• 2 Allen spanners
• 2 spare O-rings for the plug from the head
• user’s manual and warranty

After familiarising myself with the contents of the case sent to us, I proceeded to charge the battery. Here, I was pleasantly surprised. Instead of the well-known red LEDs – charging in progress and green – fully charged, the charger’s display informs about the progress of charging the pack, displaying everything in %. Maybe it is already a standard, but as a Halcyon user, who does not have such a feature, I was pleasantly surprised. What is more, after charging to 100%, the display colour changed from red to blue. A small thing but happy.

Now it was time to connect the fully charged battery to the rest of the kit. While charging, I already took care of mounting the goodman holder, using one of the Allen spanners included in the kit. It went a bit reluctantly but everything was crowned with success. Connecting the head with the battery and we have another pleasant surprise. The solid workmanship, well thought out layout of the o-rigns and their number make a very positive impression.

Now, when the whole thing was ready, it was time to mount the canister in some convenient place. Because the torch is turned on by turning its head, I could afford to place the battery in a place where it will not interfere with anything and at the same time will be out of my reach during the dive (so far, I was used to using torches that are turned on by a switch located on the canister, so the whole thing had to be mounted in a way that I could reach it with my hand if necessary).

Another interesting Ammonite solution is the canister mount. Instead of the well-known clamps, we now have a mounting through which we can pull e.g. a wing strap, jacket strap, or any other strap that might be useful to us.

In case of emergency, when our whole set is already screwed together and we do not have time/force to unscrew it and mount the canister, we can use the second Allen spanner included in the set. With its help you quickly unscrew mounting located at the canister, put it around the element to which you want to attach it and screw it back. The whole process takes as long as it takes to unscrew and screw in 3 screws. Very cool and most of all (as it turned out in practice) useful patent.

With the described set we made several dives in different conditions and depths. From a nice afternoon to late evening, diving in the 4-50m depth ranges, with visibility ranging from 30cm to 3m.

Under water, a full, juicy stream of light was immediately striking, spilling nicely over the area. Depending on your needs, the light intensity can be adjusted in three ranges, which, of course, translates into battery life. At this point, once again, I must emphasise how convenient and thoughtful patent is the switching on and adjustment of light output from the head!

We decided to check the durability of the battery during a bucket test. As a result, we had to spend 4 hours with the torch turned on at 100% power. An interesting fact is that, after discharging, we receive a signal in the form of the torch going into strobe mode, and then reducing the light output to the lowest mode, that is 20%.

As for the battery itself, its compact shape is quite impressive. The size, combined with the on/off switch on the head, means that it can be placed virtually anywhere and will not be noticeable either in weight or size.

To sum up, according to the manufacturer’s assurance, LED Solaris is a universal light with very decent parameters. Both the size and lighting times look quite good and will find many followers. Observing its work under water, I am sure that it will also work well among amateur photographers. The solutions used here and described above as well as the workmanship of the individual elements deserve a big plus.

Our thoughts after another test will appear soon. This time, we were playing underwater with fins of the Japanese manufacturer Apollo. This very characteristic equipment known in our country mainly on the military market, more and more often we can observe in recreational divers.