My uncle swore by a $12 headlamp from a hardware store bin, and after 40 nights out I finally get it

Jade Green · 2026-10-16T16:00:05.086581+00:00

So my uncle Gary has been camping out of a beat up Tacoma since the 90s, and whenever gear talk comes up he always says the same thing. He told me to skip the fancy headlamps and just grab the cheap ones from the bin by the register. I figured he was just being stubborn. Two years back I dropped $70 on a name brand light with a bunch of modes, and honestly the battery died on the second night in the Ozarks. Last month I grabbed one of those $12 lights on a whim before a trip to Arkansas, and it lasted all four nights on the same batteries. The beam is simple, it clicks on, it clicks off, and it never tried to strobe SOS at me while I was trying to find the tent zipper at 2am. Now I keep two of them in my pack and the expensive one sits in a drawer. Anyone else here run cheap lights on purpose, or am I just lucky with this one?

🐿️Pinecone Attack

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My uncle swore by a $12 headlamp from a hardware store bin, and after 40 nights out I finally get it | Camping Gear Reviews - Pinecone Attack