Remington Arms LED Headlight RMHL4AA-B Review

Quick Summary:
All of what you need in a do-it-all hunting light. Maybe too much, but that's OK! Not really a work light, where I would want the batteries in front so I could res my head back.

The Good:
Bright spot or flood beam
Red night vision beam
Strain relief-ed wire, instead of too tight
All the modes needed in a hunting light
4xAA form factor, leaves you with all 4 batteries used in a charging bundle or a battery package of alkalines.

The Bad:
Lo mode on the CREE, is probably still too bright for reading or up close work.

The Use Case:
Cabela's sells 36 items called "headlamp", so this must be a key component for hunting. I hunted for quite a few years before my first headlamp. It was OK, but it was hard to get ready in the morning and sometimes to get in position before first light or out after dark. In addition to getting in and out of a hunting site, there are the camp chores which are always done after dark outside or in a dimly lit camper. Sure a flashlight in the teeth is OK, but it really slows down the story tellin'. This and camping are what I use my light for. While camping, it is used for chasing 'coons away, cleaning up before bed, reading, and making some late night mixed drinks.

Where to Buy:
I bought this at Lowes locally for about $40. Look for the green packaging and the words "150 lumens". You can't miss it. It is also available online here or here It is a Remington RMHL4AA-B.

Specifications:
On packaging -
1)Extreme Track Blood Tracking Mode
2)Red LED – Night Vision

3)Rotating Diffuser


4)Durable Polymer Impact, Corrosion, and Heat Resistant
5)Wicking Head Strap
. . .and I would add -
A)CREE LED main LED with hi(150 lumen) and lo modes with good heat sink
B)Red LED's and 1 Blue LED used in a Red or Blood Tracking (mixed color) mode
C)Rear red LED flash for hunter identification
D)Is it regulated? Runtime definition? 25hrs 'til what?

E)4xAA form factor for increased resistance to cold weather compared to AAA


F)All internals o ring sealed for dust and water intrusion resistance

G)Side wire is clipped to headband and coiled for strain relief


H)Made by Rayovac in China.
I)Lifetime warranty


Functional Details:
Battery pack switch – Turns rear red flashing LED on and off.
Top left switch – 1: Hi 150 lumen mode 2: Low approx 40% mode
Top right switch – 1: RED night vision 2 LED mode 2: Extreme blood tracking mode(Red x 2 + Blue x 1) 3: Redd x 2 strobe.
Both sides cannot operate at the same times.
Snapping the diffuser lens to either side creates a flood beam from the original spot beam pattern.

Construction Details:
We will start at the core of the headlamp assy. At the core is a nice large well finned AL heatsink to which the CREE LED is mounted.


Is this a regulated circuit for the CREE?


Then on top of the CREE and heatsink, is a circuit board with switches.


This subassy drops into a reflector, button housing and seals to it with and o-ring seal. Lubrication seemed adequate to start with and I added a bit more during reassembly. If the lenses are sealed to the front of the housing, this appears water tight. It does seem to rely on the clear lenses being glued onto the housing for water resistance. To me, this looks like a good mix of quality and reasonable weight management.

Beamshots:
This is where camera quality leaves some to be desired. All are ~1m away from a cinder block wall for some relative size measurement.
CREE Hi Spot

CREE Hi Diffused

CREE Lo Spot

CREE Lo Diffused

Red Spot

Red Diffused

Blood Tracking Spot

Blood Tracking Diffused


Other Pictures:

Side view


This just allows you to see the 2 separate lenses glued to the front of the reflector housing. I believe any concern for watertightness lies here. It is strange that the whole thing would have orings everywhere and then just glue these lenses on. Maybe they have someway to guarantee this process?



Looking in here allows you to see how the retention rod from the cap is retained to the side of the case in the bottom of the photo. At the top of the photo is the LED "fiber optic" which allows the LED in the cap to be seen on the outside of the case.


I think I have shown it all. If it looks incomplete or I can add some detail, let me know.

Thanks for the nice, concise review.

I like the separate switches for the white LED and the colored LEDs.

The attached diffuser is definately attractive.

A medium brightness option on the white LED would be a clencher.

The lo setting, is really a medium. A 3 - 10 lo setting would be the nice addition to me. If you have no use for a real low, the lo on this light is more like medium. You can kind of tell that from the beam shots. Honestly, it's gotta be atleast 40 lumens!

Excellent review and comprehensive pictures.

How is the throw? It would be helpful if you could take some outdoor shots at a longer range. Maybe 100 feet or more aimed at a large tree.

How well does the diffuser work at close range? I'm thinking about if you are reading and the light is about a foot from a magazine. Is the entire page evenly illuminated? This is where the Zebralight is perfect.

I wonder if a resistor could be added to produce a much dimmer low?

That does look like a decent light. I like the separate switches and the coiled cord.

If I did not already have so many nice headlights, I would probably pick one up. I am waiting (and not holding my breath) to see what SureFire and Fenix come up with.

I will have to see if I can get the 10 yr old digi camera on a tripod for the throw shots. On hi, the throw was amazing. There is a line of brush 50 yards(laser measured) from the house which it lights up ok. Not bright, but the spot beam is on it and you would see a person or animal out there.

So, IMO, the diffuser does what it can. On high, it would be a good flood work light around camp. On low, it might be a bit better because it would give less glare back.

Reading was ok, but lo and diffused still has a little too much glare on a magazine. Changing the page angle totally fixes that. Also, on a magazine, it is only providing good light for one page at a time at normal viewing distance. On a book, it is ok. Yea, the entire page would be illuminated.

What great headlights do you have?

Swap the blue 5mm for a white for a low low.

That is a good idea except for the fact that the blue LED only comes on with the two red LEDs. I wonder if it could be modded to come on by itself?

Too bad the Cree does not have three levels including a nice low.

Marduke said:

Swap the blue 5mm for a white for a low low.

Click to expand...

Great review!

This is the best bang for your buck headlamp on the market. Over 100 lumens on high, and has over 4,000 lux as well! I'd love to see a comparison between this and the Energizer Hardcase. I only wish the Hardcase was easier to find.
The Remington has some awesome features, but it could be made perfect with a little help from us flashaholics. If only the following changes could be made:

- start out on low and then go to high
- if you wait longer than 1.5 seconds the next click turns the light off
- instead of the blue LED turning on in conjunction with the red LED's, they could have a single white LED that turns on by itself on the second click of that button

If these changes were made, this would be the ultimate headlamp! It's my favorite headlamp the way that it is, but it could be even better! I can only dream of a manufacturer that consults with serious flashaholics before they make a product. Imagine what incredible stuff would exist.

Well, since you have access to the board, you could rewire it so the two red's that are presumably in series are instead in parallel, and replace all three 5mm's with white. That gives you a 2x and 3x 5mm white low's.

this is a nice thorough review. i guess you can replace all the leds to white or the blue to another red.
i'm assuming it's easy to disassemble?

I used it yesterday for over an hour on hi with the diffuser lens. I was caulking and the lighting(in my house) isn't good for detail work, so I added this in. It seemed to run the entire time with no loss of brightness. A nice feature was it didn't get hot at all. It was slightly warm to the touch, but didn't make my head sweat.

nksmfamjp said:

I used it yesterday for over an hour on hi with the diffuser lens. I was caulking and the lighting(in my house) isn't good for detail work, so I added this in. It seemed to run the entire time with no loss of brightness. A nice feature was it didn't get hot at all. It was slightly warm to the touch, but didn't make my head sweat.

Click to expand...

I wish light-reviews would pick one of these up and review it. That way it could be directly compared to the Energizer Hardcase. I'd expect the runtime on high to last quite a while, since it does have 4xAA cells. I wonder if Energizer Lithiums can be used.

I would think so, but that isn't really discussed on the packaging. The packaging refers to alkaline, standard and Ni-cad. . . .but this is on some do not mix warning.

I got this light today. It shares a number of design elements with the Rayovac / River Rock K2 3AA headlamp, but there were some aspects of the K2 that irritated me, so I hoped that this model would fix those issues. For me, this Rayovac / Remington lamp will replace the K2.

My chief irritation with the K2 had been that the K2 headlamp used three cells, and had no regulation except for PWM dimming. I would have used NiMH for the more constant output they provide, but it's irritating to charge odd numbers of cells. Should I have to wait until I have six spent cells? The K2 probably shouldn't be used with lithium primaries, especially since it was said to overheat in high mode with alkalines anyway.

The Rayovac / Remington headlamp uses four cells, and I assume that means it's regulated in some way. Why use four cells otherwise? Low mode on this light is definitely PWM dimmed. :shakehead I'm not sure if this is true regulation, because I don't have the equipment to measure. High mode may be PWM regulated, but if so, the frequency is very high, and near the threshold of my ability to detect it by swinging fingers in front of my face.

I immediately ditched the alkaline cells that shipped with the light in favor of lithium primaries. I'll let you know if I burn out the led or driver board. With lithium cells, the battery case weighs about 130 grams, which is almost exactly what the battery case of the K2 headlamp weighs with alkalines. The head weighs about 70 grams, while the K2s head weighs in at 60. I may steal the K2s elastic straps, because the green and black ones on the Rayovac / Reminton are fugly. The hinge does not ratchet; it's held by friction, but you can adjust the tension on the bolt that holds the head to the forehead plate. The bolt is held with a nylon locknut, which is a very nice touch. You could almost certainly run with this lamp if you put the battery pack on your waist.

Let's see, what else? The red led on the battery case now only has one mode, flashing, and the light pipe diffuser thingy is frosted, so it works a bit better off-angle.

Any questions I can answer without measurement equipment?

How noticeable is the PWM on low?

What is the current draw on high and low (if you have a DMM)?

Is the beam as artifact and ring free as it appears in the pics?

Phaserburn said:

Is the beam as artifact and ring free as it appears in the pics?

Click to expand...

The main beam has some artifacts if you don't use the diffuser. With the diffuser it is completely smooth and 100% artifact free.

Phaserburn said:

How noticeable is the PWM on low?

What is the current draw on high and low (if you have a DMM)?

Is the beam as artifact and ring free as it appears in the pics?

Click to expand...

With fairly fresh lithium cells (1.60 V open circuit), it draws 220 mA on high, 48 on low. With new alkalines (1.62 V open circuit) it draws 250 mA on high and 52 on low. NiMH from the desk drawer (1.29 V) is 173 mA and 37. 3x NiMH cells is 74 and 16 mA. I guess that means that it doesn't use constant current regulation. Shame...

The PWM on low is noticable if you know what to look for, but isn't noticable in regular use. Likewise, the beam isn't perfect, also not an issue in regular use.

Update: One leg of the Cree is connected to the ground plane via an array of SMT resistors measuring 3.6 ohms total. I don't really know enough about circuit design to diagnose things further. However, there definitely appears to be room for custom circuitry if you're willing to gut the 5 mm half of the headlamp. You'd have to save enough of the board to retain the switch and hold it in place. The Cree star is securely mounted to the heatsink with two screws and thermal goop.

173ma on nimh high will result in 10 hr runtimes using Eneloops, which is impressive. However, even if the circuit is converting some voltage to current, which I don't know is happening, that low of a current wouldn't require such a large heatsink. Its not a bad thing, but seems that the led is barely being driven. It could be getting from 173ma up to maybe 250ma or so (guesstimate). The Cree would need to see 350ma or so to produce 100 lumens. I'm a bit confused here.

Phaserburn said:

173ma on nimh high will result in 10 hr runtimes using Eneloops, which is impressive. However, even if the circuit is converting some voltage to current, which I don't know is happening, that low of a current wouldn't require such a large heatsink. Its not a bad thing, but seems that the led is barely being driven. It could be getting from 173ma up to maybe 250ma or so (guesstimate). The Cree would need to see 350ma or so to produce 100 lumens. I'm a bit confused here.

Click to expand...

If I wasn't clear, I was measuring current at the batteries. That's not the current at which the LED is being driven, it's the current at which the driver circuit is being driven. For example, 4 x 1.29 V = 5.2 V for the whole battery pack, and I measured a draw of 173 mA. That's 0.89 W. I don't know what the Vf is, because I didn't measure it, but if we assume it's 3.2 V (and the drive circuit is 100% efficient) then 0.89 W / 3.2V = 279 mA. That's a much more reasonable number. Making some more assumptions, the LED is being driven at about 470 mA with fresh alkalines.

Yes, this thing ought to run a while on NiMH cells, but that's because (I suspect) this thing doesn't have true current regulation, just a voltage stepdown circuit. It seemed less bright on NiMH cells than lithium, but I only have one unit, so I couldn't do a side-by-side. That said, the flat discharge curve of NiMH or lithium should make this a pretty respectable headlamp.

470ma on high sounds more like it. I'm not sure what Cree bin they use, but it does produce over 100 lumens on high with fresh cells, so I would expect at least a Q2 or better.