What’s Up With the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp – Review

In this Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp review, I’ll show you how it works, then take a critical look at its features. The instructions that come in the box with the headlamp aren’t the best, so I’ll go through the details on how it operates.

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How To Use the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp

How To Adjust the Brightness on the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp

1. Press the long, pill shaped power button and release it to turn the headlamp on.
2. Use the smaller, round shaped button to select which of the 3 LED lights in the headlamp you want to use.
3. Press and hold in the long, pilled shaped power button. This will make the headlamp cycle up and down in brightness. When you first depress the button the lamp defaults to its brightest setting, but as you continue to hold it in, it will dim down to its lowest setting and blink once, to tell you it’s as low as it will go. Continuing to depress it after it blinks allows it to grow in brightness up to its highest brightness setting. It will once again blink to notify you it’s reached its highest setting.
4. If you’re using the bright, spotlight LED when cycling through the dimming option, it will at first turn both the spotlight and the floodlight on to achieve max brightness before it starts to dim.
5. While the headlamp is on, you can gently tap the lower right side of it, where there is a round light icon ☼, and it will automatically default to its brightest setting for whichever LED you have selected. Sometimes you can merely stroke or touch this lower right area and the headlamp will respond. After tapping it to get its brightest setting, you can tap it again to make it default back to the dimness it was on before the original tap. Even if you are on the less bright, flood LED setting, the tapping will turn both it and the brighter spotlight LED on to their highest settings.
6. The tapping function takes practice, as the headlamp doesn’t always respond, or sometimes has a small delayed response. At first I was tapping it way too hard, because it didn’t initially respond to a normal tap, on my first attempt. Placing my finger gently and briefly on the area, then rapidly withdrawing it, seems to make the headlamp consistently respond. Or just briefly rubbing the area works too!

How to Start the Strobe Light Effect on the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp

While the unit is off quickly press and release the power button twice in a row to turn on the strobe light effect. Then use the smaller selection button to cycle through which of its 3 LED lights (bright spot light, less bright flood light, or red light) you want to use with the strobe effect.

How to Start the SOS signal on the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp

While the unit is off quickly press and release the power button twice in a row to turn on the strobe light effect. Then use the smaller selection button to cycle through the headlamp’s 3 LED lights, and select the red LED light. While the red LED is in strobe mode, tap the right side of the headlamp until it switches to SOS mode. You can then use the small selection button again to cycle through the other LED lights (flood and spot lights) to use the SOS signal with whichever of them you’d like.

Video Instructions on Using the Black Diamond Spot 400-R

Wearing Adjustments

The Spot 400-R’s head strap is made of soft, mildly-stretchy Repreve elastic fiber – a material made from recycled plastic. It has two in-line buckles to adjust its length, where adjusting one obligates you to adjust the other, lest the middle, doubled over section of the strap suffers a bunching effect, where there is a difference in length between its two components. The strap can be made long enough to wear with a ball cap.

The lamp has a hinge on its back plate that is threaded with the strap, which allows it to be pointed downward for near-field hand work, like tying guy lines, hammering in tent stakes, or working with a backpacking stove.

Notable Design Features

The micro-USB charging port door on the Spot 400-R swings open and shut easily, and its inward section protrudes into the recess of the port when closed, helping it stay waterproof.

The headlamp can operate up to 1 meter under water for 30 minutes, and is dust-tight. IP67 standard.

There is a shallow lip protecting the headlamp’s clear plastic window, such that if the lamp were set down on a flat surface, this window would not be touching it.

The headlamp remembers the level of dimness for its 3 LED’s, even when it’s off.

There are 3 blue micro-LED lights on the side of the headlamp that give you an idea at to its charge level.

The headlamp is 0.073kg (2.6 oz.) versus the cheaper comparative alternative, the Energizer Vision Ultra HD Rechargeable LED Headlamp, which is 0.13kg (4.576 oz.) that I recommended for easy and cheap, pack in camping.

Wearing Comfort

If you have the strap adjusted to the appropriate diameter for your head, you don’t really notice it being there. The softness of the strap is comfortable during routine use (I’ve used it thus far for walking the dogs at night, playing around with a new tent in the backyard, and after hours gardening so far). You can even use the lamp around your neck on flood mode, when walking around at night.

Can You Wear Glasses With the Black Diamond Headlamp?

I wear glasses a lot, and the headlamp doesn’t interfere with my wearing of them. It doesn’t push down on the glasses’ temples or temple tips – the parts of the frame that run alongside your head. And it doesn’t fall down and rest on the front part of the frame, or bridge of the frame.

How Long Does the Battery Last on the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp?

The manufacture states that the Spot 400-R lasts 4 hours on ‘Max’, with 1 hour of low intensity reserve; 8 hours on ‘Med’, with 0.5 hours of low intensity reserve, and 225 hours on ‘Low’ with no hours of reserve. The ‘Low’ setting correlates with 6 lumens of intensity, or 6 single candles’ worth, according to the manufacture, which seems a bit lower than the lowest setting on the floodlight, but much higher than the lowest setting on the red light. Further the ‘Low’ setting is still supposed to provide about 40 feet of distance illumination, in the instructions. All this points to the dimmest setting on the flood light being what is referred to as the ‘Low’ setting by Black Diamond.

What is the Beam Distance for the Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp?

The manufacture’s max beam distance is 328 feet (100m) for the spotlight. It has credible coverage testing it in a long, 150 foot parking garage and excellent coverage inside my 50 foot span, living room to kitchen, in perfect darkness. Dimming the headlamp to a moderate setting, providing 200 lumens, still allows one to see up to 200 feet down the trail and, based on the instruction manual, on the lowest setting, up to 40 feet in front of you. I’d say about 15 feet is what you’d get on the lowest spotlight setting, just from playing around with the light.

What I Don’t Love

So far, the only con for me is the small length of the micro-USB charging cord. It’s okay for portable battery use, and even countertop electrical outlet based usage. But your headlamp will dangle in midair when charging from a standard wall outlet. If you’re going ultralight on a thru-hike, maybe this is a plus for you, but still you’re not as inconspicuous with your lamp just hanging there, when at the local CVS patient waiting area, when trying to get some free charging lol!

If I wanted to get super critical, I could mention the dimmest setting on the red LED is so low, its only use would be along the lines of reading a map 4 inches in front of you in complete darkness, or as a sleeping night-light in a tent side pocket. It only pushes out a fraction of a lumen. But of course, you’re not obligated to use the red LED on this lowest setting, so no big deal.

Field Testing

The headlamp performed well during a recent trip to Dogwood Campground in Lake Arrowhead, which features campsites credibly spread out from one another, such that trips to the bathroom were a bit of a walk. I was able to perfectly survey my large, private site at night with the spot light, as well has make the trek to the bathroom in the dark with both the floodlight and spotlight.

Using the dimming feature was not a problem, when I experienced foot traffic heading the opposite direction towards me, and needed to bring the light down, to keep it from being a visual disturbance. The red LED wasn’t bright enough to work as a walking light, but it did perfectly well for up and close, hands on type of chores.

Further Reading

Thanks for checking out my Black Diamond Spot 400-R Headlamp review!

If you’re thinking about lighting for your next camping trip, also check out my review of the UST 30-Day Duro lantern, which I’ve been using the last several years as a small, immediate area type lantern. And check out my hiking gear and camping gear pages for other reviews, hauls, and info.

Shout out to Dave Nieves – a random backpacker – who let my dad borrow his headlamp (not a Black Diamond) on the way back up to the top of the Grand Canyon when it was getting dark, a decade ago. I always think of him when I think of headlamps.