I haven't been caving for a good few years but may do a gentle amble in the not too distant future. If I were to appear at, say, Long Churn or Dow Cave with my Russian titanium generator and ancient carbide lamp I'd be laughed out of the cave I suppose [and I bet many readers of this wont even know what a "generator" is in this context]. So I need a new helmet and modern lamp. I have trawled the various web sites and see that Petzl now do the Trios, Elios, Spelios, Vertex Best and Vertex Vent, probably among others; plus offers from other makers like Edelrid. For lamps I can find Duo, Ultra Vario and Scurion (where the "basic" is ?310!!!). I know these items are to personal taste and I'll get lots of different answers but any pointers to plus and minus issues of these would be handy. Does anyone still use carbide and can it even be bought today? At least my oversuit is yellow so I wont need a new one of those!

Graham,

PM me and I will give you the low down on modern caving equipment. I think the last trip I did with you was in Peak Cavern in wet suits and a Premier carbide lamp.

Cheers,

Mark Wright

Unless you're planning to go caving a lot (and it sounds like you're not), I'd stick to basic (ie cheapest !) gear.
I came back to caving a few years ago after a long break and any of the modern LED lamps were a joy - lightweight, dependable and long-lasting.  Much better than the old lead-acids and carbides of my memory, IMO.  Given that you can easily carry several packs of spare AA batteries (giving light for a couple of days), I can't see any advantage in carbide, unless you have a perverse attachment to the smell....

if you are just going to do gentle ambling just get a Petzl Headlamp available from good outdoor shops. I used to use a Tikka Plus which cost around ?30 for some time. (Just dry it out between trips by opening the battery compartment for a while.)

That's now my backup light though as I use a Troglight for most of my caving which lasts ages. It's only ?67.50 atm,

See:- http://troglite.com/

It's waterproof and comes with mains and car chargers. It's had some abuse over the past 2-3 years and I've had no problems with it.

These luxury super bright lights are great, but you probably won't need one.

Regards, Mel.

Alveo helmets are incredibly light and a good fit for many heads.  Mine doesn't shake about on my head like the old helmets did.

I'm still using a Duo on mine but a lot of folk seem to like the Pixa 3.  Shouldn't break the bank either.

The Fenix HP 11 costs about the same as the Pixa 3, but is a lot brighter and lasts longer.