Sola on a helmet?

[Johanan]

Has anybody tried to mount a Sola Dive Light on a helmet? The shape of its body and the position of the switch makes the usual bungee method not very suitable. Any suggestions? Thanks!

 

[Randy g]

I used a go pro mount to secure it. It was solid enough to scooter with for a 2 hour dive.

 

[Johanan]

Thanks Randy! Looks great. Is there a GoPro mount for sola which fits into the "shoe" on Sola's body? And how did you attach it to the helmet? Was it the self-adhesive mount?

 

[tursiops]

I attached the receiver for a Dive Rite QRM to the side of my cave/sidemount helmet, and installed the other piece of the QRM on the base of my SOLA.
Now I can just reach of and remove the SOLA if needed; I also use a QRM hand-mount for my SOLA Tech, so if it were to fail I can remove it, clip it off, and move the helmet SOLA to my hand to finish the dive.

My GoPro mount is on the front of the helmet, but with a much shorter arm than then one randyg shows so it does not stick up above the helmet (bad idea while cave diving!).

 

[Johanan]

Thank you, tursiops, I like the idea of mounting the Sola on the helmet or on the wrist, according to the situation. The original Sola wrist strap is not good anyway. BTW, how did you placed the GoPro mount on the helmet? Was it the self-adhesive mount or in some other way?

 

[tursiops]

BTW, how did you placed the GoPro mount on the helmet? Was it the self-adhesive mount or in some other way?

The GoPro mount was bolted to the helmet using a piece of one of the many GoPro mounts I had....it might be the front piece of a handlebar mount or something, sorry, not sure.

There is no QRM-SOLA adapter. I got a SOLA D-ring adapter, and drilled/tapped it to hold counter-sunk flat-top machine screws through the QRM plate and into the SOLA adapter. There are originally two holes in the SOLA adapter: one tapped for a 1/4-20 bolt, and one for a 10-32 bolt that goes through the adapter into the SOLA body (this is the one intended to hold all the SOLA adapters to the light). I put a third hole into the SOLA adapter to hold a 8-32 flat-top screw. So I have three counter-sunk flat-top machine screws into the QRM plate: a 1/4-20 (slotted head) that goes into the tapped hole on the adapter; a 8-32 (small Phillips) that goes into my new tapped hole on the adapter; and a 10-32 (hex) that goes though the plate and the adapter and into the SOLA body. I may not have needed the 8-32, but there was room so what the heck. Most the time was spent countersinking and grinding off the three bolts so they would not be too long.

 

[Johanan]

Many thanks for this post! Very helpful.