Milwaukee Intrinsically Safe Head Lamp – Do I Need One?

If you just thought to yourself well, I love Milwaukee Tools & their lighting but what does Intrinsically Safe Mean? There is a good chance you probably don’t need your lights to meet the Intrinsically Safe Standards at which point the second thing you’ll probably think is wow that light is expensive and lumens are too low… For those working in confined spaces or around combustibles of any kind, Intrinsically Safe is nothing new, lights and other electronic items that are tested to minimize chances of a spark or electric charge that could potentially setting off an explosion. Milwaukee’s 2004HZL is their first product that meets these high standard but certainly not going to be their last.

What Are the Standards for Intrinsically Safe Lighting?

Class I, II, III are dangers of explosion due to presence of vapor, gases or liquids (class I), dust (class II) or fibers & flyings (class III). Most utilities, trenches, gas & oil are primarily concerned with Class I but there are lots of applications for Class II & Class III in grain silos, around lots of sawdust, maintenance operations or manufacturing applications just to name a few. If you’re not sure, be safe and don’t guess, many lights are rated for all 3 classes. Additionally there is Division 1 and 2 which addresses distance in relation to the hazardous location. Division 1 is designed to meet the more dangerous, in the case of a Utility Vault it means the product is safe to work in the vault itself, where division 2 means approved to work in area surrounding the utility vault. Anything rated for Division 1 is automatically approved for Division 2 as well. Again if there is any hint of a question, be safe don’t guess. If a light is rated for Class I, II, III Division 1 then it’s the highest level of intrinsically safe UL certification for any of these environments, the Milwaukee 2004HZL meets this highest level of certification and is the only light we’ve seen that very clearly marks it’s certifications right on the side.

The two big players in Intrinsically Safe Lighting currently are Streamlight and Pelican which do not clearly mark what standards they meet on their lighting and don’t even meet all the class ratings with testing in different environments. These manufacturer’s also make some lights in the High-Viz safety color that are not intrinsically safe so it’s very difficult to tell if the co-worker in the vault with you actually has the proper equipment. Both the big players do have less expensive options as well in the $40ish range but lumens of 80-120 so not really addressing the same user needs.

How Does the Milwaukee Intrinsically Safe Light Measure Up?

Typically you’ll see much lower lumen levels with Intrinsically Safe Lighting which of course means people would rather use their other headlamp that has more lumens and goes back to the age old PPE conundrum, not protective if you don’t wear it. The Milwaukee gets it right here, 310 lumens in a less than 4oz headlamp with both spot and flood capabilities, Bravo the red team nailed it! This might also be the first product ever than has no red on it so breaking new ground on many fronts. The price at $80 is high, pelican and light stream are both in that same range for their higher end intrinsically safe lights but only 215 and 250 lumens respectively and both are heavier.

Milwaukee also gives your everything you need in the package for whatever your application is, a nylon strap (black) as well as a rubber strap (high viz) plus 4 hard hat clips. The rubber strap is best for holding in place on a hard hat where the nylon strap is best worn directly on head but clips are there for nylon to work on hard hat so whatever you prefer. Of course yes the 2004HZL can clip right to the Milwaukee BOLT hard hat system so you don’t need a strap at all, was that even a question? To meet the certification, you also need to use special batteries either Energizer E92 or Duracell MX2400 which the Milwaukee light includes 3x the AAA Duracell MX 2400.

Will Milwaukee make more Intrinsically Safe lights? Absolutely, we can say that pretty confidently not based on any insider information from the top but they created a “HAZ logo” for labeling their Intrinsically Safe products so yes their coming out with more. They also have a very strong focus on electricians and utility trades ensuring all their tools and lighting work around high voltage, tested to 69KV rating like this light. We’d expect to see something similar in a flashlight and clip light, the two other most popular Intrinsically Safe lights available currently. We’d also love to see some larger lighting as well Intrinsically Safe Rockets and Rovers but might be tricky to get those to work off traditional M12 or M18 batteries, we’ll let their product wizards, much smarter than us, figure out that dilemma.

Launching this summer the 2004HZL will join a huge and ever growing line up of Milwaukee Personal Lighting (powered by alkaline or RedLithium USB), M12 Lighting and M18 lighting, also soon the MX light Tower, almost forgot about that one. Pretty much Milwaukee is looking to cover every lighting need out there for professional trades people and getting closer and closer every day.

Milwaukee Intrinsically Safe Head Lamp 2004HZL – $79 (launching summer 2020)

310 Lumens of TRUEVIEW™ High Definition Output
100M Beam Distance on Spotlight
Spot/Flood (310 Lumens)
Spot (155 lumens)
Flood – High (235 lumens), Med (155 lumens), Low (25 lumens)
4 Hours to 40 Hours of Runtime
Intrinsically Safe Class I, II, III / Division 1 Rated – Certified by Underwriters Laboratories (UL)
IP64 Ingress Protected
Dust Proof and Water Resistant
69KV Rating
9 foot drop rating
On-Strap Intrinsically Safe Callout
Three Attachment Methods (INCLUDED) – Dual Lock, Rubber Band Strap & Nylon Strap