Lumicycle MR11 halogen upgrade to LED

[Graham]

Hello,

Has anyone tried this replacement LED ( in place of a dichroic halogen bulb ) ??



This is the first time that I noticed this one on the Lumicycle website. The previous multi-LED MR11 was reported on this forum as being useless. [ Thanks again to Raph who saved me wasting the money. ]

[Si]

Looks rather nice...if it works! 40 hrs on my old battery would make it tempting, (with the big halogen as a main beam/backup). Should you get one, Graham, please let us know what you think.

[Graham]

I've contacted Lumicycle to get some more info on this MR11 LED.

[nez]

It would be interesting to know the voltage. Being able to replace my halogen bulbs with LEDs would be lovely.

[Graham]

Yes the original 1w 15 led unit is nowhere near as good as the newer 1 led lamp

It is not as tight or powerful as the 12w, therefore the beam does not go as far forward. I don't think anything comes even close to the 12w Halogen, its a superb lamp... however

I also love this 1w led. It is perfect for long slow climbs and anything under 10mph, perfect for being seen around town, with a glow ring.

I use it most of all as a head lamp, utilising one of our helmet kits with an elastic strap around the head for all my outdoor adventures, fishing, walking, camping etc, a brilliant personal head lamp.

1) Not ideal for faster road riding, not enough forward 'punch'

2) Really best for being seen, in conjunction with Glow Ring

3) Great when used as head/helmet lamp in conjunction with another main beam on bars

4) Highly recommended (a lighting toolkit 'must have')

Thanks Lumicycle, that helps.
For me it is not an obvious buy, but I might ask the spirit of Winter Solstice to get me one.
It might be useful in place of the 5W halogen, or possibly to run at the same time giving a better light than the 5W alone.

[cjchambers]

I have a similar thing that I bought from B&Q for my DIY MR11-based setup:

http://www.diy.com/diy/jsp/bq/nav.jsp?i ... 11&x=0&y=0

Replaces the 20W halogen I was using before - just as bright, but uses about 1/10 of the power, meaning I can ditch the huge battery and use a smaller one.

[Graham]

I have a similar thing that I bought from B&Q for my DIY MR11-based setup:

http://www.diy.com/diy/jsp/bq/nav.jsp?i ... 11&x=0&y=0

Replaces the 20W halogen I was using before - just as bright, but uses about 1/10 of the power, meaning I can ditch the huge battery and use a smaller one.

Thanks for the suggestion. The link goes to an MR11 rated at 240V !! . . . . perhaps they have changed the product ??
It does say "spot" but does not mention the beam angle in degrees.

I shall be interneting around for something similar to the Lumicycle product.

[PW]

Having asked around I'm not convinced. The culprit seems to be the optics rather than the LED. The fisheye lens doesn't seem to be anything like as good as the rear facing LED & mirror reflector on the B&M lights. Two users I found said it gets a bit hairy trying to use the Lumi alone on unlit country lanes, my IQ Cyo can punch a beam about 75 yards (my estimate, not measured) and light the road surface at the same time.

[tony price]

I've a twin headlight lumicycle setup with 12 an 20w halogen lamps. One benefit of lumicycle bulbs is the narrow beam (whci I have been unable to source elsewhere). Big downside is short battery life when using lots of light - hence this thread I suppose. MR11 bulbs seem to be relatively rare in powerful spot LED form - but I have a few examples on order of spot and flood variety, both at about 1.5 w each. I'll do some comparison tests for brightness and beam focus report back. Durability and water resistance is also on the agenda, so some shakedown tests might be called for.

Apologies if I sound scientific at all - it won't be. Just a try out in the dark garage, and left on till they run out of juice. Perhaps I'll manage a table for comparison if I can be ar5ed.

Tony

[Graham]

Thanks for that Tony.

Any info is good, whether subjective, psuedo-scientific or hard science.

PS. The best I have done with replacement halogen bulbs is get a couple of cheap 10 Watt / 10 degree MR11s from Maplin, about a year ago.

I think that BLT DIrect have some 12 W / 7 degrees at the moment ( tempting ! )
http://www.bltdirect.com/product.php?pi ... t+7+degree

[tony price]

Still stuck with halogen and high watts for the light output. I've found some 3w MR11 LEDs but they are longer than the lumicycle housing at about 50mm rather than the 30 odd mm. They look great though and deserve a longer housing to put them in. Broad in the beam though - have a butchers at http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/10-x-MR11-3W-HI-P ... 2c58ad05ca and see what I mean.

Off to watch the snow fall and make more coffee. Polish the bike in readiness for Thursday night and new bulbs if Santa delivers...

Why do winter club rides turn in to a one upmanship lighting contest?

[gentlegreen]

Personally I couldn't live with such dim lighting. I never took halogen lamps seriously, but with LEDs you can have truly road-worthy lighting for the same sort of power.

My commute is short - 1 hour per day. For many years all I had were a couple of 12 volt, 21 watt lamps and a 7AH lead acid battery.

I now use a 12 volt / 3.7AH NiMH battery which gets topped-up every couple of days.

To see where I'm going I have three MR16 LEDs each with different optics.

The two I use for my dipped beam are 40 degrees and 25 degrees and combined do a lovely job for a total consumption of 8 watts - so in theory would run for maybe 4 hours.

I have a third, 15 degree lamp which I switch in when I need a high beam which consumes 5 watts.

In addition I have two arrays of 48 LEDs to "be seen" - total 7 watts.

I would guess my average consumption is 20 watts.

I carry a spare battery, plus a cheap 1 watt LED torch for dire emergencies.

[gentlegreen]

Still stuck with halogen and high watts for the light output. I've found some 3w MR11 LEDs but they are longer than the lumicycle housing at about 50mm rather than the 30 odd mm. They look great though and deserve a longer housing to put them in. Broad in the beam though - have a butchers at http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/10-x-MR11-3W-HI-P ... 2c58ad05ca and see what I mean.

I'll have to try one of those.

My supplier of MR16s has gone out of business and I'm desperately trying to source them elsewhere.

A miracle that they could cram a switching regulator into such a tiny can. A shame they only come with 45 degree optics though ...

My MR16s come apart so the optics are changeable..

[Graham]

I've found some 3w MR11 LEDs but they are longer than the lumicycle housing at about 50mm rather than the 30 odd mm. They look great though and deserve a longer housing to put them in. Broad in the beam though - have a butchers at http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/10-x-MR11-3W-HI-P ... 2c58ad05ca and see what I mean.

Yep, promising, but the beam is a too wide and the light temperature too yellow.

They have a rather interesting multiple price on ebay. You could pay anything from £5.10 - £127 depending on which "Buy-it-now" item you select.

They say that they have a manufacturing facility. I wonder if they would do a specific cycle light for us ?

[BSRU]

I recently received some 5w led MR11's from China that I took a punt on from EBay, cost £12 for 3 including the shipping.

They are supposed to be equivalent to a 35w halogen, I do not know if this is true but they are brighter than my 20w halogen bulbs. Cannot use them for real yet as they have no front protection so need to sort something out.