Bike Bought - Thank you

Cycle-touring, Expeditions, Adventures, Major cycle routes NOT LeJoG (see other special board)
PH
Posts: 13106
Joined: 21 Jan 2007, 12:31am
Location: Derby
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Re: Bike Bought - Thank you

Post by PH »

BikeBuddha wrote: 4 Oct 2022, 8:47am
PH wrote: 2 Oct 2022, 10:34pm
BikeBuddha wrote: 2 Oct 2022, 9:24pm I went with sinewave beacon for a lighting system. Better for backroads. Also, can plug in battery back to power lights.
Great light for the off road purpose it's designed for, pretty poor light for anything else and of course not EU legal. If i was spending £400 on lighting (Plus the hub) I think I could do better.
Better how? Looked at Edelux 2, but, beam too narrow.
Any suggestions appreciated.
My starting point would be the expectation of how much night riding I was anticipating on a World tour, for me it wouldn't be much, I couldn't maintain long days for an extended period so the night riding wouldn't be much and something would have gone wrong if it was somewhere remote.
You're not going to find a single light that does everything well. So the next choices are whether to compromise, what to compromise, or to look at multiple lights.
The Edelux, or any of the other high end StVZO lights, will light a country lane from edge to edge and the entire lane on a multi lane road. They're not great for seeing beyond that, but most people find it more than adequate for on road riding.

My choices with that budget and wanting to keep all bases covered:
An Edelux or Supernova dynamo light
A separate USB charging device (I don't know enough about them to recommend, though my igaroD1 works fine)
An exposure or similar rechargeable with both options for bar and head/helmet mounting (The Exposure Sirius Mk10 will put the Beacon in the shade)
Plus a decent headtorch, something to use primarily off the bike, but bright enough to use as a back up on it.
But I'd probably be happy with a lot less.

I don't know anyone with a Beacon, I've ridden with a few riders using similar high power spherical beam lights. On road, even on pitch black rough country lanes and sustrans tracks, they have no advantage over my Edelux, though it is sometimes pleasant to turn night into day and scare the birds out of the trees. Pleasant for the rider that is, certainly not for anyone else unfortunate to be anywhere near them.
rareposter
Posts: 1991
Joined: 27 Aug 2014, 2:40pm

Re: Bike Bought - Thank you

Post by rareposter »

PH wrote: 4 Oct 2022, 10:23am My starting point would be the expectation of how much night riding I was anticipating on a World tour, for me it wouldn't be much, I couldn't maintain long days for an extended period so the night riding wouldn't be much and something would have gone wrong if it was somewhere remote.
You're not going to find a single light that does everything well. So the next choices are whether to compromise, what to compromise, or to look at multiple lights.
This - also worth bearing in mind that in a lot of European countries, your lights HAVE to be StVZO-compliant (although how much that is enforced is another matter...).
If you're going to take the bike direct to Nepal or Colombia for example, that won't be an issue; if you're going to ride through Europe, you will need to consider it.

For my money, I'd always go with Exposure:

https://www.exposure-use.com/Brands/Exp ... 7300a6d139

Loads of mounting options available, great lights, super reliable and you can use the output port to charge GPS and phones.

As with the rear hub, make sure you get a front hub with disc rotor mounts, even if you're building it into a wheel for rim brakes.
BikeBuddha
Posts: 52
Joined: 11 Aug 2019, 6:15pm

Re: Bike Bought - Thank you

Post by BikeBuddha »

rareposter wrote: 4 Oct 2022, 10:51am
PH wrote: 4 Oct 2022, 10:23am
For my money, I'd always go with Exposure:

https://www.exposure-use.com/Brands/Exp ... 7300a6d139

Unfortunately, they don't do a 36 spoke version for the dynamo.

But thank you for the recommendation.


I think i will stick with sinewave. I doubt i will be riding at night that much anyway. Especially in UK>
slowster
Moderator
Posts: 4629
Joined: 7 Jul 2017, 10:37am

Re: Bike Bought - Thank you

Post by slowster »

One of the big pluses of the Edelux is the design of the housing. There are no openings in the upper part of the aluminium body, and consequently water (or wind blown dust) is very unlikely to penetrate the interior of the lamp. This is achieved in part by using a magnetic reed switch to switch the light on and off. I would have little confidence that the exposed switches/usb port of the Sinewave Beacon (photograph below) would be as reliable over the long term and would prevent water and dust etc. getting inside the lamp and causing a fault.

I think the Sinewave Beacon is more suited to off-road endurance/bikepacking events and races, where the unshaped beam and output are desired for fast off-road descents, and where a higher risk of component failure is traded for performance gains. On a heavily laden expedition tourer, reliability trumps such small performance gains. It is very unlikely that someone on a tourer with panniers would want or need to ride downhill off-road at the sort of speed where a Sinewave Beacon would be substantially better than an Edelux, as opposed to riding in a bikepacking event/race with minimal luggage on the bike and where running the risk of a crash when riding downhill off-road at speed is part and parcel of the sport.

Image
sukuinage
Posts: 143
Joined: 20 May 2008, 1:18pm
Location: Germany

Re: Bike Bought - Thank you

Post by sukuinage »

PH wrote: 4 Oct 2022, 10:23am
BikeBuddha wrote: 4 Oct 2022, 8:47am
PH wrote: 2 Oct 2022, 10:34pm

Great light for the off road purpose it's designed for, pretty poor light for anything else and of course not EU legal. If i was spending £400 on lighting (Plus the hub) I think I could do better.
Better how? Looked at Edelux 2, but, beam too narrow.
Any suggestions appreciated.
My starting point would be the expectation of how much night riding I was anticipating on a World tour, for me it wouldn't be much, I couldn't maintain long days for an extended period so the night riding wouldn't be much and something would have gone wrong if it was somewhere remote.
You're not going to find a single light that does everything well. So the next choices are whether to compromise, what to compromise, or to look at multiple lights.
The Edelux, or any of the other high end StVZO lights, will light a country lane from edge to edge and the entire lane on a multi lane road. They're not great for seeing beyond that, but most people find it more than adequate for on road riding.

My choices with that budget and wanting to keep all bases covered:
An Edelux or Supernova dynamo light
A separate USB charging device (I don't know enough about them to recommend, though my igaroD1 works fine)
An exposure or similar rechargeable with both options for bar and head/helmet mounting (The Exposure Sirius Mk10 will put the Beacon in the shade)
Plus a decent headtorch, something to use primarily off the bike, but bright enough to use as a back up on it.
But I'd probably be happy with a lot less.

I don't know anyone with a Beacon, I've ridden with a few riders using similar high power spherical beam lights. On road, even on pitch black rough country lanes and sustrans tracks, they have no advantage over my Edelux, though it is sometimes pleasant to turn night into day and scare the birds out of the trees. Pleasant for the rider that is, certainly not for anyone else unfortunate to be anywhere near them.
I'd agree with this. I've taken battery lamps (B&M StVZO approved) with me every tour I've been on and used them twice, both for a short time during the day when the weather was really bad. I've never planned on cycling at night as part of my enjoyment of touring is seeing the countryside. If you're camping I'd take head torch anyway and just use that as backup if you really need it.
Obviously if you're travelling in the wilds then a hub dynamo is useful (I've got one on my commuter) but I wouldn't expect to use the light that much.
BikeBuddha
Posts: 52
Joined: 11 Aug 2019, 6:15pm

Re: Bike Bought - Thank you

Post by BikeBuddha »

Simon has guided me well to customising the right bike for me.
Thank you all again for helping.
May you be well and free of suffering.
Will posts pictures and spec when bike arrives.

:)
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