Cycling UK Forum

Here's my 48 LED / 3.5 watt tail light :-



Almost certainly illegal .

gentlegreen wrote:Here's my 48 LED / 3.5 watt tail light :-



Almost certainly illegal .

A very pleasant hearth glow there, gentlegreen. But I'd love to know why you use 48 LED's totalling 3.5v, rather than 3 at 3.5v?

CREPELLO wrote:A very pleasant hearth glow there, gentlegreen. But I'd love to know why you use 48 LED's totalling 3.5v, rather than 3 at 3.5v?

It's 3.5 watts - quite an improvement on the 21 watt car brake light I used to have, and in some senses, even brighter.
(5mm LEDs are about 0.07 watts each)

The key advantage of 48 LEDs is that my beam pattern is a modified half-sphere.

gentlegreen wrote:

CREPELLO wrote:A very pleasant hearth glow there, gentlegreen. But I'd love to know why you use 48 LED's totalling 3.5v, rather than 3 at 3.5v?

It's 3.5 watts - quite an improvement on the 21 watt car brake light I used to have, and in some senses, even brighter.
(5mm LEDs are about 0.07 watts each)

The key advantage of 48 LEDs is that my beam pattern is a modified half-sphere.

Now where did I put my glasses?

SiF wrote:Mentioned elsewhere in forums but going to be first to state anyway; Magicshines from dealextreme are great from a lumins count (900 advertised), and good value for money at ~£62. Just a little circular in the beam with no side-spread, but fine for 20-25 mph along dark lanes. Beats my wifes cateye (EL320?) by a considerable margin. My order (they are Hong-Kong based) took 10 days to arrive last month, but can take longer according to demand (apparently).

+1 for the 900 lumens Magicshine (this one with the UK charger: http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.30864 ) Bought mine a couple of weeks ago, took 11 days to arrive and cost just over £50. Just been out playing with it and the full power beam is good enough for ~25mph down hill on a country lane. It gives a decent spread of light across the road as well as the degree of brightness. I bought the Magicshine to replace a Smart twin halogen 2.5W+10W set with lead acid battery and its very much brighter, giving me at least a 10mph increase in speed, and a lot lighter as well.

I remember my mum telling me how she used to cycle home from the dances in the early hours of the morning in the 1940s in rural Ireland. There would be no lights on the bike or road. She never mentioned not being able to see. just hoped her sister had left a window open so she could sneak in before Dad got up.

bigjim wrote:I remember my mum telling me how she used to cycle home from the dances in the early hours of the morning in the 1940s in rural Ireland. There would be no lights on the bike or road. She never mentioned not being able to see. just hoped her sister had left a window open so she could sneak in before Dad got up.

Kids today are born blind.

I do wonder if high power lights concentrate us too much on what's directly in front and allow us to miss what's at the sides... They're particularly good at 'bleaching' contrast out of objects too.

When I had my first motorcycle, me and my mates used to ride around the countryside with the headlights off, you can see pretty well once you're eyes adjusted (although it took several minutes). Back then you could still see the milky way too, instead of the insipid yellow glow that passes for sky these days. However with all the light pollution we have these days it should be easier than ever to drive/ride without headlights.

Perhaps a 'back to sidelights' campaign is in order. Without that pencil thin stupidly high power beam modern cars have their pilots might be less inclined to drive at daylight speeds around the roads with all their concentration focussed forwards.

The issue with relying on night vision is of course that everyone else assumes that it is necessary to have enough photons to blind you in order to see anything.

Banning headlights would be an interesting idea though. Just drive slower!

Bright lights is akin to The Arms Race.

"I have to have brighter ones than you, so you can see me better."

If we all went back to the Stone Age before lights, we could all see each other, and when we couldn't, we would all be careful. The first person with a light must've blinded everybody!

On a ship at night, on the bridge, there is no lighting so you can see where you're going and pick out ships' navigation lights in the distance. When you go on watch, it can take 15mins or more to get decent night-vision. When you first turn up, everything seems pitch dark, and you can see nothing, but eventually all's ok!

Even before it's fully dark, my rides on shared paths are already being spoiled by idiots with blindingly bright front lights on their bikes - often strobing.

At the moment I just give them morse code on my front light (I have a flash button), plus I shout at them, sometimes I deliberately ride straight at them.
Some of them are macho "get out of my way" types, a lot of them are probably terrified n00bs - I try to act accordingly - though sometimes innocent victims cop a load of my bad language.

I have about 16 watts of LEDs on the front of my bike, but they're all carefully aimed and chosen according to conditions.

To add insult to injury, the Bristol to Bath railway path which was in need of some lighting, now has stupidly powerful metal halides which as well as wasting vast amounts of electricity, catch your eye like a poorly adjusted LED headlight .. doubtless at some point they will release figures claiming a vast increase in cycling thanks to their installation which involved tearing down dozens of established trees.

http://greenbristolblog.blogspot.com/20 ... after.html

mark a. wrote:
That was replaced with a B&W Ixon IQ and not surprisingly it blows the other two out of the water. It's very bright and the rechargeable batteries last for ages even on full power. Even better is the beam pattern, which has a nice cut-off to prevent dazzling other people and focuses the light where you need it: down and to the sides.

I have an Ixon IQ. I loved the light, but the brackets are like cheese. They just don't cope with Edinburgh cobbles, and the light worked loose, fell off and split apart. I sent it back to Ixon and they repaired it free, but the same thing happened again. I can't use a light I don't trust. So I got a Fenix L2D. The light isn't quite as good, but the bracket is better, and the casing is sturdier so it copes with being dropped. I'm thinking I might sell the IQ.

I'm always being asked about my lighting in Swinley Forest, where there's a definite off-road night riding culture:-



These are the Tiger Lights, British made in Somerset but now sadly no longer available. Came out on top of the MBUK survey, even beating the legendary Lupine Betty 7 with 468 lux / 1650 lumens on full blast, which is generally used only of fast off-road or twisty country lanes. One with diffused lens for close-up light, the other for slimmer long-throw beam.

Backing this up, I also use a 480 lumens Hope Vision 2 mounted on my helmet.

I've never had a problem with cars being dazzled, as both bar lights can easily swivel downwards with oncoming traffic and with the helmet, it's just tilting the head.

... just don't ask the cost!!

gentlegreen wrote:

It's now perfectly easy to get reliable,near-car quality forward illumination at a reasonable cost.

I would take issue with that. I suppose it depends on your definition of "reasonable cost".

I suppose it depend on your night vision. I reckon you need at least 10 watts of LEDs aimed at even a familiar country road or track to make good safe progress, and the small 1 and 3 watt lamps people are using these days are just too physically small - they dazzle if aimed above the road - which they invariably are - and don't get me started on flashing ones.

I find it necessary to make my own to keep it down to not much more than £100.

I don't know so much about needing 10W of LEDs. FWIW, I have one of those Smart halogen sets that SJS were selling a few years ago - cost me all of £13 + P&P on eBay. They came with a 2.4W wide-angle and 10W spot, but I swapped the bulbs around. The (2.4W) spot is now great for dusk and when I need to just pick out the kerb, while the (10W) wide-angle lights up everything within 100 yards and I can make out stuff well over twice that far away. The downside is the weight (it's a 6v lead-acid gel battery) but it'll run both lights for over 2 hours, the 10W on its own for about 2.5 hours, and the 2.4W spot on its own pretty much all night.

There are a few sets for sale on eBay now. Not at the bargain price I paid, but I'd still be happy to pay the £40 + P&P asked for one "Buy it now" deal. OK, it's old technology and I suspect you can get a lot better for a lot more, but these lights are good enough for my needs (although I am considering making up some 6v 4300mAh NiMH packs that I can swap at the roadside to get as much burn time as I'd like on full power).

GeoffL wrote:

gentlegreen wrote:

It's now perfectly easy to get reliable,near-car quality forward illumination at a reasonable cost.

I would take issue with that. I suppose it depends on your definition of "reasonable cost".

I suppose it depend on your night vision. I reckon you need at least 10 watts of LEDs aimed at even a familiar country road or track to make good safe progress, and the small 1 and 3 watt lamps people are using these days are just too physically small - they dazzle if aimed above the road - which they invariably are - and don't get me started on flashing ones.

I find it necessary to make my own to keep it down to not much more than £100.

I don't know so much about needing 10W of LEDs. FWIW, I have one of those Smart halogen sets that SJS were selling a few years ago - cost me all of £13 + P&P on eBay. They came with a 2.4W wide-angle and 10W spot, but I swapped the bulbs around. The (2.4W) spot is now great for dusk and when I need to just pick out the kerb, while the (10W) wide-angle lights up everything within 100 yards and I can make out stuff well over twice that far away. The downside is the weight (it's a 6v lead-acid gel battery) but it'll run both lights for over 2 hours, the 10W on its own for about 2.5 hours, and the 2.4W spot on its own pretty much all night.

There are a few sets for sale on eBay now. Not at the bargain price I paid, but I'd still be happy to pay the £40 + P&P asked for one "Buy it now" deal. OK, it's old technology and I suspect you can get a lot better for a lot more, but these lights are good enough for my needs (although I am considering making up some 6v 4300mAh NiMH packs that I can swap at the roadside to get as much burn time as I'd like on full power).

That is exactly the set that I have just pensioned off (got mine cheap from SJS as well), and as I said, my new light, for £50 inc postage, is substantially better and a lot lighter in weight as well IMHO, giving me about a 10mph boost in safe speed on steep descents on unlit country lanes. Think I might put my old Smart set on Ebay as well....

I would avoid buying any powerful headlight for road use that didn't carry an approval mark from a European country.
Some of them are getting so bright now that I fully expect the police to start expressing an interest.
Either German (StVZO) or British (BS) approvals give unimpeachable legality, and in the case of the German approval, a good measure of quality.

The only exception I would make to this is for a supplementary light, to be used only as a high beam, and switched off whenever it would inconvenience oncoming road users.