Bike light

Wellp, if you ain’t afraid of modding, you can take a Convoy S2+ (get a cheapie with the rubber-boot switch, as the metal-switches ain’t too waterproof) and stick in a 20mm elliptical TIR lens like from LEDsupply.

Eg, 10197 Carclo Lens - Elliptical Spot LED Optic

5min “mod” of replacing the reflector with the TIR lens, but it works nicely.

I think I have some Carclo lenses around here somewhere. The CREE xml stars are wherever they went to as well as the voltage or maybe current? regulators I was playing with. Found the 18650 battery holders at least, but my headlamp project never got off the ground… :person_facepalming:

Check out the Indigo5 bike light. Fully regulated with no step down at 1800 lumens.

A triple with a 10510 in an S2+ and a spacer would be even more floody and more efficient

Actually, no, it’s quite warm and nice. Maybe 4000K? Dunno beyond that, as the manual ain’t telling.

Trying the Convoy S11 with SST40 or whatever. It was somewhat of sale. Hopefully not too throwy. Figured it was worth a try for the price.

I’ve been a slow convert, but I’ve gotten around to think that bike-lights with the appropriate beam (like car headlights) are the best bet.

You want something throwy to see what’s up ahead of you, and you want something floody to see what’s up close and to the sides. But too floody means, yeah, getting rather annoying to oncoming cars. And possibly dangerous instead of just annoying if you’re throwing 2000lm down the road.

Just gonna add that floody and throwy are mutually exclusive, and spill + hotspot is not the solution, as spill to light up what’s in front of you and to the sides will also shine upward into oncoming peoples’ eyes.

Unless you wanna do like that one guy here was doing, ie, going around sticking exhaust-tips on his lights to kill off stray spill. Might look goofy, but should work.

Most of the time no one is out there in the forest on the trails, let alone at night. Planning 5,000 lumen + isn’t out of the question for big mountain descents, it’s just out of budget for now.
Hope I didn’t overspend for the S11, but it said $12 so I figured to try it at least.

Thanks for the thoughts on safety for cars & roads. Even gravel forest roads sometimes have a truck or two, so that makes good sense.

I’ve had some good results with a Sofirn C8F (link ): 3 emitters (Samsung LH351D - neutral white 5000ºK) and the tail switch to turn off when cutting thru roads with street lighting (oncoming traffic/pedestrians - have another front (white) and back (red) lights to be seen. Nice combination of throw and flood. The high color index helps in quick judgement between a soft twig or a hard dry branch. Not needing the turbo mode all that often, a typical ride of some 2 hours it can sustain. Also, have a second one in case this one was to fail in all the bouncing around - but has held up.

BTW, I mount the slightly oversized light on the yoke (just beneath the handlebars), just in case I was to flip over. Wouldn’t want to tear-up the light or myself!

Edit:

[quote=Lightbringer]

The fellow is andychrist and he’s got a particular setup for his low-rider… And you will find more info on this MountainBkeRiding Forum (link )

What do you think of the SP36 Pro? Would it be silly to mount to a bike?

andychrist has done it. Be it the non-pro version. Depends where you mount it. Does give a lot of light and good runtime. The SST40s do make a nice thrower and some spill. Depends on the reflector (or in this case, the TIR).
A mount may be hard to find. My mounts are flexible (and that’s a thing I’ll have to amend this season - often have to re-adjust the light) and somewhat forgiving for all the harshness I give it. I’m not into trail cutting, but rather trail riding (nothing too intense).

Trail-cutting reminds me of last year ride when I rode down a trail that quit in a bramble patch. It was too steep to go back up a half mile so the better part of the night was spent hauling the bike over & around huge fallen logs & thick bushes to attempt finding the trail again. Rode a few deer/bear trails in the process, but never found the trail. Maybe it’s out there somewhere, but…

It seems like a good reason to get more lights. :innocent:

And that’s why I keep a second light (and some first aid, and a poncho, and a multi-tool). Already got lost and the Maps (on phone) didn’t show much.

Had to goggle “lowrider bike”. Good Lord… they’re like those little clown-bikes! :open_mouth:

My ancient Schwinn is like the anti-lowrider. (Ha! “andy-christ”, I get it…) Tires are 1” bigger’n the norm (27” vs 26”, or was it 28 vs 27?), and the frame is a taller rhombus than most, so it’s more of a “high-rider” if anything. :laughing:

From some exchanges, he seems to live in some outback and come hell or high water, he rides to / from work every day. Being his only means of transport, he did make the adjustments for the low laid back view with many lights affixed on his set-up.
I must give him credit for experimenting with many lenses/diffusers/reflectors.

But you’ll have to enlighten me on “andychrist”.
Wordplay of Handy Man? or something on the lines “and Christ…” (as in dispair)?

Edit:

Can’t find the thread with his bike (perhaps in the Mountain Bike Forum) but his is more like this:

His was more set to weather the elements and quite nice / practical.

andychrist called his recumbent ‘low riding’. Misleading - as you mentioned; those are somewhat childish.

Oh! I found it.

Don’t know if I’m threading personal info here, but someone might chime in and I’ll take it down.

Imagine all the lights you could mount to one of those!

What I really need is a good light head, so I can just use all these 18650s, lipos, & tool battery chopped up packs around here.

Figure his name’s Andy, and “Anti-Christ”… “Andy-Christ”… hjeh.

Crikey… I could go for one of those! Make it easy to do some food-shopping without having to schlep 3000lbs of metal around me to do it.

Y’mean… more’n there already are? :laughing:

Yes! Might as well go all out with colored spoke lights, smaller diameter chaser rope lights along the frame, a few Imalent MS18’s… :wink: