Bloody lights thread urgent recommendations

[Pyro Tim]

Joking apart, I have a cheapo £6 Cree Chinese via west Drayton flashy thing that's fine incoming and outgoing on flash on lit roads and alongside it the lezyne light sabre for off road and lanes on non flash.


And a bell.

The £6 ones are nothing compared to the £16-24 ones

 

[The History Man]

Book and candle

 

[The History Man]

Joking apart, I have a cheapo £6 Cree Chinese via west Drayton flashy thing that's fine incoming and outgoing on flash on lit roads and alongside it the lezyne light sabre for off road and lanes on non flash.


And a bell.

The £6 ones are nothing compared to the £16-24 ones

You'll be lucky to afford the batteries soon light up them cliffs while you can.

 

[JamesM]

Why anyone would spend any more than £20 on a light now baffles me

For the same reason people buy other high end parts for their bikes rather than the cheapo stuff that does exactly the same job.

 

[BobToo]

These T6 lights should come with the wide angle lens as standard, with the clear lens being the aftermarket option.

 

[NeilM]

These T6 lights should come with the wide angle lens as standard, with the clear lens being the aftermarket option.

^^^^ This ^^^^

I have an aftermarket wide angle lens in the light I use on my road bike.

 

[drcarlos]

For bar mounted I use these: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Hot-SolarStor ... 1e82a7ba49 they are not 5000LM but 2 x 1000LM with 3 stage brightness that run for about 3 hours and have a 3 led gauge for power. My battery isn't waterproof, but having used RC batteries made up like this for years they have never needed to be. These are better for handlebar mounted than the single 1800LM cree that's £16 as they give a wider beam. They are also significantly brighter on full power.
I use the single on a helmet mount for trail work and they work really well as a combo.

Carl.

 

[The History Man]

As this seems to have turned into a 'my light is better than your light' for some rather than light banter, i have just ordered one of these. Not for the weight weenies but similar to a helmet mount as it would be above the eye-line of oncoming motorists while presenting me in a menacing silhouette. Does anyone have a a longish QR skewer for my rear axle?

Have just added an artist's impression of how it might work for you, Alison

 

[hamster]

Why anyone would spend any more than £20 on a light now baffles me

For the same reason people buy other high end parts for their bikes rather than the cheapo stuff that does exactly the same job.

A lot of the really cheap ones don't have the attention to detail on waterproofing. Also many of the really cheap chargers are downright dangerous and do not meet any safety approvals. See the Torchy site for examples.

My super-cheap ebay lights have been a mixed experience. The rears were made of poor quality plastic: the mounting clips snapped and the moulding of the clips for the lenses was poor, so they kept falling off. In the end they had to be taped up. Water got into the switches which corroded. My Cateye rear lights have lasted over 5 years and were definitely the better buy.
The fronts work well, although the mirroring on the reflectors is flaking after three years.The mountings were not well thought out and needed some mods to work. The lights are increasingly tetchy on connections and have to be slightly unscrewed and screwed up again to get a reliable steady beam. The anodizing is fading unevenly and they are all different colours now. The drive electronics are poor - if the battery has dropped a bit on voltage the flash fails to work although the beam is still good - a design fault. That said, they are bright (amazing compared to the opposition when new) and overall I feel they have been good value. However I miss the universal mounts of the Cateye lights.

You pay your money and take your pick.

 

[drcarlos]

Interesting I just found the Solar Storm x2 on the torchy site, I think he feels threatened as the beam comparison shows up really well compared to his branded lights but he slags off the battery and charger as being poor quality without stating why. He can obviously get away with this as the maker is hardly likely to sue him, but slaging it off without providing any explanation strikes of just sour grapes (as it outperforms his light at half the price) if he'd opened up the charger and showed poor wiring or suchlike or shown bad batteries in the pack I might have changed my opinion but I think I will ignore his site from now as my personal experience seems to be very different. My charger charges both my batteries and shuts down without exploding in a big ball of fire and my batteries give the claimed run time.
I think the simple fact is that things seemed to have moved on and he is being left behind.

Carl.