Lights

[xerxes]

Re:

Have a look at: http://www.torchythebatteryboy.com/p/bi ... abase.html

There's some useful beam shots that give some idea of what x number of lumens actually looks like. Beam shape is also important, I have a Cateye Nano Shot Plus, which is an all-in-one unit with about 650 lumens on maximum, but a fairly narrow beam, which makes it good on the road and it can be quickly removed.

I also have a ~900 lumen light with a separate battery pack, but it's very "floody", which isn't very good on road, unless you angle it down a lot, it's too dazzling for oncoming traffic, you can't remove it quickly if you want to pop into a shop either.

 

[greencat]

Yeah, I agree with the floody nature of some of these cheap lights. Fantastic for offroad/areas with no lights - not great for other road users. I've seen traffic on the other side literally pull over before I got into the habit of manually dipping them. I'd cycle past and it was like daylight inside the cab of their car. Not kind. Once I tried out the flashing mode in London. Seriously obnoxious - everything reflective like street signs was strobing for about a 1/8 mile away.

Now I tend to combine with small handheld fat pencil like torch - that is plenty bright but a very narrow beam - for on road with a Chinese floody jobby for off.

 

[JamesM]

Re:

Those Chinese single XM-L T6 lights are around 700 lumens, not the claimed 1800. A single Cree XM-L can't make any where near 1800 lumens. I have one of the Chinese XM-L lights and I also have one of the Smart 700 lumen lights in the link I posted earlier. They both seem about the same in terms of brightness. The Smart is a great light for 30 quid, it uses a Cree XM-L2.

 

[highlandsflyer]

It is great we have the choice to spend less than £20 and a little time and get lights that are light years ahead of what we had back in the day. (See what I did there?)

 

[legrandefromage]

Found these today

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-2-Cree-XM ... OdejLoti6w

 

[highlandsflyer]

Re:

Nice! Wasn't someone on here flogging something similar they custom CNCd?

 

[JamesM]

Found these today

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-2-Cree-XM ... OdejLoti6w

The numbers don't add up.

2 Cree XML LEDs producing 1800 lumens, so 900 each. At that level each LED will need around 3.2v and over 2 amps. The battery is 3.7v and 5.2 amp hours. Claimed battery life on max is 5 hours :?