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So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?



 
 
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  #21  
Old September 20th 07, 02:40 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
Matt O'Toole
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Posts: 657
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

On Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:01:56 -0700, SMS wrote:

I must get catalogs from Performance and Nashbar (same owner) twice a
week. Maybe it's the time of the season with it getting dark earlier,
but I've noticed that there seem to be a hell of a lot of new bicycle
lights coming on the market, especially new high-power LED lights that
must be using the Cree LEDs and claim to be as bright as an HID, i.e.
"http://www.performancebike.com/shop/profile.cfm?SKU=24466&subcategory_ID=4320".

It's also amusing to see the move back to metal cases as the LEDs
increase in power. Love those external heat sinks that they try to blend
in as part of the industrial design on
"http://www.performancebike.com/shop/profile.cfm?SKU=23115&subcategory_ID=4320".
Maybe they can do a heat pipe and use the waste heat for some sort of
heating system for winter riding.

Are there really that many people buying $200-400 lights for their
bicycles? I hope that this signals a trend to more night riding, and
hopefully the prices will fall with all this competition.


Actually there are a lot of people buying these systems, and the more
expensive they are, the better they seem to sell -- especially in places
like southern CA, where there are so many mountain bikers with lots of
money to spend.

Powerful lights have made it more comfortable for people to ride before
and after work, and/or early and late in the day when it's cooler. I used
to do a lot of mountain bike rides in the evening myself, often finishing
after dark.

However I'm sure part of the attraction is the toy factor, with so many
neat things to buy, which people then want to go out and use. In some
places night riding has even been banned, to give the deer and coyotes a
rest from all the nitwits invading their habitat.

Yes, the market does seem crowded, with everyone trying to get into the
bike light business. I'm not sure what the attraction is. Even with so
many brands around now, it's rare to find a shop that carries anything but
Nightrider and Cateye. Selling bike lights would be a tough way to make a
living. But that never seems to stop people from trying, if it's what
they're interested in.

Matt O.
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  #22  
Old September 20th 07, 02:55 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
Matt O'Toole
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Posts: 657
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

On Wed, 19 Sep 2007 23:35:56 +0100, Clive George wrote:

"SMS" wrote in message
...
Clive George wrote:

With that in mind, why do you persist in advocating solutions which
have wasteful lenses?


What you don't understand is that all that light is not "wasted."
You're falling into the trap of misunderstanding of how lights work as
both "seeing" and "being seen" devices, as well as ignoring the
advantages of the symmetrical beam. You need to realize how important
it is to have not only a spot beam, but the light up the periphery as
well.


How is lighting up the sky anything but wasting light? There's nothing
there to reflect back, there's nothing there which needs to see you.


This is true, but many bike lights are so "well focused" that you can't
see street signs or even parked cars. They do this so they can advertise
better lumen ratings.

FWIW my well-focussed B+M front lamp has no trouble with illuminating
road signs and "the periphery" - the sides need rather less light than
the main beam.


Well that's how it should be. I have an old Cateye Micro that's about
right -- with a bright center spot, and a large, dim peripheral ring that
lets me see signs, parked cars, and overhanging branches. I have a
Nightsun MR11 helmet lamp with a beam pattern nearly identical to the
Cateye's, just round instead of square. Superimposed on one another,
they're practically the same, but of course the Nightsun is much brighter.

I've done some work in automobile headlight development, and even those
are art as much as science -- too sharp a cutoff is undesirable.

Matt O.
  #23  
Old September 20th 07, 03:00 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
datakoll
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Posts: 7,793
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?



mexicans

  #24  
Old September 20th 07, 03:04 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
Matt O'Toole
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Posts: 657
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

On Thu, 20 Sep 2007 01:42:58 +0100, Clive George wrote:


"SMS" wrote in message
...
Clive George wrote:

FWIW my well-focussed B+M front lamp has no trouble with illuminating
road signs and "the periphery" - the sides need rather less light than
the main beam.


If it's aimed high enough to illuminate the signs, then it's not
sufficiently illuminating the road. If it's aimed low enough to
illuminate the road sufficiently far ahead then it's not sufficiently
illuminating the signs. There's no free lunch here.


You don't need much light to illuminate road signs. Well, not here
anyway - they're properly reflective.


Clive, you're spoiled. The UK is definitely at the forefront of traffic
engineering and safety. We (the US) could learn a lot from y'all.

Matt O.
  #25  
Old September 20th 07, 03:25 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
Crescentius Vespasianus
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Posts: 385
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?


How is lighting up the sky anything but wasting light? There's nothing
there to reflect back, there's nothing there which needs to see you.


clive

-------------
Au contraire, riding in the dark with my
DiNotte on, something flew above my
helmet, and a little forward. If it
wasn't for my DiNotte lighting up the
sky, I wouldn't have seen it was a
Burger King Cup, full of ice, that was
thrown at me from some kids in a car
that just passed me. Without the
DiNotte, I wouldn't even known anything
was thrown at me.
  #26  
Old September 20th 07, 05:01 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
datakoll
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Posts: 7,793
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

On Sep 20, 10:00 am, datakoll wrote:
mexicans


NOW THERE'S A GOOD IDEA FOR A NEW INTERACTIVE WEBSITE!

"dead mexicans"

a major category - "no batts"

local noise sez there were 2 last week?

  #27  
Old September 20th 07, 05:14 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
SMS
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Posts: 9,477
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

Matt O'Toole wrote:

This is true, but many bike lights are so "well focused" that you can't
see street signs or even parked cars. They do this so they can advertise
better lumen ratings.


Bingo.

A lot of people don't understand the benefit of a _less_ focused beam,
they've been so brainwashed by statements of how great light A or light
B is because no light is "wasted" illuminating anything other than the
area directly in front of the bicycle.

There's no debate that the 3W dynamo lights provide a focused beam that
is probably the best use of its limited power. The SolidLight appears to
be the first light that can be powered by a dynamo that also provides a
beam that either on purpose or by accident, provides sufficient
peripheral illumination. There are lots of good battery lights on the
market that able to do this, as well as many el-cheapo lights that do not.
  #28  
Old September 20th 07, 06:12 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
Tim McNamara
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Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

In article ,
"Frank Drackman" wrote:

"Tim McNamara" wrote in message
...
In article , SMS
wrote:


But on that topic, I have also gotten spontaneous compliments on my
lights from non-bicyclists several times- car drivers and
pedestrians commenting on how bright my lights are. And I have
gotten many comments from beginning randonneurs during the night
portions of rides. On half a dozen or so brevets I have had riders
ask to follow me because my lights worked so much better than their
NightRiders and whatnot. I like the company so it works out OK.


Sounds like a win for everyone!


Yes, it is. Riding for hours alone at night can be fun, but often it's
better with others along for the ride.
  #29  
Old September 20th 07, 06:16 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
[email protected]
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Posts: 2,041
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

On Sep 19, 2:51 pm, SMS wrote:
Clive George wrote:
With that in mind, why do you persist in advocating solutions which have
wasteful lenses?


What you don't understand is that all that light is not "wasted." You're
falling into the trap of misunderstanding of how lights work as both
"seeing" and "being seen" devices, as well as ignoring the advantages of
the symmetrical beam. You need to realize how important it is to have
not only a spot beam, but the light up the periphery as well.

Look at the Solidlights for example. Other than the 1103 model, they use
two or three circular lenses which results in some overlap, but the
resulting beam is still more symmetrical.

Read the review at "http://www.blayleys.com/articles/lights/page4.htm"
which states "The light is a symmetrical beam, rather than the focused
beam of most of the lights designed for the Schmidt dynohub. But there
is an advantage to this type of beam for PBP. One thing I have noticed
recently is how well road signs reflect back. For PBP, this means the
reflective arrows on route markings on signposts and in trees should be
quite visible."



Don't know which PBP the people in the link above rode, but maybe they
changed where the route arrows are placed from their PBP to the 2007
version I rode. You had to have a helmet light to see the route
arrows on PBP 2007. They were frequently not too close to the road.
They were on top of sticks, signs, trees, etc. along the side of the
road. Somewhere. Anywhere from 5 feet to 25 feet from the side of
the road. No frame mounted bicycle light could illuminate an area big
enough to see all of them. Most sure, all no. I liked having the
ability to see any and all of the arrow route markers when coming to a
corner or turn. The Princeton Tec EOS Bike helmet light on medium
setting worked very well for finding the route markers at round
abouts, turns, intersections, etc. Powered by 3 AAA batteries. Same
Duracell batteries lasted the entire 20+ hours of night riding I did
over three days of PBP.



It's great to see a device like the SolidLights 1203D on the market.
Finally a company that "gets it" and produced a bright, safe, light for
dynamo systems. Not cheap, but as Mike pointed out, with the relatively
small quantities of each type of high-end light, the quantities aren't
there to bring prices down.



  #30  
Old September 20th 07, 06:18 PM posted to rec.bicycles.misc,rec.bicycles.tech
Tim McNamara
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Posts: 6,945
Default So many new lighting systems, who's buying them all?

In article ,
SMS wrote:

Matt O'Toole wrote:

This is true, but many bike lights are so "well focused" that you
can't see street signs or even parked cars. They do this so they
can advertise better lumen ratings.


Bingo.

A lot of people don't understand the benefit of a _less_ focused
beam, they've been so brainwashed by statements of how great light A
or light B is because no light is "wasted" illuminating anything
other than the area directly in front of the bicycle.


Again, have you *ever* ridden with a Lumotec? I get good central
lighting and enough peripheral lighting too. I don't know what fantasy
lights you are using, but obviously you need an upgrade. There are
indeed lights that overfocus the beam such as the Schmidt E6/BiSY, which
I don't care for because of that reason. But there are lights with
better beam patterns.

There's no debate that the 3W dynamo lights provide a focused beam
that is probably the best use of its limited power.


The power is the same, Steven. Do the math.

The SolidLight appears to be the first light that can be powered by a
dynamo that also provides a beam that either on purpose or by
accident, provides sufficient peripheral illumination.


The difference is simply two lamps in one housing.
 




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