Dyno Light

So, Western Bike Works had a 20% off sale, so I got a Shutter Precision PD-8 for about $110, which I thought was a smok'n deal. I have to find a rim and some appropriate spokes in my collection of junk downstairs, but I expect to put something together in the next week or so.

But I need a light. I would love to get the Supernova E3 triple, but I figure there has to be something available on the market that will do the trick but cheaper. I don't need no stink'n StVZO anything. Are there any second string lights that are good and not home brew. Maybe a Chinese knock off!

-- Jay Beattie.

On 30/09/14 14:26, jbeattie wrote:
So, Western Bike Works had a 20% off sale, so I got a Shutter
Precision PD-8 for about $110, which I thought was a smok'n deal. I
have to find a rim and some appropriate spokes in my collection of
junk downstairs, but I expect to put something together in the next
week or so.


Good for you. Soon you will be welcomed into the age of "Comes without
batteries" and "batteries not included or needed".

But I need a light. I would love to get the Supernova E3 triple, but
I figure there has to be something available on the market that will
do the trick but cheaper. I don't need no stink'n StVZO anything.
Are there any second string lights that are good and not home brew.
Maybe a Chinese knock off!


What is your objection to an StVZO light? Cost? Quality compared to a
Chinese flash light?

Just once I would have liked a high beam function, descending through
tight corners at night. For 99% of my urban and suburban riding, I
prefer more of the stink'n light on the road - where it's most needed.

I read somewhere that the IQ-TEC Premium can get water in it from
underneath. I put a piece of tape over where I suspect it may get in.
No water has got in, and I've had a few wet rides.

--
JS

jbeattie wrote:
:So, Western Bike Works had a 20% off sale, so I got a Shutter Precision PD-8 for about $110, which I thought was a smok'n deal. I have to find a rim and some appropriate spokes in my collection of junk downstairs, but I expect to put something together in the next week or so.

:But I need a light. I would love to get the Supernova E3 triple, but I figure there has to be something available on the market that will do the trick but cheaper. I don't need no stink'n StVZO anything. Are there any second string lights that are good and not home brew. Maybe a Chinese knock off!

Tailight is easy: Busch & Müller Toplight Line Plus or the same thing,
with the brake sensing (detects the change in frequency from slowing
odwn, and pulses the light), as you prefer.

Headlight, I'd get either the B&M lumotec IQ2 B (about 175 or so) or the
B&M premium Cyo ($120ish, depending on which you get.) If you can,
don't get one of the sensing models, or the models with daytime
lights. They're gimmicks, and stupid, and just cost money, but I'm
not sure the IQ2s are available iwthout them.

The regular cyo is also a very nice light, at about 90 bucks these
days. I have a three year old one on my commuter, works great. (It
cost rather more when I bought it, and I'd have gotten the premium Cyo
if I needed to replace it today.)


--
sig 116

grate ! the gen vampires readjoyce....

now we will read a review on front end weight.

buying knee pads ?

+1 to the several recommendations for the B&M Cyo; this is de facto the best choice of reasonably priced, warranted and generally available lamp today.. The somewhat superior Phillips Saferide is worth mentioning, but first you have to source it... Also +1 for B&M Line Plus, best inexpensive rear lamp in the world (next stop four hundred bucks for an anti-social Dinotte).

About sourcing a Cyo at a reasonable price, unless you're a xenophobe, shop for it in Europe, where it is much cheaper than in the States, even taking into account delivery. Here's a page full of various Cyo models priced in dollars from a French dealer I use and can recommend: http://www.xxcycle.com/php/boutique/...&marqueSearch=

Which one you want depends. Racers often choose the sports or 60 lux model but people who ride in narrow ways, on paths, on bad surfaces, etc, like the 40 lux model, which has a built-in reflector, so it has R in the name, and offers a bit more light close in, but about the same amount of light at about the same quartermile limit. (I have had both types since they first came out and I declared them the first grown-up lamps from B&M. In addition. "Senso" lamps have built-in light-sensitive on-off switches. Whether you want to pay another ten bucks or so for an automatic on-switch depends on whether you plan on using the lamps as daylight running lamps. I do. It causes no perceptible extra drag. But my lamps have all the trimmings, including Senso capability, anyway because I bought them on a sale where they were cheaper than less well-specified lamps. There's also an 80 lux model, of which I have no experience. Don't get any ot the T models with the built-n blue dyalight LEDs; they're universally hated for the good reason that they have screwed optics and aren't as good as the others.

You need to spend some time on the Busch & Muller site to familiarize yourself with their number scheme and the various series of Cyo light, not all of which are equal, nor sequenctially better (the first series is superior to the second, everything else is superior to the ones with the extra-LED daylights.)

Buying a lamp is much more complicated than when as a kid you used to hang around Phil.

Andre Jute
Illuminatus

On Tuesday, September 30, 2014 5:26:27 AM UTC+1, jbeattie wrote:
So, Western Bike Works had a 20% off sale, so I got a Shutter Precision PD-8 for about $110, which I thought was a smok'n deal. I have to find a rim and some appropriate spokes in my collection of junk downstairs, but I expect to put something together in the next week or so.



But I need a light. I would love to get the Supernova E3 triple, but I figure there has to be something available on the market that will do the trick but cheaper. I don't need no stink'n StVZO anything. Are there any second string lights that are good and not home brew. Maybe a Chinese knock off!



-- Jay Beattie.

On Tuesday, September 30, 2014 6:00:17 AM UTC+1, James wrote:
On 30/09/14 14:26, jbeattie wrote:

So, Western Bike Works had a 20% off sale, so I got a Shutter

Precision PD-8 for about $110, which I thought was a smok'n deal. I

have to find a rim and some appropriate spokes in my collection of

junk downstairs, but I expect to put something together in the next

week or so.

Good for you. Soon you will be welcomed into the age of "Comes without

batteries" and "batteries not included or needed".

Now, now, James, we're all growing to grow old and conservative -- about thirty years from now.

But I need a light. I would love to get the Supernova E3 triple, but

I figure there has to be something available on the market that will

do the trick but cheaper. I don't need no stink'n StVZO anything.

Are there any second string lights that are good and not home brew.

Maybe a Chinese knock off!

What is your objection to an StVZO light? Cost? Quality compared to a

Chinese flash light?

Just once I would have liked a high beam function, descending through

tight corners at night. For 99% of my urban and suburban riding, I

prefer more of the stink'n light on the road - where it's most needed.

Yes, that's why I generally recommend the 40 Lux Cyo lamps with R in the model number: they put more light on the road where you need it, rather than out there somewhere where some posters may have to see if they were riding as fast as they brag.

But a high mode with a switch so that you can read signs and see overhanging branches, but be able to dip/dim for oncoming traffic, now that would perfect the Cyo.

I read somewhere that the IQ-TEC Premium can get water in it from

underneath. I put a piece of tape over where I suspect it may get in.

No water has got in, and I've had a few wet rides.

I normally add this caution, but that's because the cyclists I mostly hang out with are tourers who really can't afford to have a lamp fail in Outer Butfugistan just because it is immersed for three hours in a river of acidic water. Generally speaking, in civilization, unless the owner turns his bike upside down and washes it with a pressure hose, the Cyo isn't at risk. (It's not just the Cyo. All B&M dynamo lamps are vulnerable to water ingress from below.) Anyway, commonsense or a piece of tape will protect your lamp. For those heavily into touring in adverse terrain, the Edelux from Schmidt, makers of the highly regarded SON dynamo, is a sturdier lamp with the Cyo's optics. Of course it costs appreciably more $$$ and offers none of the functional options.

Andre Jute
To see and to be seen, that is the question

http://www.starbike.com/en/accessori...namo-lighting/

The above website is good for dynamo lights. I use two of the Busch&Mueller Cyo lights. Not sure which particular model. They are mounted on the fork blades on either side of the front hub. Powered by a Shimano dynamo hub from about 10 years ago. Lights are only 5-6 years old. The Cyo light is about $40. The Supernova Triple is about $160. The Schmidt is about $135.. I've ordered from Starbike and a few other European websites and had good service and good prices.

On 9/30/2014 12:26 AM, jbeattie wrote:
So, Western Bike Works had a 20% off sale, so I got a Shutter Precision PD-8 for about $110,
which I thought was a smok'n deal. I have to find a rim and some
appropriate spokes in my
collection of junk downstairs, but I expect to put something together in
the next week or so.

But I need a light. I would love to get the Supernova E3 triple, but I figure there has
to be something available on the market that will do the trick but
cheaper. I don't need no
stink'n StVZO anything. Are there any second string lights that are good
and not home brew.
Maybe a Chinese knock off!

Be careful with Chinese knock-offs. Maybe three years ago I bought an
LED headlamp (Avenir, I think) that looked amazingly cheap considering
it had good StVZO optics. It wasn't as good in light output or beam
pattern as the B&M Cyo I have, but it was far better than most bike
lights. I liked it so well that in a month or two I tried to order
another, but it had vanished from the market.

Within a year or so, it stopped working. The LED itself failed, which
has to be unusual. I was able (with difficulty) to replace that bad LED
with a super LED that an LED engineer had given me, but I'm pretty sure
you wouldn't screw around with such a project. So I'd just shell out
the money for a good B&M headlamp. It's not much money in the long run.

Incidentally, there's been talk about limiting speeds on a bike that has
dynamo lighting. I'd said that I'm seldom over 25 mph at night. But
after Sunday night's club ride in the dark, I found that my top speed
was 32 mph. It was probably on the one bumpy downhill road we
encountered. I had no trouble making my way through the patched asphalt
using the Cyo headlamp. YMMV, of course.


--
- Frank Krygowski

BUY 2

On Tuesday, September 30, 2014 4:22:48 PM UTC+1, Frank Krygowski wrote:

Incidentally, there's been talk about limiting speeds on a bike that has

dynamo lighting. I'd said that I'm seldom over 25 mph at night. But

after Sunday night's club ride in the dark, I found that my top speed

was 32 mph. It was probably on the one bumpy downhill road we

encountered. I had no trouble making my way through the patched asphalt

using the Cyo headlamp. YMMV, of course.

The Cyo everyone is recommending to Jay is a better lamp than most US automobiles on dipped/dimmed mode, and a far better headlight than the VW Beetle had in its 6V years, which senior members will remember. It's a good lamp.

There are however two situations in which even a good lamp will do you no good.

One is the well-known effect on a wet road, where no lamp is much use to a cyclist, especially at dusk. See for instance http://www.thorncycles.co.uk/forums/...59139#msg59139 in which, if you study the first photo carefully, you can easily grasph that you'll never see the hazards at anything faster than walking speed; the second photo is artificially lightened to highlight the particular hazards I was writing about.

The second is riding too fast for the road. If it is to be the road (or the trail) that trips you up, even in good nighttime conditions, over a certain speed it doesn't matter that you have no light near the bike, because the bicycle speed will exceed your reaction time. At http://www.thorncycles.co..uk/forums...59283#msg59283 an incident is described where I depended not on sight, which was exceeded by speed, but on knowledge of the road, but the road had been changed by an overloaded vehicle, and there was indeed no longer any road where I always landed before after going airborne over a known bump. The expensive result is pictured. If you're going to speed like that all the time, you may as well choose the 60 lux Cyo, which throws less light near the bike than the 40 lux which I chose twice (thrice, actually, I also have a Fly-E which is the Cyo R optics in a different format case with 36V electrics) as the more versatile all-round lamp. You can't blame the lamp if you ride outside its capabilities, or outside your own, or outside the road's, our outside weather conditions; no lamp in the world would have saved me and my beloved vintage pedals. I still ride there before dawn on warm nights, in exactly the same manner, but three inches away on a parallel track, which costs an out-of-proportion 12.8s over 11.8km because those three inches wipe apex-speed on the next corner and kills the next hill for me, a snowball effect.

Andre Jute
Fast enough on a good night