Planet Bike Blinky "3" 3 LED Taillight

Hi guys, I'd like to get a taillight for my MTB, is this a good choice?, it has a lot of positive reviews on Amazon. What are your recommendations?. I have several AAA Eneloops I'm not using, and I want to give them a purpose.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000RYAKHC/?tag=cpf0b6-20

I have no experience with that particular light. It looks to be a red cover over bare LEDs. That allows the light from the LEDs to cover their normal wide angle dilluting their ouput per unit area. Better lights use reflectors or more usually, optic lenses to concentrate the output into a beam that can be seen farther away. Small weak bike lights get lost in tail lights of vehicles. IF you ride in the times near dawn and dusk, weak lights wont work well.

Planet bike has a new Turbo Superflash. Mine are awaiting the completion of my order before being shipped and I will report on them. I am betting my life on those and the new PDW light which are daylight visible.

Hi Brian, I ordered the Superflash Turbo. I thought the cheaper light would be good enough, but you get what you pay for.

Been away. First chance to reply. I hope it works out for you. I feel better about your purchase. There are no guarantees when it comes to drivers NOT seeing us (they miss school busses fer cryin' out loud!), but these lights look like they will help good drivers not screw up.

Expect new lights as soon as fenders are in and order is shipped. Also working out the video camera and editing. Should be able to document these pretty well, but based on the older Radbot 1000, the new Turbo looks very good. One goes on my helmet to replace a PBSF that is almost invisible in the day. It looks like the Tuebo and new PDW light are both nice advances.

PS Where in Ontario? Raised near Hamiltom. high shool in Brantford, BS at Watterloo, MSc at U of G and a couple of years in Ottawa. Coming that way for a wedding soon.

I watched the videos on YouTube for both the Radbot 1000, and SuperFlash Turbo, their both good choices.

Which fenders did you buy?, are they clip-ons?.

I'm from Cornwall, Ontario.

I have the SF (standard 1/2 w) , Mars 4.0, and the Rabbot 1000. The Radbot by far is the most visible, especially for daytime use. In my experience runtime with Eneloops is somewhere between 8 and 10 hours on flash.

Also the Radbot has a reflector, which is a nice touch should your light die on you.

Fenders, Tanaka Stainless steel, gold/brass finish:



For this bike (my good bike: randoneur-type riding, some commuting errands):



The SKS's are getting ratty.

The PDW 'DangerZone' replaces the Radbot 1000.

Older post on the older blinkys is here. Plan is to redo with HD video and newest lights. But message remains unchanged.

I'm a bit late to the game here, but I absolutely love my superflash. I commute to school about two miles away and the superflash pretty much stays on the back of my bike all the time. I've had no reliability issues, the light is nice and bright (and features a slightly random-er strobe for better noticeability), and the mounting bracket/release clip mechanism seems strong and well designed (compared to other lights that have broken off at the mount). I couldn't ask for more out of a rear light.

I loved the three I own, too. If they are only for night use, they are OK, and about as good as it got short of a Dinotte 140, 200, or their old 400 until recently. The helmet light is going Planet Bike Turbo and I will report back. The crazy flash mode with the smaller LED's is really frenetic as the driver approaches. The new light has more than one choice now, I think.

Be aware using the Superflash or the Stealth version, that our eyes adjust remarkably so we can't judge up close brightness well. The Superflashes will be about 12 lumens at the 30 minute mark with fresh cells which holds pretty well for a maybe 20 hours or more, but drops to 1 or two lumens at 80-100 hours depending on capacity of the cells. That is barely noticeable 50 feet away in sunlight. They work well with NiMH cells and frequent recharging instead of full draining is better for the cells, too.

When my new ones arrive (waiting for one item to complete the order) I plan on video and posting in this forum. You may wish to up the ante to penetrate the attention of cellphone-zombie drivers.

The Superflash is a pretty good light. It's much brighter than what I used to have on my bike circa '03. Mine has issues with the power switch--it sometimes turns itself on.

I think drivers are more distracted than they were in 2003. Maybe more sleep deprived. Definitely not paying enough attention driving. What was good enough once, may no longer. But that is another discussion.

Some older Superflashes had problems falling off the back (fixed by a rubber band as insurance). Some had a too tight switch-housing clearance and would turn on, switch modes and turn off on bumps. Sounds like CoryZ's is one of those. The PDW Radbot 1000 may need its spring connectors rebent to avoid bumps shutting the off especially when cold. The Princeton Tec Swerves had some switch issues which were resolved in later ones. So it seems these inexpensive (compared to the Dinotte) blinkies all have some issues 'come to light' with use.

The advantage of the Turbo version of the Superflash is that it's way brighter AND a lot of that sort of production thing is sorted. It also fits all the old mounts. Very handy.

Brian, I got my SuperFlash Turbo today, are you sure you can use NiMH rechargeables?. On the inside it says 1.5v, and not 1.2 or 1.5v.

I have been using NiMH rechargables in three of them since 2008. The thing is, the Superflashes output is voltage sensitive. So on fresh alkalines 1.55+ volts, they have a bit higher input that they ever show with NiMH cells. They have higher output with Nimh fresh off the charger (1.42 volts each) within an hour they settle in to about 13 lumen output and slowly decline over the next 20-40 hours (guess I gave up at 16), by 80 hours the cells are maybe 1.05 volts and output is in the 1.5-3 lumen range. Depends on whether you have 1000 mAhr cells or lower capacity ones, temperature, etc. YMMV. As far as I could see Lithium, Alkaline, or NiMh all settled in the same range only the settling in time varied. BTW you need a 20% difference to be noticeable, a halving to be obviously lower.

Thanks for the info, I have the 1000 cycle Eneloops (800mAh), and I've already done a break-in on them with the MH-C9000 charger/analyzer. I wanted to make sure the light wouldn't quickly drain, and even shorten the life of the batteries.

NiMH cells don't neeed to get fully darined like NiCd, and as I understand from Battery university (great reference source BTW), it isn't good for them. Many shallower discharge/recharge cycles are better. That fits the blinky output curve: sooner recharge is better. The Radbots get about 7 hours so I do them all at 4-6 hours. I haven't gone beyond 16 hours since I saw the slow fall off with voltage. After 30 minutes, the NiMH cells tracked on the Lithium ones for output, a bit higher than the alkalines.

BrianMc said:

NiMH cells don't neeed to get fully darined like NiCd, and as I understand from Battery university (great reference source BTW), it isn't good for them.

Click to expand...

I realize that, what I meant was, if the SF Turbo was for Alkaline's only, would it use up the energy in the battery faster than normal with NiMH batteries?, or would they just not power the light?.

Time to repost:



This says that after the initial higher voltage is used, NiMH = Lithium, both beat Alkaline by 30 minute mark.

Okay, but I already I know that NiMH is superior to Alkaline. Are you telling me that anything that uses Alkaline's can also use NiMH batteries?.

I really love the light by the way, I feel much safer with it on. Once the alkaline batteries that came with the SF Turbo no longer output enough light, I'll replace them with Eneloops.

On full, aka non-flashing, I got a 5 hour run time ( see New King of Blinkys thread). Eyeballing the very short flash cycle, I'd guess duty time is no less than 10% and no greater than 20%. Suggesting output in flash mode will drop rapidly in the 25-50 hour range. If you have anything else that can use up the last of the AAA's juice, I'd swap them out without a qualm at the 20-25 hour time frame. Since it is your safety and a bike related injury involves a lot of Carbon emissions, I'd still swap them out and discard them. About 20 hours or earlier would also be your recharge point for for the NiMHs.