Overwhelmed by bike light choices- can someone help?

Trucker D · Oct 19, 2013

Hello-

MY wife and I both have electric bikes, which have completely replaced our cars for anything in town.
Now that winter is coming on we are looking for a nice light system. Without doing any research, we bought supernova e3 pros for both bikes. They work ok and are beautifully made but we were expecting more light for that price, specifically a little further reach. We are almost constantly at 20 mph with the electric assist with full load of groceries/costco etc and definitely want to see ahead.

We have invested a good amount of money into these bikes and use them as a car replacement daily so price isn't our biggest concern. We are looking for sturdy, stylish, and bright lights.

Are there recommendations where to begin looking? Thanks!

Tachikoma · Oct 19, 2013

Sturdy, stylish, bright and no price concern, I'd say go ahead with this company ;-)

samgab · Oct 19, 2013

I would give serious consideration to the Fenix BT20. 750 lumens, dual distance beam system (excellent throw as well as spread), runs on a pair of rechargeable 18650's. It's a very good setup.
If you prefer a 4 x AA system, they also have the 350 lumen BT10, but I'd go for the BT20, as you can never have too much light.

Edit: Note, the Supernova E3 Pro are 205 lumen, the BT20 is 750 lumen and a good neutral white emitter tint. Markedly brighter as well as having good beam shaping reflector - it doesn't shine into the eyes of oncoming motorists.

Trucker D · Oct 19, 2013

Thats the one for us, thanks!!

STiFTW · Oct 19, 2013

I have a few BT20's and love them

znomit · Oct 20, 2013

Can you power the lights from the bike battery?

samgab · Oct 20, 2013

znomit said:
Can you power the lights from the bike battery?

It would depend upon what voltage the bikes' battery packs runs at. But you'd probably need a DC/DC converter to drop the voltage down to 7.4 - 8.2 V from the bike battery pack's (something like 36V), so although possible, it would probably be simpler to just use 18650s to run the bike light.

edit: ...or you could buy 4 of the BT20 systems per bike and wire them up to all run in series. That would be a crazy wall of light (3000lm), and it would all run off the bike's battery pack, assuming it's a 36 V system

znomit · Oct 20, 2013

samgab said:
It would depend upon what voltage the bikes' battery packs runs at. But you'd probably need a DC/DC converter to drop the voltage down to 7.4 - 8.2 V from the bike battery pack's (something like 36V), so although possible, it would probably be simpler to just use 18650s to run the bike light.edit: ...or you could buy 4 of the BT20 systems per bike and wire them up to all run in series. That would be a crazy wall of light (3000lm), and it would all run off the bike's battery pack, assuming it's a 36 V system

Running drivers in series is a big nono.Taskled do an ebike friendly led driver and bumm.de do an ebike light.

Marcturus · Oct 20, 2013

There also is a Philips safe ride bike light 80, pedelec version. Careful to scrap the supplied wire mount before it breaks!
As we weren't told about power supply and mounting options, how about this one?
http://www.hella.se/Produkter/Extraljus/Luminator-Compact-LED/
Sturdy? Looks like it.
Stylish? To a trucker, hopefully.
Bright? Useless word, really.
Reach? Definitely.

Steve K · Oct 20, 2013

just a comment on the Hella light.. why are there heatsink fins inside of a sealed lamp assembly?? what the heck??

Trucker D · Oct 20, 2013

The supernovas are plugged into the electric battery, I like the fenix because we can transfer them
over to other bikes when we'd like to ride something else

I do appreciate other suggestions for stylish bright lights, but the fenix is the top choice by the wife so far.
Her ride

samgab · Oct 20, 2013

znomit said:
Running drivers in series is a big nono.Taskled do an ebike friendly led driver and bumm.de do an ebike light.

Yeah it was a joke, hopefully no-one took it seriously.

Marcturus · Oct 21, 2013

Steve K said:
just a comment on the Hella light.. why are there heatsink fins inside of a sealed lamp assembly?? what the heck??

I don't know, so feel free to speculate about possible reasons:

- It's a company tradition, and within the warranty period, it does the job?
- Limit on new tooling for this niche product, marketing dept agrees that it needs to blend in with the rest of the Lumi-C product range?
- They only have about 10W to keep that comparatively large frontal lens area clear and don't want to waste it on defrosting the housing?
http://www.nabendynamo.de/news/bilder/Edelux_im_Schnee.jpg

@Trucker D: nice ride, too!

subwoofer · Oct 21, 2013

Trucker D said:
Thats the one for us, thanks!!

You will like the Fenix lights. Lupine is a no-expense-spared option and are awesome lights, but still suffer from being tied into proprietary battery packs. One feature I particularly like about the Fenix lights is that they have user replaceable cells so you can carry as many spares as you like and even use primaries (disposable) cells if you like.

DavidAD · Nov 9, 2013

STiFTW said:
I have a few BT20's and love them

What kind of battery life do you get?

chanrobi · Nov 29, 2013

The selling feature of the bt20 is bogus, aka the cutoff so that you are not blinding other people is nothing more than a gimmick .

It is not a true shaped beam like the phillips saferide. I cant find the link where someone did a detailed analysis of it with pictures but you should look beyond the bt20 - i briefly considered this model until then. Another knock against it is a seperate battery pack - annoying to have to transfer back and forth between bikes compared to self contained units ...

Ill write a more detailed reply as soon as i finish making breakfast....

swhs · Nov 30, 2013

chanrobi said:
The selling feature of the bt20 is bogus, aka the cutoff so that you are not blinding other people is nothing more than a gimmick .

It is not a true shaped beam like the phillips saferide. I cant find the link where someone did a detailed analysis of it with pictures but you should look beyond the bt20 - i briefly considered this model until then. Another knock against it is a seperate battery pack - annoying to have to transfer back and forth between bikes compared to self contained units ...

Ill write a more detailed reply as soon as i finish making breakfast....

The other 'feature' of the BT 20 is supposed to be the dual beam. That to me is more bogus than the cutoff, which is from what I've seen on pictures indeed not a true cutoff. I tried to get information and possibly a loaner for testing for my site from Fenix, but got no response. What is it with these companies?

What you want is an even beam, with soft drop off to darkness at the sides, and that does not overexpose close to the bike. Overexposure is annoying in a background noise sense, but you notice it also in that it causes you not to see as well the areas that are less well lit, and it becomes really apparent in rain. An example is the Luxos (dynamo lamp, but I'll tell anyway

), which is really bad in such circumstances. Most people seem to think the Luxos is great, but I think the beam of the Luxos is junk in any respect except sharpness of the vertical cutoff (sharpness of cutoff to the sides is not desired but it has sharp cutoff there too).

I think anyone looking for a light that works best in rainy conditions should also look at the light colour, neutral white is far preferable to cool white.

nollij · Nov 30, 2013

Currently, I'm loving the Serfas True 500+ that I bought a couple of months ago. At 500 lumens peak output, its easily as bright as a car headlight and it has a pretty decent top cutoff. I've been eyeing the new Schmidt Edelux II and the B&M IQ Cyo Premium that are hub dynamo powered available at www.compasscycles.com or at Peterwhitecycles.com. I prefer the Peterwhitecycles site b/c he does a better job of explaining the lights. That said, hub dynamo lights are (probably) going to run you more money up front, but they are a great investment in the long run and they never run out of batteries!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

subwoofer · Dec 2, 2013

chanrobi said:
The selling feature of the bt20 is bogus, aka the cutoff so that you are not blinding other people is nothing more than a gimmick .

It is not a true shaped beam like the phillips saferide. I cant find the link where someone did a detailed analysis of it with pictures but you should look beyond the bt20 - i briefly considered this model until then. Another knock against it is a seperate battery pack - annoying to have to transfer back and forth between bikes compared to self contained units ...

Ill write a more detailed reply as soon as i finish making breakfast....

swhs said:
The other 'feature' of the BT 20 is supposed to be the dual beam. That to me is more bogus than the cutoff, which is from what I've seen on pictures indeed not a true cutoff. I tried to get information and possibly a loaner for testing for my site from Fenix, but got no response. What is it with these companies?

What you want is an even beam, with soft drop off to darkness at the sides, and that does not overexpose close to the bike. Overexposure is annoying in a background noise sense, but you notice it also in that it causes you not to see as well the areas that are less well lit, and it becomes really apparent in rain. An example is the Luxos (dynamo lamp, but I'll tell anyway ), which is really bad in such circumstances. Most people seem to think the Luxos is great, but I think the beam of the Luxos is junk in any respect except sharpness of the vertical cutoff (sharpness of cutoff to the sides is not desired but it has sharp cutoff there too).

I think anyone looking for a light that works best in rainy conditions should also look at the light colour, neutral white is far preferable to cool white.

The BT20 does have some beam shaping, and the lens area designed to created the 'dual-beam' is found at the top.

Obviously we must take all manufacturer's claims with a pinch of salt, but compared to typical bike lights, the BT20 does indeed have beam shaping and the light used to create this is diverted from the area at the top of the reflector.

Now how much this really reduces the glare is difficult to prove, certainly not like their diagram where the light completely misses the cartoon man.

What I will say is that in real world use, the cheaper basic bike lights get a lot of flashes from oncoming traffic, but since using the BT10 and BT20, I've not had a single flash, so this suggests that there is in fact less glare.

Despite what you term 'bogus' features, these Fenix Bike light have been very good. Apart from a couple of Lupine lights I also use, the BT10 and BT20 are permanent fixtures on my bike.

I think there is a lot more work that can be done to make better bike lights, but the BT10 and 20 are a step in the right direction.

Overwhelmed by bike light choices- can someone help?

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