pe2er
Enlightened
I Have recently upgraded my Alleweder Velomobile to a Strada VM. This means another chance at improving velomobile lighting 
This is my Strada, looking at it from an oncoming traffic point of view. What you see is a Lumotec BM IQ Cyo mounted in the nose.
Because this light is mounted fairly close to ground, I also wear a light on my helmet, same light I used in my Alleweder
Not entirely satisfied with the visibility at night, I decided to add two additional lights mounted to the mirror. For this, I bought two identical Romisen flashlights with XRE-Q5 emitter (the light on top is only for comparison)
Romisen RC-A5-Q5 Cree Q5-WC 3-Mode 180-Lumen LED Flashlight - Black (1*AA/1*16340)
These lights turned out to be 'crappy', but since I only needed the light head they suffice as a donor. Here is a trial to see what the effect is, using the flashlights on internal 14500 battery.
For oncoming traffic, the width of the Strada is more obvious:
Here is a picture of the light from within the IQ Cyo main beam:
Looks like a lot of light here inside the living, but it will be more reasonable on dark asphalt...
So I hacked the flashlights to shorten the body and remove the 1.2 ... 4.2Volt driver. Instead I used an MR-16 size 1 Watt driver from DealExtreme to match my 12 VDC ships battery.
Here are some shots taken with a Sony Cybershot DSC-W380. Camera settings were f/2,4, ISO-80, 2 seconds.
This picture shows the improvement of the side visibility.
The following pictures were taken with the camera on a small tripod in between the two mirrors. First one showing only the original IQ Cyo.
IQ Cyo in combination with the two new lights.
IQ Cyo switched off.
The camera blends all three lights into one. With the naked eye, the lights are visible as three individual light sources
So, I am quite happy with the improved visibility and illumination of the road edge.
I Temporarily connected the lights to the on-board electrical system and included a switch to dim the new lights. Dimmed, they are about as bright as the white 5mm LEDs mounted in the nose as 'Daytime Running Lights' just above the IQ Cyo.
Will do some more testing to determine if the lights remain as is, or build a variable dimming unit (with PWM?).
This is my Strada, looking at it from an oncoming traffic point of view. What you see is a Lumotec BM IQ Cyo mounted in the nose.
Because this light is mounted fairly close to ground, I also wear a light on my helmet, same light I used in my Alleweder
Not entirely satisfied with the visibility at night, I decided to add two additional lights mounted to the mirror. For this, I bought two identical Romisen flashlights with XRE-Q5 emitter (the light on top is only for comparison)
Romisen RC-A5-Q5 Cree Q5-WC 3-Mode 180-Lumen LED Flashlight - Black (1*AA/1*16340)
These lights turned out to be 'crappy', but since I only needed the light head they suffice as a donor. Here is a trial to see what the effect is, using the flashlights on internal 14500 battery.
For oncoming traffic, the width of the Strada is more obvious:
Here is a picture of the light from within the IQ Cyo main beam:
Looks like a lot of light here inside the living, but it will be more reasonable on dark asphalt...
So I hacked the flashlights to shorten the body and remove the 1.2 ... 4.2Volt driver. Instead I used an MR-16 size 1 Watt driver from DealExtreme to match my 12 VDC ships battery.
Here are some shots taken with a Sony Cybershot DSC-W380. Camera settings were f/2,4, ISO-80, 2 seconds.
This picture shows the improvement of the side visibility.
The following pictures were taken with the camera on a small tripod in between the two mirrors. First one showing only the original IQ Cyo.
IQ Cyo in combination with the two new lights.
IQ Cyo switched off.
The camera blends all three lights into one. With the naked eye, the lights are visible as three individual light sources
So, I am quite happy with the improved visibility and illumination of the road edge.
I Temporarily connected the lights to the on-board electrical system and included a switch to dim the new lights. Dimmed, they are about as bright as the white 5mm LEDs mounted in the nose as 'Daytime Running Lights' just above the IQ Cyo.
Will do some more testing to determine if the lights remain as is, or build a variable dimming unit (with PWM?).
