offroad LED bike lights

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gecko4

Newly Enlightened
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Oct 28, 2006
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looking for advice on making super bright led bike lights so i dont have to go spend 3 to 400 quid on some hids any tips bearing in mind i don't know a great deal about electronics, is there a step by step guide out there that anyone knows about?
 
Welcome to CPF 🙂
Right now the high output lighting systems are now being re-thought and re-engineered for the newest LED out there, the Cree XR-E. This requires new reflectors/optics and that is getting sorted out now.
For offroading at night, maybe a 600 lumen light would work for you and lights of that class are being designed. Think four premium binned Cree XR-E LEDs blasting at 2.4 watts each through 4 specially made reflectors.
The new Crees should be very good for bike lights since they have a larger hotspot and much stronger spill around the hotspot. You stepped in at the right time so watch this latest thing unfold. All my bicycle lighting projects center around the XR-E and I am gunning for a 500 lumen 8AA Mag four LED Mag frame light and a 120 lumen single AA helmet light.
As far as manufactuer built Cree lights, have no idea of the time frame but it won't be very soon.
 
cheers benthead any ideas on where i can acquire the knowledge to build such a light
 
gecko4 said:
cheers benthead any ideas on where i can acquire the knowledge to build such a light
Click to expand...

Step 1
Take all the money out of your wallet and start it on fire.

Step 2
Get a Paypal account

Step 3
Bang head on wall repeatedly and start more money on fire.

This will simulate what it feels like to be a modder! 😉

There are sections on CPF that involve modding and group buys. These are the areas you can see the best of CPF come up with crazy designs, premium parts and custom machined parts to fit different lights.

Stop off at the manufacturer's section called McGizmo. He has many parts available to build lights and the Sandwich Shoppe sells his stuff and Wayne's creations.

So far, I have a custom bored barrel HA-III 2D Mag, a 8AA to 2D battery holder, Kiu HA-III aluminum strike bezel (with glow dots!), four (McGizmo) McR19 aluminum reflectors, 5 Cree XR-E LEDs on the way and a MaxFlex multiple output programmable current regulator board (due in about 6 weeks) Eight Powerex 2700mAH NiMH AA batteries and custom glass for the lens. Mix all those parts together and I still have....well, a bunch of parts! I need a heat sink to mount all the mess and a weekend to put it all together.

Once this thing is done, it will be my monster light but I will get over 3 hours of regulated 420 to 540 lumens of light. The COST of all this insanity is very expensive as you could imagine. As a self-contained "2D Mag" frame mounted bike light...it will work very well. It also gives me the option to remove it and use it as a flashlight.

Hang out in the modder area, read the "sticky" threads at the top of the pages to gain knowledge on how all this stuff works. Bin codes to thermal epoxy most of it is covered. The Cree XR-E LED information is becoming available so serious firepower can now be had.

Above all, have fun, ask questions and burn the money in your wallet to start off. 🙂
 
I think that the bike light people are behind the times for what is needed now. Plus bike lights are WAY too expensive.

I have a Niterider classic dual beam($200). I used it in the 24 hrs Moab. They had Niterider quickchargers there so was able to charge between runs. But, still, my light only lasts about 2 hours, and no option to use new battery. Battery is water bottle size and heavy. Now, it doesn't charge at all and is out of warranty.
I recently used a Dorcy Metal Gear luxeon LED from WalMart ($18.83) in an all night orienteering event. This was on foot. It worked well in the very dark woods.
It is 6 oz with batteries and 5 1/2" long. Uses 3 AAA.
I am thinking to work a way to mount this on my handlebars. If you used two of them angled slightly laterally offcenter, you could have good enough coverage to ride singletrack.
This is a much cheaper solution and could easily carry extra batteries too.

I suspect there are other flashlights that would do better, but this one is readily available and pretty good price. If I could get a lens that diffuses the beam I could maybe use just one on the bike.

I am thinking of the diffuse beam from my Tikka XP headlamp type of lens. It allows a spot or not beam, but is probably not bright enough for biking.

I just looked at the links to other solutions listed in the previous post. They are all homemade lights requiring, obtaining various parts and +using ungainly heavy batteries.
What I have outlined above requires only that you buy the light and all you have to do is to make some sort of mount.
 
Last edited:
Hello BentHeadTX🙂

Your Mag-project hears very interesting. Please share with us you ready light🙂

Best regards

____
Tom
 
gecko - I'll write something up on my website (actually have, but decided it was too long to post), and link it back here sometime this weekend hopefully. It's really quite simple though, here are the only "decisions" you need to make... (details will be later....

Appearance - "nice" housings either modded or made, or cheap "whatever you have around" housings, prototype boxes, etc... housing has little bearing on utility other than potentially as a heatsink and for durability/ruggedness/weathertightness purposes and ease of designing. If you have a machine shop and the skills, the sky is really the limit. I don't have funds, machine shop, or skills, so I scrounge (some creative ideas I've seen, someone used stainless steel salt/pepper shakers for bike lights... someone else made a pocket light out of an altoids tin...).

LED types - Cree XR-Es.... okay, that's a no-brainer at the moment

Brightness - # of LEDs and/or watts to drive them at

Beam style - reflectors or optics choices as desired

Power/runtime - battery choices in capacity (mAh), volts (to match circuit desired), size, weight, costs, including charger speeds, charger costs, etc

Mounting methods (cheap bar clamps (<$1) to fancy bikelight mounts to helmet/headlight mounts)

Other considerations :
Separate battery pack vs integral battery pack (I say separate, always, but that's me)
Portability - welding to handlebars is probably not the best plan, although Hope sells an integrated light/handlebar stem combo...)
Adjustability - tilt/swivel/etc
Upgradeability - you could literally encase a single heatsink mounted
LED/reflector, and all electronics required, into a 1" cube of acrylic with just wire leads (or a jack) and the heatsink coming out of the back and the end of the reflector (and a protective unbreakable lens) on the front, and it'd work great, but it would be a bit hard to mod later on. I might have do this sometime though, sounds fun, and easy to mount anywhere and virtually indestructible...

I personally care little about looks, and mostly about utility, cost, brightness and runtime. Anyhow, more to come...
 
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