Bike lights made by an 18-year old

Just posting these pictures for fun:







I made this headlight pair back in my senior high school year ('92). At the time, I had limited tools and materials at my disposal. The parts you see are ABS plumbing pipe, a hose clamp (for angle adjustment), two 3C maglites, and glue. I think it required a drill, hacksaw, and file. These were the days when Mags were THE thing, at least in my corner of the map. All-in-all, not too sophisticated, I think you'll agree... but cute, perhaps.

I wore a "fanny pack", with all of the batteries in it. RCA-type connectors linked my on-person battery pack to the lights. The thinking was, that if/when I took a spill, the cables would easily disconnect. Also, it was better to have the extra battery weight on *me*, than on the bike.

It wasn't quite the quality product that I had hoped for. It was bright enough, but too heavy. You'll have noticed that the tubes were somewhat shorter than normal 3C lights - this is where the hacksaw came in handy.

'Nuff said. Thought you folks could use a chuckle.

-Trev

Hey, a CPFer from waay back What a good idea it was, and still is. I can see a few LuxIIIs in each of those heads if someone did them today

Looks functional enough even if it's not as pretty as you wanted.

Wow monster light. Good idea.

Neat project.

kewls!

--neg

Nice avistar plane in the background.......I always wanted on of those but kinda glad I held out. I'm now a brushless Li-Poly guy.


Mac

How well'd it work?

Actually.. that setup is really not too bad. Your use of Maglites gets me thinking about all the stuff we can do with them nowadays. I can just imagine 2 x 2C Mags with my 600-output-lumen ROP high output bulbs. Cars will wonder just what the HECK is that!! though for more runtime I recommend the lower-output 350 O/P lumen bulbs.

With external battery packs your options are even better. A pair of 6V SLAs or a single big 12V SLA in series will drive those bulbs hard for hours. You just need heavier-duty lines (MINIMUM 5 amp, preferably 10 amp) and quick-release connectors.

I'm glad you all thought it was a respectable effort. And yes - we could REALLY drive a good pair of modded lights up there... funny that the thought hadn't even occured to me yet.

(Nice catch on the Avistar in the background, cmacclel! This is my only gasser, everything else is brushless and LiPo, too )

I'm a little bit more interested in getting the small-and-efficient velcro-based mounts that I've seen in some other threads. It was fun having two adustable focus mags, let me tell you. On the road, I'd tighten both beams. In neighbourhoods, you could turn one wide for better peripheral vision. And obviously, the trails were best served by overlapping floods. Ahhh, those were the days.

-Trev