Wednesday, 16 January 2013
Reply to a letter on flashing lights...
In response to Mr L Stroud of Blackfield, as a cyclist who uses flashing and steady lamps on my bike I have to say they are VERY effective at warning others that there is a bike in the vicinity.
I find it slightly worrying that he complains about their brightness. Most that I see are underpowered compared to the lights on cars (excluding the Xenon lights and DRLs - those are in a league of their own).
I have ridden with lights on steady-only before and it does lead to issues with the batteries running out more quickly (especially in the cold) and drivers taking more of a risk (I'm not sure why). My experience is that cyclists are best to arm themselves with 4 lights - one front and back on flash, and the others on steady. Also aim for between 40 to 100 lumens in brightness so that you're not drowned out by other traffic lighting.
Lastly after kitting your bike out take it out in the dark and test it. Have a friend hold the bike, walk a few metres and look back to make sure the light is angled correctly and doesn't blind out any hand signals you will need to make.
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Great advice, especially as I've recently upgraded my front lights. I went from a single battery powered Cateye EL-520 (IIRC) firstly to a Lezyne Mini Drive XL and then to a Power Drive XL (moving the Mini up on the helmet for more directed light)
The Mini XL does 100L/200L/50L/100L Flash, whilst the Power XL does 250L/400L/125L/250L flash and I find them both more then usable on the mid settings (100L and 250L)and use both on constant at night and just the Power Drive XL on flash during the day. My father in law commented that he doesn't really like flashing bike lights as he finds them distracting, that to me sounded like a great plus point :-)
As for the night use I find having a rather bright light helps as drivers can easily mistake you for a motorbike so won't take the piss so much when pulling out :-D
The bonus with both these is being rechargable via mini-USB which means I can charge at work and always have good working lights for return leg. My only additions to the blog post would be check batteries at END of ride and carry a backup set & spare batteries in bag.
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