Hight End See By Front Light Suggestions Please

dick_sternum

After an accident last year kept me off the bike for a couple of months, I'm starting to get back into commuting to work once again - just in time for the weather to be truly crappy obviously!

I commuted sparingly last year and doing it this year I've realized that it's, well, bloody dark out there. Basically I live up on the edge of Dartmoor and commute into the North of Plymouth each day so I have a run of 13 miles each way. 3 of which are on the lovely, unlit, single carriage, high hedged lanes of deepest (darkest) Devon, 3 on the lit but busy roads around the North of the city and the rest on unlit cycle path complete with tunnel. I'm not particularly fast, so ride time is a little over an hour.

I'm currently running an Exposure Sirius Mk5 on constant beam and a small lezyne on flash upfront, but I'm looking for something with more power for better visibility on the truly dark parts of my route, that's also not going to dazzle drivers in the 3 miles of busy roads I have to endure (currently switch between medium and max on the Sirius). I'd also like something that can last more than a single ride on full beam without needing charging, or longer rides, just in case. I'm finding the Sirius is just enough for some parts but offers no confidence when descending the steep pot hole riddles lanes round here.

Budget is around £200 and I'm currently looking at either the Exposure Strada 1200 or the Toro Mk9, both of which are on offer at Evans at the mo. Anyone used either or both or compared the two? I'm wondering if the Toro is suitable for road riding being more MTB orientated according to Exposure. I'm hoping to do a few offroad night rides up on the moors so the Toro looks ideal.

Any other options to consider? I don't really want a separate battery pack.

arthur_scrimshaw

I use a Strada mk5 800 lumens for my commute, 9 miles each way every day, 90% unlit country roads. I charge it once a week (if that) and normally run it on mid power. It's 4 years old now and still seems to keep it's charge? No brainer for me.

spatt77

hi, Ive got a Cateye Volt 1200 which is very good and can be had for £76, if you want to pay slightly more get the Volt 1600 for £109. hope this helps.

thegreatdivide

I’ve gone through a fair few lights over the years but took a punt on the Ravemen PR1200 this winter and it’s quite simply the best light I’ve ever owned. The car style high/low beam feature is perfect and can be activated via a remote on the bars. Pitch black country road – whack it on high beam. Car coming towards you – stick it on low beam/spread beam. You also get a digital power display and it’s built like a tank.

Edit - an it can also be used to charge your USB devices (phone/gps etc) in case you’re caught short.

jp4urio

CatEye Volt 800 gets my vote. Comes in around £60, and is the most powerful single barrel I could find from a big manufacturer. Supurb build quality, lasts for long rides and I love the 'pulse' feature that runs at 200lm with a 800lm flash every second or so for commutes. It's perfect for road riding at speed down dark B roads.

The ones above 800lm seem to all be double barrel, and are a bit too chunky for me. I used the CEV800 in a storm so heavy it was one they gave a name to, doing about 45 miles, and it was brilliant. It's a focussed beam that really punches through, but the level of output means it still floods wide when you're in the dark lanes. I find if I'm doing night rides they tend to start off light and/or are for the majority on roads that only need a low to medium setting, so I adjust as I go. You may prefer just having a massive battery in a larger unit of course, I prefer the slimmer unit for all occasions.

If off road personally I'd rather have a floodlight on the bars and a spotlight on the helmet, both of reasonable power, than going for one light on the bike. Off road you need the directional light on the helmet to fill in the shadows over crests and see round corners the bars arent pointing at yet.

thegreatdivide

spatt77 - check the first line in this review http://road.cc/content/review/221409-ra ... ront-light

amrushton

Evans have the Strada 600 for £119 - basically lower power strada. i use the high power one and its excellent. the Toro may be better suited to off-road/tracks but it is still a good light. I'm a big Exposure fan due to their ruggedness and after sales service. That lower power strada may do the job

https://www.evanscycles.com/exposure-st ... n-EV313642

A helmet light is also excellent as you get that higher level light catching the eyes of pedestrians out of the general melee of lighting

Evans sale ends tomorrow btw

trek_dan

I've got the Toro as 99% of my night riding is off road, when I use it for commuting I always have to switch it to low so as not to dazzle drivers. If you intend on doing any off road riding in the dark I'd say the Toro was the minimum.

svetty

Exposure lights have always been my go-to.....

dj58

I use 2 Cateye Volt 700, newer model is the 800, more than enough light on high beam for unlit roads and as long as you angle the light down and to the left you won't dazzle oncoming traffic.

dick_sternum

Thanks for all the advice, (most of which has clearly been ignored ), as a Toro Mk9 has been ordered from Evans. I wasn’t necessarily planning on buying so soon but thought I’d play safe in case the price goes up post sale. Be just my luck that it’ll now be reduced further!

andyh01

I know a little late but I had simlar awhile ago went from a Moon XP500 to a Hope Vision R4 as best value for £/lumen and the number of available replacement parts.
The front light has several setting and suitable for Both road, including hyper flash mode (constantly on with a higher pulse flash so never in an "off" state) as well as off road use/ settings.
The other advantage is you can run the Rear district R4+ (daylight 120 luman rear red light) from splitter cable best value/reliable/serviceable with replacement parts light set imo
Whilst the battery pack is external you can always carry an extra pack if needed to last longer.

The only draw back I see is it's not usb chargable but again could get an extra charging cable and leave at office.

milemuncher1

Aldi had a Cree LED front light on offer earlier in the year. I bought one, and paired it up with my trusty old Halfords number on the opposite side of the bars. That Combo has proved to be better and brighter than some 100 quid plus lights I’ve bought before now. The Aldi set was about 13 quid, and the Halfords set was about 20 quid.

http://www.halfords.com/cycling/bike-li ... bike-light

That’s pretty much identical to the Aldi light.

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stor ... reId=10001

Those are the other ones.

kingstongraham

I've got a Lezyne MegaDrive that's still going strong on its 4th winter, and having bounced down the road a few times. Think the equivalent they do now is the DecaDrive.

andyh01

KingstonGraham wrote:

I've got a Lezyne MegaDrive that's still going strong on its 4th winter, and having bounced down the road a few times. Think the equivalent they do now is the DecaDrive.

I originally had the micro drive set was ok but the internal battery went faulty had the red power light error sent. The rear light dropped out of its bracket on a few occasions too, managed to get refund and replaced with the moon xp500 n moon shield rear when on half price much better n still going strong.

scott_w1987

https://www.cyclesurgery.com/p/moon-met ... lsrc=aw.ds

I replaced my old Lezyne PowerdriveXL with the above. I got it for £75 from wiggle before winter and I consider that a bargain for how good it has been. So at the above price it's a no brainer. It's easily as good as a few different exposure lights which cost over triple the amount, I've done many side by side comparisons with my team mates that run various models. Battery life and light output are excellent and it has a wired remote!

maddog 2

Strada mk6 1000 lumen front
Moon Nebula rear, with custom mount

Sorted.

spatt77

thegreatdivide wrote:

spatt77 - check the first line in this review http://road.cc/content/review/221409-ra ... ront-light

undoubted a very good light but I cant offer my opinion on it as i do not own one, however the Ravemen is the new kid on the block, the Cateye Volt is tried and tested over time.

evs78

Ive just gone mad and bought the Ravemen for £52 from some Chinese website (I’m normally very cautious when it comes to online purchases but had a mad moment). It came up as a sponsored ad with google and has decent reviews (its called banggood.com - yes, I know!!!). I’ve paid with PayPal so hoping if it is dodgy I’ll be ok but I’ll report back if all goes smoothly!

daniel_b

thegreatdivide wrote:

I’ve gone through a fair few lights over the years but took a punt on the Ravemen PR1200 this winter and it’s quite simply the best light I’ve ever owned. The car style high/low beam feature is perfect and can be activated via a remote on the bars. Pitch black country road – whack it on high beam. Car coming towards you – stick it on low beam/spread beam. You also get a digital power display and it’s built like a tank.

Edit - an it can also be used to charge your USB devices (phone/gps etc) in case you’re caught short.

Like the look of that a LOT - how do you find the mount for reliability\solidity?
Notice that was pretty much the only thing the review was critical of - but a fairly key point, with the condition of our roads, such as they are.

Evs78 wrote:

Ive just gone mad and bought the Ravemen for £52 from some Chinese website (I’m normally very cautious when it comes to online purchases but had a mad moment). It came up as a sponsored ad with google and has decent reviews (its called banggood.com - yes, I know!!!). I’ve paid with PayPal so hoping if it is dodgy I’ll be ok but I’ll report back if all goes smoothly!

I see how you have done that now - be very interested to hear how you get on, if and when it arrives, and if it seems legit!
If you remember, would you mind updating the thread or dropping me a PM?

The reviews on that site, and some of the pics all seem legit, and in the main positive - one chap with an apparently failed unit after 3 weeks.

froze

Be careful buying Chinese knockoffs, the Chinese will rate these lights with huge lumen ratings that are too good to be true but fool people into thinking their really must be great, almost all the Chinese generic lights are only putting out about 25% to 33% of their light lumens they claim. And if you use some common sense when you see huge lumen figures then look at the battery run times which are also blown out of proportion you'll discover there is no way a light can put out 4000 lumens and run for 3 hours...at least not without a huge battery that would be too bulky for biking with.

Anyway there are a few websites that actually have light comparisons done at night, do be forewarned about these comparisons is that the camera is not the human eye what you'll actually see is going to be different then the photos but at least the photos give you an idea of how bright one light is over another. Also you may find a few models no longer being made due to updates, but most of them are still selling:

These first two appear to be the same stuff, but they were done at separate times and thus have a few lights in one that aren't in another/

https://www.bikelightdatabase.com/beams ... 5D=blaze2w

https://www.bikelightdatabase.com/beams ... =lumina650

https://www.bikelightdatabase.com/reviews/

http://road.cc/content/buyers-guide/212 ... -how#beams

http://reviews.mtbr.com/2016-lights-sho ... ight-light

daniel_b

IS it a chinese knock off though?

The reviews seem good, and one with pictures seems to have the branding on and in the right place.

Not saying they can't copy everything, including a badge, but past clones I have seen they tend to leave the name off and go for a different name. Happy to be educated otherwise though.

This be the link:
https://www.banggood.com/RAVEMEN-PR1200-1200LM-2XM-L2-Simulation-Design-of-Automotive-Headlight-3-Modes-8-Brightness-Levels-p-1178847.html?rmmds=search&cur_warehouse=CN

stevie63

In answer to your earlier question Daniel, the mount for the Raveman is rock solid if you use the supplied 3m strip on 31.8mm bars. For me the only issue that I have is that my computer on an out front interferes with the beam pattern and casts a shadow so I need to change the way I mount it.

northpole

Exposure lights work great for me. Despite living in London, I believe lights can save your life by making sure people see you - that does not mean having the beam pointing in people's faces! I use a six pack up front and a blaze on the back. The six pack I have is MK4 which is around 2000 lumens (new ones are over 4000), it is very bright, the beam is projected a great distance up the road and the battery retains charge for ages - despite having owned mine for a few years now. Appreciate the OP has bought a new light but for any others I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the six pack, new or used. Just make sure you direct the beam onto the pavement, not into drivers and cyclists eyes!

Peter

daniel_b

stevie63 wrote:

In answer to your earlier question Daniel, the mount for the Raveman is rock solid if you use the supplied 3m strip on 31.8mm bars. For me the only issue that I have is that my computer on an out front interferes with the beam pattern and casts a shadow so I need to change the way I mount it.

Thanks for the reply stevie - I think next time I need a front light, this brand will be top of my list.

super_davo

froze wrote:

Be careful buying Chinese knockoffs, the Chinese will rate these lights with huge lumen ratings that are too good to be true but fool people into thinking their really must be great, almost all the Chinese generic lights are only putting out about 25% to 33% of their light lumens they claim."

There is a world of difference between an eBay special "3000 lumens" with an external 18650 battery pack and a Raveman. Its like the difference between a cheap Doogee or Elephone Android handset and a Huawei or a Xiaomi.

I've just ordered this:
https://www.banggood.com/XANES-SFL04-75 ... rehouse=CN

which is still very cheap unlike the Raveman, but looked interesting. The "German standard" means the 750 lumens needs to be cut off at height so will be a nice concentrated beam, should be ideal for commuting. Heard good things about them, will report back when I have it...

evs78

Daniel - the light arrived and reasonably quickly too; within 8 days of ordering. Haven’t used it yet as I needed an aero bar mount (£7 from Rush Cycles) and will update the thread once I have tested it out.

daniel_b

Evs78 wrote:

Daniel - the light arrived and reasonably quickly too; within 8 days of ordering. Haven’t used it yet as I needed an aero bar mount (£7 from Rush Cycles) and will update the thread once I have tested it out.

Thankyou kindly, some pics of the unit if you have time, would be good too.