mrbadexample
Senior Member
- Location
- Walsall
One thing I forgot to ask, which isn't covered by Torchy, is I'd like a USB recharge option too, if possible. Do any of those four have it, or should I be emailing Torchy? 

Those q5 are ok for being seen but for real unit riding they do not cut the mustard unless you do convert them to 18650 batteries, unless you know your route and ride slowly .Ahh in that case most of what i said is fairly irrelevant. Sorry about that.
There not great but i have no problem on unlit lanes with them at a reasonable speed on max beam and that's with aaa batteries. We are somewhat spoilt for lumens these days it's not that long ago that these lights would have been considered god like. There not amazing by any means but I have used them and found them adequate. Everyone has different ideas on what they call acceptable however.
It is nowhere near the lumens quoted. Never is with these lamps. Probably on a a par with a cateye 530 for brightness. lasts over an hour on full beam would be better with 18650 batteries..The Smart Lunar would be a good choice - Lunar 35 plus rear light here, £24
In terms of what is actually needed to ride on unlit country lanes, using a basic round torch beam, 100 lumens is plenty, 50 is OK, and 20 is usable provided you slow for the corners. 40 is about what a decent halogen dynamo light gave Before LED, and I used to not worry about riding at 20mph on narrow and winding lanes, or descending at 35mph on bigger roads.
More brightness is always attractive, but it comes at a cost in run time.
If the Cree Q5 that Milo linked in post #7 really does give 400 lumens as claimed, it would probably only last for 40 minutes at full power.
As a rule of thumb, a recent high power LED such as a Cree will give about 110 lumens per watt. An AAA contains about 1 watt-hour of energy, an AA about 3 Wh, and an 18650 about 9-10Wh. So 3xAAA = 3 Wh, 400 lm/110 = 3.6W, so it would last 3/3.6 hours = 50min. That assumes that the driver electronics consumes no power, and that all of the power in the battery is extracted. Neither of these will be the case.