Lights

[The Central Scrutinizer]

I have never had any lights on my bike but for this coming winter with the dark gloomy days i thought i would buy some for safety reasons.
These would be for daytime only so a case of being seen rather than lighting up a dark road.
I don't want to spend a lot and i have seen these from lezyne which might fit the bill.

https://www.evanscycles.com/lezyne-femto-drive-light-set-EV194253

Any thoughts on these lights or other recommendations would be welcome.

 

[Milkfloat]

I use them as backup lights as they are so small. Nothing wrong with them at all, but I would not use them exclusively in the real dark. if your local Aldi have them, then for £9.99 they have a twin pack of rechargeable 'Moon' rips off that are far better.

 

[summerdays]

For me I would be more tempted to get a USB charged light. Those ones have those small batteries, and I hate wasting batteries so I would carry on using it when the light was starting to fade, whereas with rechargeable ones I am happy to charge more frequently to keep the light topped up. You don't need over the top for day time use but it is nice to have them for gloomy, damp, foggy days in winter.

 

[mjr]

There's no evidence that daytime lights improve cyclist safety, is there? Unless you've a dynamo, you ain't gonna get close to foglight brightness.

 

[summerdays]

There's no evidence that daytime lights improve cyclist safety, is there? Unless you've a dynamo, you ain't gonna get close to foglight brightness.

No idea if there is official evidence ... I just go by what my eyes see/notice and I do see bike lights particularly the rear light in the those conditions.

 

[Apollonius]

Another vote for the Aldi Moon Comet clones. It was a bit foggy when I set off today, so I put a back one on. Got back at 2 and it was still flashing. Why not?

 

[mjr]

Another vote for the Aldi Moon Comet clones. It was a bit foggy when I set off today, so I put a back one on. Got back at 2 and it was still flashing. Why not?

Because motorists get to expect everything on the road to be lit and then BANG! they end up in a fence like the van on the fen road I rode along this morning which seemed to have completely failed to notice an S bend and continued straight on, possibly because that's the first bend north of a village without huge reflective chevrons. The previous two bends have chevrons because there's a flood defence on the outside of the first and a house on the outside of the seconds, whereas this one has nothing behind it except a small drainage ditch.

And that's if we get lucky and they only hurt themselves. Maybe the unlit thing will be an animal or a child No, it's really not good to encourage motorists to expect everything to be lit.

 

[Apollonius]

Fair point. I feel the same way about so-called "high vis".

 

[NorthernDave]

If you have a Tesco Extra near you they have a lot of cycling stuff on promotion.
I got a USB rechargable LED rear light that on the top setting is very nearly as bright as the sun for £4.65. The store near me has quite a lot of lights to choose from, some excellent value, others not so - although oddly most of them don't seem to be on Tesco's website....

For the ultimate bargain, Poundland rear lights are as bright as any, run almost forever on a couple of AAA batteries and have more light patterns than any sane person needs. The front ones aren't so good though.
http://www.poundland.co.uk/my-cycle-5-led-back-bike-light

And Planet X have a sale on at the moment that features a lot of bike lights, with some real bargains in there.
http://www.planetx.co.uk/c/q/deals/sale?utm_source=web&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=TbarFibonacci

 

[RMurphy195]

I use a Cateye Omni 5 - gives a bright light with a wide angle of view. I have my front one mounted on the head tube using the mounting designed for the rear light, this works well and leaves a bit of space on the head tube! http://www.rutlandcycling.com/10231...currency=GBP&gclid=CObg36PfgNACFVS4GwodJ4UPDQ

 

[Tin Pot]

I have never had any lights on my bike but for this coming winter with the dark gloomy days i thought i would buy some for safety reasons.
These would be for daytime only so a case of being seen rather than lighting up a dark road.
I don't want to spend a lot and i have seen these from lezyne which might fit the bill.

https://www.evanscycles.com/lezyne-femto-drive-light-set-EV194253

Any thoughts on these lights or other recommendations would be welcome.

I have them as backups only.

Lights in the daytime will provide *no* protection from motorists.

 

[steveindenmark]

If you feel that your life is only worth a tenner, I would go for it.

Otherwise I would get a decent set of lights and a helmet torch so I could be seen properly.

 

[mjr]

Otherwise I would get a decent set of lights and a helmet torch so I could be seen properlykilled by an oncoming motorist I dazzle with my confusing and hard-to-direct-safely light.

FTFY

 

[NorthernDave]

If you have a Tesco Extra near you they have a lot of cycling stuff on promotion.
I got a USB rechargable LED rear light that on the top setting is very nearly as bright as the sun for £4.65.

This light might not be quite the bargain I though.
Charged it for 6 hours until the tiny flashing light next to the USB post went constant* and then used it for the first time on Saturdays ride in flashing mode as it wasn't properly light when I set off. When I got home two and a half hours later it was switched off...it switched straight back on, so I thought maybe I'd caught it and accidently switched it off.
Used it again on Sunday's ride with Mrs ND and it had switched itself off again within 20 minutes and then switched itself off again shortly afterwards at which point I left it.

Charged it again for 8 hours, so will see how it goes next ride out. I still have the receipt.

* - the "instructions" make no reference to the time needed to charge, or run time, or indeed what the flashing / constant light when plugged in to charge mean, although they do advise how to switch between modes in 6 different languages.