Posted by surprisetalk 9 hours ago
I replaced a lezyne light battery too. There was no point buying a complete light, send this one to waste when I could just look up for the actual reference in a search engine, find the correct one and replace it.
It is not about money, it ia about not sending unneeded stuff to waste management, which we pay for actually.
I wonder how many people just chucked the unit when the battery wore out.
If they kill a battery even every 5 years, that’s still fine IMO and replacing the battery is way better than tossing the whole thing.
1. Reflectors are the best for baseline visibility, they cost nothing and are reliable.
2. The tail light is the important one.
a) Try to find ones with a pulsating mode, blinding other road users by shining bright rapidly blinking lights into their eyes is not good, actually.
b) If you've got the money, consider a radar instead.
3. For the front, decide if you *need* illumination strong enough for you to see where you're going in darkness, or if you can get away with just being seen by others.
a) For the former, make sure you get a front light that has a beam cutoff, preferably a lens-based solution. Then of course, install the light with a proper downwards angle, otherwise there's no point to the cutoff.
4. Side visibility is important, this is usually accomplished by some see-through parts at the business end of the light.
5. DO NOT use blinking modes at night. Blinking is for daytime, use only constant or at most, pulsating modes at night.
6. BTW, the 2nd most important piece of equipment after your tail light is a mirror (>=2inch diameter).
• If biking casually or without a need for strong front light, honestly just get the cheapest lights you can get + some reflectors. Having any light at all gets you 99% there.
• Magicshine lights in general, I myself have the EVO 1300 for front and the SeeMee 300 for back. Proper lensed beam cutoff for the front, pulsing modes for the back, and good side visibility for both.
• Bontrager Flare RT for the back — small but powerful thanks to its focused beam. They also seem to have a front positional version but I haven't tried it.
Having steady rear lights mounted at the socks/ankles is the way to go. The movement of the feets makes you instantly recognisable and standing out from very far away. There is a (australian I believe?) company that sell pedals with integrated lights too but I can't remember the name.
I am still using a regular rear light powered by a dynamo hub though, as batteries can always die without warning.
Can you explain this? What is this and how does it replace a taillight?
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/group-tests/best-radar-bike-li...
Radars don't push cars away from cyclists.
They are more a placebo than anything really.
> a) Try to find ones with a pulsating mode, blinding other road users by shining bright rapidly blinking lights into their eyes is not good, actually.
These lights would have predated the private equity era but I'm guessing sourcing options were somewhat more limited back in 2016.
Between that, and selling out to a foreign-private-equity-held holding, and the incident during which an innocent shopper who came to return an item was attacked by a security guard, and the idiotic Vancouver location with no connection between underground parking and the store room, I decided never to set foot there again.
Fuck MEC, the Mountain Equipment Coo^H^Hompany! Not the MEC you knew.
The wider point stands though: a bike light is a battery, an LED, and a switch, and the battery dying first is the most repairable failure mode there is.