Originally Posted by
event horizon
For me, high brightness is ideal as it lets me descend at the same speeds that I do during the day time.
Over the decades my lights have gotten progressively brighter and brighter. That's resulted in more throw and no longer being able to out run my lights, picking out hazards more easily and generally having more fun.
I fully agree. My lights, however, have gotten a little dimmer as we've moved towards LED. For light output, I've found nothing that compares to an overvolted MR13 halogen light. Running a 12V MR13 at 14.4V puts out a whopping...and real... 1200 lumens per lamp. It's enough that I could illuminate trees 1/2 mile away across a lake. LED bicycle lights don't put out nearly that amount of light and, for some reason, their throw isn't a long. On the downside, they pull a lot of power.