dfw

I bought the ViewPoint EVO Dual Headlights from Performance. I tried them out, but I wasn't too impressed. Here's what I found out, so you can make your own judgements.

1. Mounting:

The mounting clamp has removeable rubber inserts so supposedly you can fit it on larger handlebars. I have 25.4 bars. In order to mount the clamp over the bar tape I had to remove the inserts. I can't imagine the mount would fit over bar tape on 31.8mm bars. I wasn't too impressed on how sturdy the mount was, but the lights did stay put for the short time I tried them.

2. Adjustment

The only adjustment is vertical which is made my adjusting the mounting clamp. The two lights cannot be adjusted independantly and there is no horizontal adjustment at all.

3. Light performance

The set comes with a 20w and a 10w halogen and each light can be switched on seperately. Turning both lights on puts out a lot of light and would certainly be adequate for most nighttime riding but I didn't find them to be exceptional. Both lights are spot. It would have been nice if they had made the 20w a spot and the 10w a flood, but such is not the case.

4. Battery + Wiring

The wiring was the one thing that really stood out on these lights. It seems really sturdy and top notch. Everything seemed to make good firm connections and I can imagine it all would have good water resistance. The battery is only rated for 1 hour of operation with both lights on. It mounts to the frame pretty well and I can imagine it would fit well on a number of different types of bikes.

The lights were on sale for $149 at performance. With the 20% coupon code, they came to $119.20 and you get almost $15 worth of team performance credit, so I guess you could say it costs around $104. It's not a bad deal, but I think I'm going to return it. I'm going to spend a few more bucks and get a CygoLite Z-Force HID NiCad setup.

I also bought the ViewPoint Flashpoint Taillight. As soon as I tried to mount it, the mount broke. The mount is a complete piece of crap. I was very disappointed because I was impressed by the taillight itself. I really liked the idea of having a reflector built into the light. The lights themselves seem very bright also.

HiYoSilver

Skip performance for the taillight, go to REI or somewhere else and get the cateye TL-LD1000.

The dual headlights can slide down a bit, but there easy to adjust. Last year you could align the lights separately. Be sure to have a back up headlight. When they go, they go fast. Otherwise they are good lights for the money. HID is next for me but couldn't afford at first.

dfw

Performance has the TL-LD1000 and that's the one I've been looking at. I'll probably wind up getting that one to replace the cheesy one I'm using now. The Performance taillight was a big letdown in regards to the mount. It has 9 LEDs vs the Cateye's 10 and both use lenses to enhance the light. I haven't seen the TL-LD1000 in action, but I can't imagine it putting out much more light than the Performance Flashpoint. Plus the Performance taillight has the advantage of having a CPSC reflector. Technically in Texas you're not legal unless you have a CPSC approved reflector on the back. I'm not really worried about the legality issue, but the taillight does have the added advantage of reflecting vehicle's headlights back at them which should improve the visibility range.

oboeguy

That's about what I was going to say. I scored the same deal, of course. I'm quite satisfied, though, so I'm keeping them. My only gripes are that the lights fall off the mounts a little too easily when my bike is folded and in its bag, and that the mounting stuff for the battery is a little ghetto -- it relies too much on gravity and the assumption that the battery will hang from a bike's top tube. I have it mounted on top of my folder's "top tube" (no real front triangle) and it does shift position from time to time.

HiYoSilver

Flashpoint: AAA batteries
TL-LD1000: AA batteries and side LED's. Reflector should be already on bike seat stem. Legal != effective.
Cateye is most effective with top row solid and bottom row side to side.

slvoid

Hahaha... my light & motion dual only cost like 90 bucks more, high quality construction. Both lamp heads are independantly adjustable up down and side to side, I can change the focus on both lamps, it comes with both wide and narrow angle aluminium reflectors and a remote switch for one of the beams.
You get what you pay for.

Walkafire

Well... I for one like the ViewPoint EVO Dual Headlights from Performance.
The only thing I dislike is the point where the lights mount to the plastic "main" mount on the bars.
As far as the Mounting Clamp not fitting well... it tells ya to remove the rubber inserts if you need to.
I also like the "spot" lights... lets me ride a wee bit faster. I ride with just the 10w 95% of the time, I turn on the other (20w) when there is a lot of traffic or when conditions call for it. They are plenty bright for me.
....Oh yeah... mine are adjustable side to side... but I keep them tight, cause they are set

One thing about Performance... you can take them back.

filtersweep

"Hahaha"- you are right, however I have been in this racket long enough to cap my light budget at around $120- since you are mostly paying for battery- and batteries are "wear items" in my book. they eventually lose their effectiveness... rendering the system worthless in a few short years.

tibikefor2

I have been a user of performance lights for a number of years. I have been happy with the lights. I replaced the 20w light bulb with another 10w light bulb. 2 10w light bulbs have plenty of light for me.

I hate the batteries that came with the performance lights. When the battery would no longer hold a decent charge, I replaced the battery with a 6V 8,000 ma pack from Batteries Plus. This allows me to do my roundtrip commute on one charge.

dfw

Ok, I've been running with these lights for a few weeks (I decided against replacing them). I kept them because I saw the lights as a good platform to modify from.

I did discover the lights can be adjusted horizontally by losening the screw underneath the lamp housing. I played around with it a bit and found there's not really any improvement in adjusting them at an angle. Straight ahead seems to work best.

My plan is to modify the whole system. I'm opening this up to comment to see if anyone has any thoughts and suggestions.

The lamp housings take MR11 bulbs, which you can get in a variety of voltages, wattages, and beam spreads. I'd like to upgrade the voltage from 6V to 12V and go with 12V bulbs. My idea is to go with two 20 watt bulbs. One will be a narrow flood, and the other a spot. If anyone is interested in the technical details of the bulb, you should know you'll need a LENSED bulb (which means there is a flat piece of plastic on the front of the bulb) because the lamp housing doesn't have a lens. The lamp housing also uses a GZ4 base, so you'll need the MR11 bulbs that have the two small prongs.

10 degree Spot

20 degree Flood

I'll need to change the battery, of course. My plan is to build my own battery pack out of 10 NiMh D cells. I plan on soldering them together in series and in a formation which will enable them to fit inside a water bottle. This will give me a 12v battery. I thought about using 11 cells for 13.2 V which would increase the light output at the expense of bulb life, however I'm already going to have 40 watts total, so I've decided against going with 11 cells. My goal is to get at least 5000 maH, which should give me about 1.5 hours of run time. If anyone knows of a cheap source for NiMh D cells, this would help as they seem to cost about $9-10 each. I could go with C cells at the expense of about 30 minutes of run time. My commute takes just under an hour, so 1 hour of run time is cutting it a bit too close.

I haven't done much research on a charger. I'd really need a smart charger since overcharging NiMh cells will ruin them. If anyone has any good sources, let me know.

pharnabazos

EVO dual is on sale now for 119.00 +20% coupon=95.99 if anyone's interested. I ordered it and I'll chime in on this thread when it comes.

dfw

Ok, after searching around a bit, I found this which I think I'm going to order:

12v 5.0 Ah NiMH battery pack + Smart charger ($59.95)

That should solve my battery and charger needs. The batteries in the pack are C cells, but 5.0 Ah should give me about 90 minutes of runtime at 40 watts, which is acceptable. The size of the pack should fit nicely into a water bottle, which should waterproof everything. The charger is supposed to recharge in 3 hours.

With $5.72 (plus shipping) for the two bulbs I posted the link for earlier, this should turn my EVO dual into a pretty kicka$$ lighting setup.

This will bring my total price to about $170, not counting shipping. If all works as planned, I think it will be pretty hard to beat this setup for the price. From what I've heard, a flood paired with a spot is a pretty good combination. The spot gives you max light where you need it, and the flood fills in the periphery while softening the contrast of the spot. If I want a backup battery, the 6v battery pack that came with the lights would work as a backup to the 12v battery. I'll have to see how that goes, I don't think I'll really need a backup. I'll post an update once I get it all running.

oboeguy

Please do keep us informed. I figure when my set eventually needs upkeep (battery effectiveness fades, bulbs burn out etc) I will go back to this thread.

In the meantime, I should mention that I am still quite pleased. Not only have I used them on my daily commutes, but I've also travelled with them twice, and had our butts saved by having the light set on the bike both times (riding after the sun goes down on unfamiliar turf without lights... yikes! that would suck). When in doubt, bring your lights!

dfw

I started a new thread which fits the subject of upgrading the EVO Dual better.

New Thread