npcannon

Greetings folks! I've sort of lurked here since getting a dyno hub/light setup on my bike just to see what people though. I decided to do it once/right. I went with an alfine hub, luxos U and toplight line brake plus. It worked great for about 3 weeks, then the standlight on the toplight stopped working. I got the stuff from peter white and after a bit of back and forth, I returned the light for a new one. This one lasted a week before the standlight stopped working. Everything seems normal on the luxos, the brightness, standlight, etc all work great, it charges my phone if I want, etc. The toplight works well when moving but turns off immediately upon stopping. There was a thread I'd read before by someone with a similar problem who ultimately replaced their light, I'd hate to be on 3 lights in a month.

Peter white suggested to check the wiring. If I swap the wires, the rear light doesn't work at all. Could this problem be with the Luxos or the hub itself? This was not an inexpensive endavour and I'm pretty frustrated with the now 2 failures of this light. I haven't exactly received good communications from peter white cycles either, so I'm trying here for ideas. Thank you!

-Nate

mulveyr 

No, the Luxos-U ( I have one ) is quite picky about the taillight wiring; the taillight needs to have a 2-wire connection to the Luxos *and* you cannot have it grounded to the frame via a mounting bolt/etc. I had a similar situation when I first got mine--if I reversed the taillight wiring it wouldn't work at all, and when my taillight was grounded to the frame it would sometimes work, sometimes wouldn't, I'd get a very high pitched whining noise coming from the dynamo, etc.

Is the green "taillight OK" LED on the back of the Luxos illuminating? I presume that if you've had at least some communication with PW you're aware that you need a 2-wire connection instead of the tradition single wire version, etc.

npcannon

Yes the green light "RL" comes on when I turn on the lights. The light appears to work normally just not as a stand light. I did find that it appears the LBS had the ground wired to + and the hot wired to - from the hub to the luxos. This did not appear to affect the function of the luxos, I swapped them back and everything is still the same. I wonder if that cooked the taillight. Again, though, the taillight itself works fine when it's getting power, it just stops when it doesn't get power. This is not fun!

npcannon

So after breaking 3 of these, I broke down and decided to fix it myself. Ze Germans don't seem to have good QC.

The standlight broke AGAIN, so I took it apart. It's glued together and I broke some plastic bits.

As you can see in the picture, the batteries that keep the standlight running are sort of loosely held in place. I glued them down and then I glued a little piece of a collar stay onto the back of the case in an attempt to hold pressure on the batteries. It's working again, which is positive, how long it works is sort of an issue. I've voided the warranty, but if it lasts longer than 3 weeks, it's better than any run I've had from one of these lights so far.
-Nate

fietsbob

Capacitors charge for the standlight , Perhaps the battery is what gets used in the Brake Light gets even brighter mode

Had no issues with either of the 2 non brake light plus toplight line taillights , is the addition of the brake light feature that important ?

unterhausen

the "battery" is a 1 Farad supercap, you can see the marking.

fietsbob

Looked like 2 coin batteries stacked in series, I see Voltage not pF markings.

Anyhow , minus their Brake Light function , Neither of my 2 toplight Line Taillights have given me any trouble

Wanderer

I think you should follow up with Peter White, as to your findings and repair ---- looks like they got a bad batch of lights. Given the circumstances, it should still be covered by warrantee. MHO

If it were me, I would also follow up by CC to the manufacturer.

unterhausen

Interesting detective work. B&M lights are a little cheesy inside, I wasn't really that impressed when I took mine apart to fix the ground issue

look on the top just above 5.5v, the top of the 'F' is just hiding at the edge of the metal plate. And it's F, not pF, thus "supercap"

fietsbob

Doubt opening up a $2 chinese light would look like a Smart Phone inside.

npcannon

7 month follow up, still working fine.

I followed up with PW as soon after "the fix" and he never responded, honestly I know he's busy but he really never seemed to care about this issue. I'd found someone else with the exact same problem and they had dealt with PW as well, so I know that at least 2 people had this issue. They just kept telling me to send it back, send it back. In the first few months I had the light it was broken more than it was working. Since this "repair" it's worked fine through thousands of miles and practically daily use.

Honestly, I don't care about the brake function, so knowing that it is likely the cause for all this trouble really pisses me off. When the last light broke I asked for a non-brake one and they just didn't have them in stock. Later my GF at the time got a non-brake one and it's worked flawlessly. My advice, avoid the brake nonsense or see if they've figured out and fixed the issue.

unterhausen

he's not actually that busy, unless you count the time he spends drinking schnapps. It's too bad the Germans dominate the high-end dyno light business, none of them are that great at building lights

PaulRivers

Yeah, Peter White is unfortunately often pretty dismissive of issues. Personally I can only suggest ordering from a 3rd party (Home - Harris Cyclery bicycle shop - West Newton, Massachusetts as a lot better for me), or don't going into nuance - just say "it's not working I need to return it".

I contacted him about a front light with a bad beam pattern and he gave me some usual deflecting "I'll just say some absurd theory to get you to go away" excuse. :-(

2_i 

That was quite a while ago, but I had very good experiences dealing with B&M customer service directly. They did not mind, in particular, me opening and meddling with their taillight when it made sense. The response time to correspondence and general level of care were very good.

avimentor

Late to the party here, but ...

I'm trying to figure out how to get the case open on my BM Toplight brake plus without destroying it so I might install longer studs to work with my new Tout Terrain frame. Any suggestions or tips on getting the case open would be appreciated.

fietsbob

I suspect Peter has an alternate tail-llght for the TT, maybe bump up to the B&M Toplight line small where the bolts are external .

Or the Schmidt taillight which uses the same lens in an aluminum case.



NB: you can bolt a piece of aluminum on, with Flat Head Bolts to the Frame Rack,

then use it to attach the existing light as Is , to that.

unterhausen

it's never easy to do something like that, but look for tabs and try pressing on them while prying with a razor knife

recumb123

Hello there,

Thought i'd drop in my experience with Busch und Müller bike lights too. So far i've been biking tens of thousands of km on bikes with their front and tail lights. For tail lights i used mostly the View, the View Brake Plus and the Toplight Line plus and brake plus. Thusfar i have had not a single problem with any of their front lights i've been using, but almost every tail light i had thusfar keeps breaking down. Either the standlight or the brake function is lost, of they just stop functioning altogether.
So, while i admire the quality, efficiency and endurance of their front lights, i must admit i have very little confidence in their tail lights. I have no idea why two products coming from one company can have such a difference in quality.