Night light mount solution for my Optima Baron LR
02-14-23, 08:35 PM
#1
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Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: Brighton, Michigan
Posts: 661
Bikes: Optima Baron LR, '14 Nishiki Maricopa,'87 Trek 330 Elance, '89 Miyata 1400, '85 Peugeot PGN10, '04 Fuji Ace, '06 Giant Rincon, '95 Giant Allegre, '83 Trek 620, '86 Schwinn High Sierra
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Night light mount solution for my Optima Baron LR
The Problem:
My Optima Baron Lowracer has never been good for night rides. Most night lights are handlebar mounts. My tiller/bars setup are from Performer. I could mount it between the tiller and my brakes, but I run into problems. First is the brakes/gear cables getting in the way. The light shines on them, making it hard to see past them. Second and even worse, the night lights seems to light my feet up. With every pedal stroke, the light reflects off my feet back into my eyes. Third, there seems to be no real way to mount a light onto my bike.
So, I had to make a mount.
The Solution.
I really wanted a One Armed Bandit from Bacchetta. But everyone is out of stock right now. But that got me thinking about a solution. The front derailleur mount is 28.6. I started thinking I could mount a 35° stem onto it. I just happened to have a 60mm 35° stem lying around. I tried it. It stuck out perfectly at 90° from the FD mount. But not long enough. I then had Amazon ship me a 110mm 35° mount. It was perfect.
But I still needed something for the night to mount to. The stem was for a 25.4 handlebar. So off to Home Depot where I found some 3/4" PVC piping, which had an OD of just over 1". I measured I would need 10cm to give me plenty of room between my pedals. I cut it to length, and it mounted perfectly into my stem.
A bit of innertube to shim around the PVC piping. This was to give my night light rubber band more to grip onto, and less slippery than the PVC piping
I'm quite happy with how it turned out!
My Optima Baron Lowracer has never been good for night rides. Most night lights are handlebar mounts. My tiller/bars setup are from Performer. I could mount it between the tiller and my brakes, but I run into problems. First is the brakes/gear cables getting in the way. The light shines on them, making it hard to see past them. Second and even worse, the night lights seems to light my feet up. With every pedal stroke, the light reflects off my feet back into my eyes. Third, there seems to be no real way to mount a light onto my bike.
So, I had to make a mount.
The Solution.
I really wanted a One Armed Bandit from Bacchetta. But everyone is out of stock right now. But that got me thinking about a solution. The front derailleur mount is 28.6. I started thinking I could mount a 35° stem onto it. I just happened to have a 60mm 35° stem lying around. I tried it. It stuck out perfectly at 90° from the FD mount. But not long enough. I then had Amazon ship me a 110mm 35° mount. It was perfect.
But I still needed something for the night to mount to. The stem was for a 25.4 handlebar. So off to Home Depot where I found some 3/4" PVC piping, which had an OD of just over 1". I measured I would need 10cm to give me plenty of room between my pedals. I cut it to length, and it mounted perfectly into my stem.
A bit of innertube to shim around the PVC piping. This was to give my night light rubber band more to grip onto, and less slippery than the PVC piping
I'm quite happy with how it turned out!
02-15-23, 02:31 PM
#2
Senior Member
That's probably the way I'd do it, too. Two issues I see are 1. foot flash, and 2. blocking forward vision a bit. There are no ideal solutions. Maybe mount an extension on the underside of the boom and beyond the pedals? (But that would make it vulnerable to hitting stuff.)
