GlennR

Wow... 53 posts.

This place has gone to the dumpster.

What's next ? IHOP vs Waffle House

Maelochs

Indeed .... but then, I am not in a life vest floating in the open ocean, and if I was ... i would ditch the bicycle and there goes the light.

I use Cygolite Hotshots, in a few different intensities .... none of them weigh as much as a single AA battery, all are rechargeable via USB.

When I started using lights, the options were weak generator lights which rubbed the tire, exceedingly expensive generator hubs, and double-D-cell low-efficiency lights, which are what opted for. II rode every night for more than an hour, and often did two night rides a day (second shift, odd hours.) I found the headlights to be very bulky and poorly performing. Regular batteries were only really bright for the first hour or so, and eventually had to be discarded while they still had life in them because they just weren't bright enough. Rechargeables (back in the day before Li-Ion and such) were bright for an even shorter time, and wore down quite quickly. The only safe solution was to bring four or six D cells (two in the light, and spares, and back-up spares in case the primaries died early in the ride to work and the secondaries faded halfway through the ride home.)

Yeah ... when I can get 35, 65, 05 100 lumens out of a rechargeable light which weighs less than an AA battery, I can forego the 7-mile range. As I noted, I rarely ride on a road which is straight and flat for seven miles anyway, so the range is moot. (And I never ride in the open ocean ... )

Further, seeing as I have more than five decades of in-traffic cycling experience, and am still alive, I kind of have to figure that regardless of whether what you do works for you, what I do works for me. We wouldn't be having this conversation otherwise.

As a side note, plenty of riders have been hit despite having superior lighting, because people who aren't paying attention simply don't see what they don't look at. But that is besides the point---I use good lights regardless. When my time comes, lights won't save me---but they might lessen my difficulties before that day.

Anyway ... maybe this didn't come across, but I was not criticizing you, nor disagreeing with your system. I said it might be great for you but didn't suit me, but I never said you shouldn't do it, or that there was something wrong with you because that was the system you chose. Not so sure why you feel you need to defend yourself ... but that's cool.

I could say, if it was such a great system, why not Still use it? But the fact is, so long as we are both ridding and liking it and staying alive I really don't care about any of that.

I find your system interesting, but not suited to my specific needs. I hope that doesn't upset you.

Ride on and enjoy the ride .... and know that if you choose to do otherwise, I will be riding and enjoying it anyway.

Cougrrcj

Back in the '60s, on my JC Higgins 3-speed, it was either the bottle generator against the tire, or a weak battery light...



Early '70s, I went with the arm- or leg light, powered by two C-cells. Still dim, but when attached to the leg, it was in motion - and thereby grabbing drivers' attention a bit more than a steady dim 6 watt bulb...



Then in the mid '70s when the Old Man got more into sailboating, I'd grab one of the USCG-approved strobes. Better visibility than either dim incandescent...

I used the strobe until about ten years ago - when the leaking battery destroyed the circuitry. and besides, now we have LEDs...

Now I use a 450 lum USB rechargable LED headlight, and a USB rechargable 200 lum taillight.

In my driving commute, I've come upon cyclists with such dim LED taillights as to be virtually useless. What ever happened to wearing a reflective trouser band/clip? Those grabbed drivers' attention! That old Fuji has a reflector on each seatstay, one on the rear of the rack, one on the rear of the seat bag - and also two bands of 3M reflective tape around the rack supports.

EDITED to add -- Oh yeah, and the yellow reflectors on the pedals!!!! Those reflectors in motion - really grab one's attention!

And QUIT WEARING BLACK when riding in dusk/twilight/night!!! BE SEEN!!!

GlennR

The law of survival of the smartest dictates and red rear and white front lights.

jack1234567

Red！
1. The red light has the longest wavelength and the highest safety
2. The rear lights should not flash, because the driver can't judge the distance

veganbikes

What about the Original Pancake House and Dennys! It's not just a one breakfast chain system.

rsbob 

Just looked up #2 because I felt intuitively it couldn’t be right, and I was kinda wrong for a different reason. Studies in Europe (Germany, Netherlands) show that rear blinky lights can actually be more dangerous because of the “moth effect” when it comes to drunk drivers. Drunks tend to drive toward flashing lights. Ever wonder why so many police cruisers get nailed by dunks at night with their safety lights on? In fact several European countries ban rear blinking lights. Who wooduthunkit?

i know when I see a flashing light or multiple, it/they gets my attention, even when sober especially with those with over a mile range. No differentiation between rear blinkies at night versus day presented in the research, but a safe assumption is that we are talking night.

Also read about how super bright front strobes AT NIGHT can confuse approaching drivers who want to turn left in front of you as to distances. When I used to bike commute in the dark on a MUT some of the oncoming lights were retina bleaching bright and it was hard to judge their distance. Most learned to cover their lights when approaching a cyclist from the opposite direction.
May have to rethink Mr Blinky for Mr Steadystate.

flangehead

https://howard-johnsons-restaurant.business.site/

rsbob 

Boy does that light bring back memories. Strapped that bad boy on for at least two years when returning from night classes. To say the light output was underwhelming would be an understatement

dabac

There’s a fair amount of detail that goes into how visibility works.
Blinkies are more easily noticed, but harder to pinpoint.
When pinpointing ability suffers, so does the ability to judge speed. Blinkies suck against a backdrop of moving lights, as on the inside of a wide curve in dense traffic.
And it doesn’t stop at getting noticed and positioned.
Getting identified as a cyclist can be just as important to trigger the right responses from the other road users.
What works for cars doesn’t always transfer to bicycles as cars tend to be more predictable WRT staying in lanes etc.

One thing I wonder about is what’d happen if road traffic adopted more from the nautical side, with color coding.
What if bicycles had a white AND a colored front light? (Apart from red)
I believe it’d make it a lot easier to pick out cyclists against a backdrop of other lights at least.

Rigsson

White in front, red in back. As required by state law.

As long as we're reminiscing, did anyone else use the Belt Beacon? Many times I was complemented by drivers on the noticeability of the beacon. As it was made to look like the amber flasher on a traffic barricade the driver usually said something like 'I thought I was coming up on a construction zone so I was watching carefully.'

OldTryGuy

MAYBE this discussion will be over soon, very soon, ya know very-very soon, like before you even know it, it will be over by Easter, a miracle, so soon

GlennR

I see what you did there

dabac

Today, I wonder how many drivers would take that as yet another reason to get angry at cyclists. ”Dressing up as a construction zone, what an a-hole” kind of thing.
There’s certainly no shortage of aggression around.

FiftySix

Thanks GlennR . I'm officially hungry now.

Milton Keynes

IHOP just because of the one-legged waitress.

Milton Keynes

At any rate, red lights on the rear for me due to the traffic statutes in my state:

bikecrate

Good lard. This was worth arguing about? Even if there wasn't a law common sense says to put the white light on the front and red on the rear like every other vehicle you are likely to encounter on the road.

The few times I've run into these contrarian cyclist lights it was pretty confusing. I thought I was coming up behind a cyclist when in fact he was heading towards me. Closing speed was a bit disturbing.

Milton Keynes

You mean someone was actually dumb enough to put a red light on front of their bike? I really wonder what the logic was with that... maybe they thought they'd preserve their night vision or something.

I-Like-To-Bike

The thread was useful in providing a few examples of how easy it is to use Google to quickly come up with a wrong or irrelevant answer to "prove" that someone else is wrong or at best unenlightened.

And how easy it is to agree with or "like" an erroneous response because it fits the preconceived "correct" answer and it cited a Google search.

livedarklions

Another thread defying the adage that there are no stupid questions.

livedarklions

By the way, if you tow a really heavy lighthouse behind your bike, you'll get a great workout and be really, really visible.

dabac

Apparently, it takes all kinds. On a local forum a guy spent several days preaching the superiority of riding on the other side of the road compared to everybody else.
He had a mortal fear of being run over from the rear, so he considered being a source of confusion for all other road users to be a big improvement.

Maelochs

More, it showed that some people would rather tell others to google stuff they claim to want to know than to actually google it themselves ... because if they had facts, their non-fact based debating style would be cramped.

But ... this is BF, so .... whatever.

Milton Keynes