64
votes
Red light facing forwards?
No. You should always ride with a white light facing forward and a red light facing backwards. If you want additional illumination, you can add multiple white/red lights in the appropriate direction. ...
- 3,783
28
votes
Accepted
Protecting bike attachments such as lights against theft
Take the lights and anything else thats likely to be stolen off your bike.
For things that can't be removed easily, you may want to use something like Pitlock security skewers (or security bolts) or ...
- 45.8k
22
votes
How can I attach Harbor Freight blue puck lights to mountain bike for front lights?
Do not do this!
You mention in the comments that you’re almost entirely riding on the road. The pictured light is (based on having used them for other purposes myself) essentially useless for ...
- 1,021
21
votes
Fortified Bicycle appears to gone out of business -- where to get one of their replacement bike light batteries?
If your light is not sealed, and you can see a battery that looks like this
(the colour/color does not matter) then you can pop out all the old batteries and fit new ones. Replace all the batteries ...
- 115k
17
votes
Protecting bike attachments such as lights against theft
In terms of accessories like lights, GPS, etc. the only way to be safe is to remove them entirely. Remember that if something is quick-releasable for you, it's also quick-releasable for thieves. Bike ...
- 3,783
17
votes
General mounting solutions for lights etc
I use a couple of hose clamps, and two rubber strips or offcuts from old inner tube.
I have also used double-sided foam tape and electrical tape, but the inner tube ones are the best.
This setup is ...
- 11.8k
16
votes
Fortified Bicycle appears to gone out of business -- where to get one of their replacement bike light batteries?
First, hello, and welcome to Bicycles SE. Sorry to hear about your manufacturer collapsing... that's really unfortunate, particularly for a higher-cost item like an e-bike. My guess is that 18350950 ...
- 858
16
votes
Do rotational-symmetric-looking front lights usually throw half their light into oncoming traffic? How To dinstiguish?
Unfortunately, there are a lot of head lights for bikes out there which do not have a sharp cutoff at the top of the light cone to avoid blinding oncoming traffic. You have to check each individual ...
15
votes
Accepted
Cheap import lights VS branded lights
I run a bike light testing and review site called The Bike Light Database which started as a series of blog posts for the Bicycles Stack Exchange community blog. I've personally tested dozens of ...
- 3,783
15
votes
How strong should lights be for a route partially in a city and partially outside city on a public road?
https://bikelightdatabase.com/ has a lot of good information.
There is much more to a light than output. Optics is far more important (and in parts of the world, its illegal to use bike lights that do ...
- 46.2k
13
votes
Is my helmet/camera/light setup dangerous?
If we check the helmet's documentation, there's guaranteed to be some legalese text in there similar to:
modifications to the helmet will void warranty, and may decrease the effectiveness of the ...
- 115k
11
votes
Where to mount a headlight if the handlebar is obscured by a basket
Something like this accessory is what you need:
Can be fitted onto wired or meshed bicycle baskets.
This specific model is made by the "Rixen & Kaul" and can be found in many online shops. E.g. ...
- 211
11
votes
Accepted
Is it possible to get a light that is too bright?
Blinding road users will be the result of the following factors:
Total light output
Mirror design (how is the light shaped)
How you aimed your light
Most trail lights (and high output battery ...
- 30.2k
11
votes
Mounting the front light on the frame instead of the fork or the handlebar?
The light is better on your handlebars or fork than on your frame - the frame lags and always points at some tangent to where you're going while turning, so either you need a really wide beam, or you ...
- 115k
10
votes
Accepted
What is the process of adding a light to a Yamaha PW equipped ebike?
Okay, so I did some research into this and here's what I found:
The Yamaha drive offers enough power for many, but not all, ebike lights to be connected. For example, Supernova M99 Pro won't work -- ...
- 1,047
9
votes
Protecting bike attachments such as lights against theft
Fortified Bike sells bike lights that are designed to be theft resistant. They're made of heavy aluminum and use security screws so most thieves won't have the proper tool to unscrew it.
The also ...
- 1,779
9
votes
What to look for in a (Cheap) MTB headlight for night trail riding
As already suggested by @Batman, have a look at this Bike Light Database write up.
What to look for ...
LED - with cheap lights don't believe the claimed Lumen, Look at the LED specification - a ...
- 46.2k
9
votes
Is my helmet/camera/light setup dangerous?
Safety is not an absolute. The transition from Safe to Unsafe does not happen immediately. The state of the helmet is probably considered not safe, compromised, but not unsafe. Much will depend on ...
- 46.2k
9
votes
How strong should lights be for a route partially in a city and partially outside city on a public road?
For illuminating the road ahead at speed where you'll get motor assistance on a UK-legal e-bike, 300 lumens in a well-shaped beam is plenty. You only need the sort of output you mention for off-road, ...
- 53k
9
votes
How can I attach Harbor Freight blue puck lights to mountain bike for front lights?
Realistically, this tool is for lighting up your worksite and is unsuitable for use as vehicle illumination on the road.
Why?
The focused spotlight on the end is a tight beam, and is too narrow to ...
- 115k
8
votes
Pedal-powered head/tail lights
You can get lights that are powered by a dynamo (generator) in the front hub. Combined with bright LED front and rear lights you get excellent visibility (both seeing and being seen) and very little ...
- 6,966
8
votes
Accepted
What is the difference between Light and Motion's Urban 800 Chainbreaker and Urban 800 Anchor Steam bike lights?
Just the color. The products are identical. Light & Motion lists their different color variations as separate "products", probably due to some limitation of their store site engine.
Note that ...
- 3,783
8
votes
Conceptual: Bike Lights built into Grips
You would be entering in a very busy market with no obvious advantages. Let's look at the two types of LEDs that you might use:
If you're using inexpensive and low-power 5050 LEDs (15 lumens@350mW; ...
- 28.8k
8
votes
LASER bicycle lights
The most important part of a vehicle light is the optics because you want a beam with a precise shape and distribution in order to illuminate the road evenly, without wasting light into the sky or ...
- 1,684
7
votes
Accepted
Light brightness indication
You can't directly convert because you need the distance and beam angle. Lumen is a measure of output while lux is how much light is falling on an object. 5 lux is very dim indeed, less than a sliver ...
- 28.8k
7
votes
Is this a bike light and how do I turn it on? (I know it sounds stupid)
This is a halogen light. Such lights are usually powered by a bottle dynamo. That is a small electric generator that is driven by the front or the rear wheel. There is usually no switch. One simply ...
- 9,454
7
votes
Can I get a bright rear light using AA batteries, or is there a compelling reason why nonreplaceable batteries are so widespread?
Most modern lights use rechargeable lithium ion batteries. Those come in three form factors: Pouch cells, cylindrical cells and coin cells.
Pouch cells come in a lot of different dimensions which ...
- 25.2k
7
votes
Is my helmet/camera/light setup dangerous?
No, this is not safe.
The light very likely will blind/dazzle or at least annoy oncoming traffic or pedestrians. I do not know how strong yours is, but if I shine mine directly into the face of an ...
- 746
7
votes
Accepted
How can I attach Harbor Freight blue puck lights to mountain bike for front lights?
Edit: I had not considered the point about these lights being flood lights, and I agree that they're not adequate as main front lights.
I was tempted to delete this answer, but I think the direct ...
- 11.8k
7
votes
General mounting solutions for lights etc
I use FreeCAD to produce STL files that then can be sent to the number of 3D printing services possible to find on a web, including some that aggregate multiple 3D printing providers. The benefit of ...
- 6,752
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible