A new glare-free headlamp for road riding

[Bicycler]

Just to add I got a cheapo dynamo wheel for winter use from Taylor-wheels.com, shipped from Germany for about £40 all inc and it's been great so far. At that price it's worth a punt just to see if you get on with a dynamo, then maybe get a nicer wheel next time.

Sure but wheels with the much better 3d72 hub is available from them for 68 plus postage and all my research here and elsewhere indicates it's a much better hub. You pay the extra cash once versus the extra drag every time you ride

But would you feel the extra drag?

[Annirak]

I converted to a dynamo on the back of a 9-10 mile (mixed rural/urban) commute, and then on to a hub dynamo, best decision(s) I ever made.

When you are commuting for that long each day it's rather nice not to have to think about lights - they're just there, part of the vehicle.
I also commend disc/hub brakes, and an IGH if it can be made to suit. Doing 100 miles a week (assuming no other riding) and you really want maintenance to be at a minimum, especially over winter...

Battery, and LED, technology has moved on in the few years since I changed to a dynamo, but I'd probably still make the change now.

I'm willing to give dynamos a punt. I have no idea where to start. At least with battery road lights, I knew what I was getting into (German lights being pretty much the only option).

I can't find beam comparisons of dynamo lights, I don't know which dynamo(s) I should be looking at... I don't know whether I should be trying to buy a whole wheel or to get a LBS to replace my current hub.

The bike I'm riding at the moment is my backup bike since I had an accident in August. It came with junk rims. It still has junk rims. They're QR skewers and there's no bolts for discs, so hub brakes and disc brakes are out for the moment.

I probably won't be replacing my road bike for a while yet, but the ability to switch the Speed Premium over to the road bike was attractive. If I go with the suggestion of a dynamo, I lose that, and I'll have to spend the money for a dynamo and a headlamp twice.

[Annirak]

Just to add I got a cheapo dynamo wheel for winter use from Taylor-wheels.com, shipped from Germany for about £40 all inc and it's been great so far. At that price it's worth a punt just to see if you get on with a dynamo, then maybe get a nicer wheel next time. (Then I have the B&M IQ Cyo Premium which is amazingly bright and has the cutoff and the B&M Secula back light which claims to do this and that but is basically a bright back light.)

Taylor Wheels doesn't seem to sell 700C wheels. I guess I'd have to look elsewhere.

[RickH]

Taylor Wheels doesn't seem to sell 700C wheels. I guess I'd have to look elsewhere.

They do 700C - they just call them 28"!

Rick.

[Bicycler]

I can't find beam comparisons of dynamo lights,

http://www.peterwhitecycles.com/headlights.asp
Somewhat more technical but including a few now obsolete models (just shows how the technology has developed in a few years): http://swhs.home.xs4all.nl/fiets/tests/ ... oor_dynamo

RE: Dynamos - Opinion seems to be that the budget Shimano N20 and 30 are okay but a bit heavy and draggy. Same with Sturmey Archer. The Shimano N72 and N80 are good value for money and reliable and probably the best bet for you. SP and especially SON are more high-end dynamos. Generally complete wheels can be bought much more cheaply than buying a new hub then paying for it to be built into wheels.

Having two bikes you want to use at night is a good reason to stick to battery lights (or buy 2 dynamos ).

Taylor Wheels doesn't seem to sell 700C wheels. I guess I'd have to look elsewhere.

They do 700C - they just call them 28"!

28" being the same size as 29" but smaller than 27" The bike industry needs to get that nonsense sorted

[[XAP]Bob]

Just to add I got a cheapo dynamo wheel for winter use from Taylor-wheels.com, shipped from Germany for about £40 all inc and it's been great so far. At that price it's worth a punt just to see if you get on with a dynamo, then maybe get a nicer wheel next time.

Sure but wheels with the much better 3d72 hub is available from them for 68 plus postage and all my research here and elsewhere indicates it's a much better hub. You pay the extra cash once versus the extra drag every time you ride

But would you feel the extra drag?

No.

I did some calculations on this forum somewhere and the conclusion that was a hub dynamo "cost" about one foot of climbing per mile travelled - a 1:1500 slope.

I challenge anyone to detect that sort of a slope.

The Germans require dynamo lighting on almost all (i.e. all non racing, defined by a weight limit) bikes, so they produce excellent dynamos and lights in this area - with the benefit that the EU harmonisation means that they should all be accepted under the "equivalent European standard" clause in the UK RVLR.

I'm actually still getting along just fine with a B&M Lyt Plus - 25 Lux I think. I am normally in town nowadays, so it's much more about being seen, but when I do go to unlit areas I find that it shows me most of what I want, I wouldn't want to ride a single track at 30mph in the dead of night, but then I probably wouldn't do that anyway...

[Brucey]

the drag from a hub dynamo isn't much, it is true. But then each of the drag forces on a bike could be added to and whilst each addition would go unnoticed, it all adds up and the net result is that you go more slowly. The big losses are aero and rolling resistance. Having a hub dynamo is a bit like losing a few psi out of your tyres, it'll go unnoticed in almost every case.

How much drag though? Well in a nutshell, lights on (around 15-20mph), it is between 5W and 7W for pretty much every hub generator out there.

Lights off, it varies more than this. A few generators (older shimano nexus and some current SA models) actually drag as badly or even worse lights off than with the lights on. The best generators (SON models and shimano sport series (3N72, 3N80 etc) drag 1-2W only, lights off. They weigh less, too. The mid-range shimano models (3N20, 3N30, etc) are a little worse than the best, but a lot better than the worst; 2-3W lights off is typical.

Typical tourists/commuters push out around 100-200W, so 'lights off' losses could be less than 1% of the total, or up to ~7% of the total depending on the rider and the generator.

cheers

[mjr]

There's a Taylor-Wheels 700c Shimano 3N30 on one bike here, using a classic motorcycle on-off switch to control the lights and I think you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between lights-off and a non-dynamo wheel.

Taylor-Wheels has quite a few sizes, including old roadster/hollandrad (old 26", bigger than MTB 26") - check the full descriptions for the ISO sizing before buying.

[Annirak]

Having two bikes you want to use at night is a good reason to stick to battery lights (or buy 2 dynamos ).

Yeah. I only have one at the moment (barring the broken road bike), but I am shopping for a new bike. I'll buy a new one if the right one comes along or if we get to the 2015 model clearance, whichever is first.

I find it really hard to justify getting a light set that forces me to use it on a single bike while I'm in the market for another bike.

[Brucey]

if the idea of a hub generator otherwise appeals, I have known some roadies run a front light only hub generator setup, that can be easily swapped from bike to bike (or nicked, presumably...). Typically the front light is mounted on a bracket that clamps on with the front QR, so the whole lot comes on and off with the front wheel. They then use a battery rear light (or two), which at least have a long run time, if they actually stay on at all, that is....

Personally I don't care for the low front lamp position or the huge shadow that the wheel casts, but it does give you a 'one-light for several bikes' setup, without excessive 'battery faff'. If you decide that you want it permanently installed on one bike later on, you can always mount the lights better, add a rear, etc.

cheers

[Annirak]

It certainly would be interesting riding a hybrid with a road front!

I have a hybrid with 35mm tyres right now. I'm looking at getting either a CX bike with 28mm tyres or a road bike with 25mm or 23mm tyres. I don't think that there would be good compatibility between 35mm tyres and 25mm tyres...

[redfacedbaldfatman]

I have a couple of Ixon IQ premiums with batteries and chargers on order. The plan is to replace my two chinese lights with the Ixons, but I may end up sticking with the chinese lights as they are brilliant (angled down at the road surface) and they compliment my dynamo luxos U perfectly by lighting up the foreground much more than the Luxos could.
So I might end up with both Ixon IQ premiums on a topeak bar extender on my road bike, like the youtube review.
I ordered chargers with both so that I can charge both at the same time. Having two lights on a bar extender will eliminate the front wheel shadow.

[[XAP]Bob]

And the low cost of the Lyt makes that an attractive option for a multibike setup.

[Annirak]

Sure, but it's not exactly in the same class as the Speed Premium.

[Annirak]

Honestly, the more back and forth there is about this, the more I think that a battery light is the way to go.

I recognise that it takes more management, but once we start talking about having a hybrid and a road/CX bike and the quality of the lights involved, the battery light, which can be easily moved from bike to bike, starts to seem awfully attractive.

Thanks everyone, I appreciate the suggestion of the dynamo lights. If I were planning to ride only a single bike after dark, that would be a really excellent option. However, since I'm planning to do significant riding with a hybrid and later switch to a road bike or CX bike (only relevant because of wheel incompatibility), I think that battery is the way to go for me.

At some later time, I may look at dynamos again, but for the next 2-9 months, a battery light is what makes sense to me.