A Strategy

A few weeks ago, a young man (19 years old) invited me to join his team for racing the Frozen Hog, as I've previously mentioned. Of course, shortly there-after, I discovered that he and I were the only two people actually signed up for our four-person team.

Now the way it works with the Frozen Hog is this. All those belonging to the same team race in the normal race category they signed up for. In other words, there is no "team" start time/race. You race in your age-group and level and whatever points you earn in your category are added up for the cumulative team score.

I just found out today that we have the other two people signed up. One of which is a young teenage girl (13-17 years old). As you might imagine, there are fewer young teenage girls willing to race in the snow, mud, cold and smog than there are slow middle-aged men with something to prove. In fact, we're counting on her being the only one.

Hopefully, she'll score lots of points for being the winner in her category--which might offset my sure-to-be mediocre showing for the middle-aged-slow-guy category I'm signed up for. I hope we win.

Pro or No?

A while back on MTBR's forums, I said that I would post a comparison between the Triple Shot (TS) and the Triple Shot Pro (TSPro). Since the Triple Shot didn't get invited back to the main review, I'll do that comparison now... and give you a sneak peek at the review to come.

In many ways the TS and TSPro are the same. They both look the same (except for the color) and they both are bar mount only. They both use a remote switch and both rely on 3 LEDs in a line for the light source. The similarities end there, though. The TS uses an NiMH battery, while the TSPro has a lighter Li-Ion pack. The optics are different as well. The TSPro has two light levels, while the TS is on/off only. The real difference, however, is the beam pattern.

Here is the Triple Shot:
And here is the TSPro:
As you can see, the TSPro has a better beam pattern -- it lacks the dark rings that the TS has -- and it has better projection than the TS. Overall, I think that the updated LEDs, combined with updated optics makes for a better light.

Thick as Pea Soup

No... I am not talking about my mental faculty -- though there are times that that argument could be made -- I'm talking about fog.

Last night, it was foggy. Very, very foggy. This made riding a little interesting and drove home my contention that there is more to a light than sheer brightness. You see, I was running DiNotte's 5W light on my bars -- I wanted to get re-acquainted with the light -- and Nite Rider's MiNewt on my helmet -- not a bad combo, to be honest. However, thick fog negated my use of the helmet light completely -- a note to anyone who says that a helmet light is all you need, in fog and dust all you see is the light reflected back to your eyes -- and with the 5W on high beam I could barely make out the gravel road ahead of me. T. was using DiNotte's 3W and he was having trouble with it on low.

My point? HID's cannot be dimmed far enough. With a HID I would have been essentially riding blind, only able to see the brightly illuminated fog through which I was riding. LEDs are supremely dimmable, and this not only helps out in foggy conditions, but also allows you to stretch your battery life by reducing the output when it is not needed, like climbing.

Let's use the Lupine Wilma as an example. On full power, it'll bleed it's battery dry in 4 hours -- 3 hours is claimed, but I measured more than that. On low, however, it'll last 33 hours! And this is from a small Li-Ion battery. Near HID brightness -- 420 lumens -- but the light level can lowered when needed or desired. And though I used the Wilma as an example, I could have used the Big DiNotte, or BR Lights, or numerous others to make my point.

The next feature that sets LEDs apart is a blinking mode. These high power lights make for high power flashers, too. Again using fog as the antagonist, during daylight hours I have found myself commuting in a fog bank. Now, I don't want to get hit, cut off, narrowly missed or any other mishap that could happen should a driver be unaware of my location. Put one of these super bright lights on flashing mode, and it'll be seen at high noon in the desert. Princeton Tec has the best flashing mode, but most of the others blink on and off as well. Anything that makes dicing it up with traffic a little safer is a good thing in my book.

Now, if ultimate brightness is your thing -- you know who you are -- then you can't beat a good HID... yet. Take a look at Light and Motion and Lupine (if you have a fat wallet). Or, you can wait a little while for the next crop of emitters to hit the scene. Either way, you'll end up well lit.

106 Watts

So, what does 106W of LED light look like?

It looks like this:

That's 15 lights with a total of 31 individual LEDs, the least powerful of which is 3W. From the side, they look like this -- toned down so the individual lights are identifiable.

Starting on the left you see the Big Dinotte, Lupine Wilma, CatEye Triple Shot, Triple Shot Pro, Princeton Tec Switchback 3, BR Lights C2, Exposure Lights Enduro Turbo, Double Shot, Double Shot Pro, Switchback 2, Nite Hawk K2, Dinotte 5W, Dinotte Ultra 3, Joystick and, lastly, NiteRider's MiNewt. This is what the set up looked like:

I used a Canon Eos Rebel -- in full manual mode -- to take the pictures.

Purgatory: Day 3.

As I have mentioned before, I signed up for the Frozen Hog. Cold, very cold. In fact, Utah seems to be stuck in really-cold mode. It is terrible outside.

What would I like to do, more than anything? Ride my bike ... Outside!

For the last three days, I have been in the Bay Area. That is, California. The locals tell me that California has hit a "cold spell." I'm standing here, outside in the warm sunshine. It's about 60 degrees out. Part of me is just happy to be here. Happy to feel the warmth. Most of me wants a bike. I don't just want to be in the warmth here, I want to be riding in the warmth.

Alas, it is not to be. I'm mostly inside getting trained on some software for work. I only get outside to stretch during the breaks. I never get to ride a bike. If I had my choice of any bike in the world right now, my first choice would be a Ritchey BreakAway--a bike on which I have never ridden, though any bike I could have brought with me would seem incredible. My second choice would be any bike that I could ride on for a few hours.

Have I died? Is this what hell is like?

Run Time?

Battery life is very important when you ride at night. I like to use the analogy that it is like water in the desert. The last thing that you need on a night ride is to have your light shut off before the ride is done, plunging you into darkness and an inopportune time -- like bombing down a rocky section of single track. Run times are always given by the light manufacturer, but you don't know what methodology they used to get that figure. It might taken from actually watching the light for a period of time, or they might calculate it from the Amp-Hour rating on the battery. However, batteries behave differently depending on the age of the battery, the time since the last charge, the ambient temperature, etc. I've particularly noticed a severe reduction in high beam run time with the Li-Ion batteries -- which most of the lights in this review use. They'll kick down to a lower setting sooner when the temperature is below freezing. That's just a fact of the battery chemistry, so it's not one light or the other, but across the board.

So, what do I do to determine run time?

Well, I don't have time to sit and watch 15, or so, lights. Instead, I let a computer do it for me. You saw the results last year in the graphs like the one below.


This graph is for the Blackburn X3 light. What does this tell us? Well, that the light output is fairly steady for a little over 200 minutes (or a little more than 3.3 hours). Then it cuts to low power for another 100 minutes, or so. After which, the light turns itself off to prevent damage to the battery. This is what a regulated power source looks like.

The graph below belongs to the Princeton Tec Eos. This is a 1W LED that is regulated for the first bit, then drops of like an unregulated LED, just for comparison.
As the batteries (Alkaline) run down, the light gets dimmer.

How I make these graphs is with the following: One photo-voltaic (solar) cell from Edmund Scientific, a Di-194RS terminal panal from Dataq Instruments and I also use their WinDaq data acquisition software to record the voltages.

I made a small stand out of PVC to hold the lights and I shine them on the photo cell from 7 feet away. I use a small (8" diameter) fan to keep the lights cool. If I neglected the fan, the lights would overheat, or their internal thermal management system would kick in and dim the light to keep them from overheating. Either one would throw off my measurement. The run times are done at room temp, approximately 71 degrees Fahrenheit. I do the test at night so that there isn't any fluctuation in the ambient light.

So, there it is. It's a simple set up that allows for trouble shooting of your lights. Do you think that the run time isn't what it should be? Maybe you have an older light system and you want to know what kind of run time is left, this is one way to find out. It's relatively inexpensive and very easy to set up.

Switchbacks

As I've mentioned, I have all three of the Princeton Tec's Switchback series; the Switchback 1, Switchback 2 and Switchback 3 with one, two or three 3W LEDs, respectively. However, I've only talked about the Switchback 2. Like the SB2, the SB3 and SB1 come with both wall and car chargers and they both charge in 2 hours -- I've checked.

Like I said last time, the SB3 uses the outside two LEDs for the spot part of the beam.


The frosted middle LED provides the fill light. The battery is a little large, here shown next to a water bottle, but provides a full 6 hours of light.

The battery -- like all of the Switchback lights -- contains indicators of the charge level. The three indents inside the hole in the strap are the indicator lights. They are -- from left to right -- green, yellow and orange.


The Switchback 1 is the most diminutive of the Switchback line. It has a single LED and, like the others, comes with both helmet and handlebar mounts. Here it is next to the Nite Hawk's K2.

Another view.

The SB1 has a 4.5 hr burn time on high (claimed) and I am in the middle of testing this right now.

It looks like the lights are going to cost around $389, $269 and $199 for the SB3, SB2 and SB1, respectively.

All Alone

Saturday, I did something that I have never done before: complete a ride at night off-road... alone.

You see, normally, I either ride with some one or bail early because my imagination has gotten the better of me and I'm sure that there is everything from cougars to bears to monsters sneaking up, just outside of my visibility. I do ride at night often, its just that I prefer to ride with someone. It gives me piece of mind -- and distracts me from the monsters. Lately, it also gives me extra handlebar space so that I can do a comparison of more than one set of lights. Be that as it may, I found myself needing to ride -- I had yet to ride with the Princeton Tec Switchback 3 and 1 -- but without a riding partner.

Oh, and it was 20 degrees out.

But I persevered and completed the ride. I even poached a trail. My justification for this is that the ground was either snow covered or frozen, depending on elevation, so there was no way I was doing damage to the trail. Besides, I needed to try the lights on single track -- gravel roads don't really cut it all the time. Whew, I feel better having gotten that off my chest.

The lights...

I really think that Princeton Tec has done a bang up job with their new Switchback line. I'll have some pics later, but the specs are as follows for the SB3:

6 hour run time on high (claimed)
2 hour charge time
helmet and handlebar mounts included
wall and car chargers included

Unlike the Triple Shot (not Pro, just the normal one), the SB3 uses the two outside lights for the spot, and the center one is the flood. CatEye used the outside two for flood and the center one for spot, making the spot really weak.

I'll have a little more information tomorrow or Wednesday along with pictures of both the SB3 and SB1.

A Hog

February 3rd, 2007

I'm going to be racing.

The event: The Frozen Hog.

This is my first off-road race, and it'll either be lots of mud, or snow. I'm hoping for snow, if only to save clean-up time afterwards. I never seem to have enough time to clean my bikes like they deserve.

Of course, most people who sign up do it for fun, but I know me. You see, it is only ~6.5 miles. That sounds so short. I mean, I did a 200-mile race last year (on the road), 6.5--even off-road--should be easy.

What this really means is that I'm probably going take of fast and early, then suffer and come in last place.

Any suggestions for racing singletrack? In the snow?

32 and Raining -- but Well Lit

I tell you, I'd rather ride in 20 degree (F) and dry weather than 32 and raining. We're supposed to get snow at some point today and when I left home, it was indeed snowing. That soon switched to rain as I dropped elevation -- slightly, I was right at the snow line -- but didn't warm up at all. Even my normally bomb proof tights let me down. Hopefully, it'll just be snowing when I ride home this evening.

Now, on to more important things...

The K2 light arrived from Nite Hawk yesterday. There was a little mix up with UPS and it was left on a neighbor's porch -- a neighbor that is in Florida at the moment -- but after a little sleuthing I found it. I know, 116 can look like 118 when you are in a hurry.

Once I retrieved the light -- I'm sure it looked like I was stealing the package, but it had my name on it, really -- I plugged it in to top off the batter, and fired it up. This is a single K2 Emitter. The K2 is Luxeon's second generation LED and is supposed to be a little brighter than the previous Luxeon III and V. This light, though Nite Hawk doesn't mention it, runs at about 5W.


The light mount is ambidextrous -- it works on either side of the stem and center mounts the light. The included helmet mount is fairly low profile and the catch on the quick release is now metal -- a nice improvement over last year's plastic catch.

The lens is about the same size as last year's lights so it's a little bigger than the other 5W out there. Below is a head-on shot compared to Dinotte's 5w. Admittedly, the Dinotte is small, but it's lens size is similar to the BR Lights lenses and other multi-lens lights.


The light has more modes than you can shake a stick at -- multiple flashing, and the usual high-med-low. There is also a flickering mode that is supposed to simulate candle light.

Battery life is supposed to be pretty good, but I haven't verified it yet. Nite Hawk is claiming 4.8hrs on high. The batteries are NiMH. The K2 is $220, retail.

BR C2

On Friday, I received Exposure's direct competitor -- BR Lights' C2. Like the Exposure, the light is self contained and relies on two 5W LEDs. It comes in a nice hard case (see below) so it's easy to store.

The size of the light head is a compromise in order to have everything in one piece. It's not bad considering that the built-in LiIon battery is good for 3hrs 45min (claimed) and charges in a mere hour and 10 minutes, but it's somewhat blocky. It is smaller than a light head and battery combination, but it's all in one unit so it looks bigger. It's not heavy, though, at a claimed 415g for everything -- light, clamp, battery... you know, what you'd have to have to use the light.

BR Light top, CatEye Triple Shot Pro bottom.


One thing I really like is the power button. It's huge, raised and oh so easy to hit with gloved hands.

The little dot in front of the button is the indicator LED. It lets you know the battery status on the fly.

Light Update

So, the light review is shaping up to be bigger and better than last years -- if possible. Here is how it is shaping up: in addition to the lights listed HERE, Princeton Tec is sending out the Switchback 1 and the Switchback 3. The K2 light from Nite Hawk will be here early next week, as will the BR light.

This all gives the following:

Three single 3W lights -- Minewt, Joystick and SB1
Two dual 5W self contained lights -- Enduro Turbo and BR Lighting C2
Two dual 3W lights -- Switchback 2 and Double Shot Pro
Two 3x3W lighs -- Switchback 3 and Triple Shot Pro
Two larger cluster lights -- Wilma and Dinotte's big light

The K2 from Nite Hawk will slot in there somewhere once I know which set I'll receive. In addition, don't forget, I'm adding last years winners, the Double Shot and Dinotte Ultra 3, bringing the grand total to 14 total lights. If you see a larger light review (LED) anywhere, send me the link.

As I have been, I'll be giving you the specs and initial impressions as these new lights arrive. It's gonna be a busy January!

A New Year

I let New Years Day pass into evening without a ride. I did this on purpose, you see, I have a ton of lights that need to be used and rated so I have to do all of my riding in the dark this time of year. I rode with the Exposure Enduro Turbo and Joystick, while T. rode with Big Green and the Princeton Tec Switchback 2 -- a combination he loves.

We also decided to hit up some trails that are due to be obliterated this spring when logging begins in that particular section of the forest. Normally, this time of year sees us on mostly tame trails and gravel roads, riding more suited to the 'cross bike than a 5" travel full suspension bike. But, since I really, really needed to get some good trail time on the Barro TNT tires, and it was a new year -- not to mention the above mentioned trail obliteration -- we went on the better, more technical, and wetter, trails.

Now, the Barro's are a little narrower than I normally run, but performed pretty well, overall. I don't think there is a tire made, currently, that wouldn't have packed up a little -- as these did -- but in general they weren't holding me back much. My time off of the slippery roots held me back plenty, but that's another story.

The lights were nice. The 'all in one' design of the Exposure lights makes attaching it to the bike a cake walk. No need to string wires, no need to find a spot for the battery. The 2x5W configuration does a decent of illuminating the trail. There isn't as much light as some of the other multi-LED light heads, but then again, this light is as much about simplicity as it is about serious illumination. Some trade offs are to be expected.

I especially liked the helmet mount. It is easy to adjust, the light itself is extremely lightweight -- might be lightest, battery included, I've ever used. And I've used most of them out there. The beam is very much a spot, which, when combined with the wider Enduro Turbo's beam, is pretty good.

So, what did you do on the first day of 2007?