[Closed] Are the new wave of LED lights that much brighter than a Lumi HID?

HID's are 'about' 450 Lumens.

I had a 700Lm LED though and find my Hope HID has more useable light as the beam pattern is much better.

It depends on what light you are talking about really.

lumi HID ~500 lm

LED ~200 to 2000 lm

However, a 500lm LED light will be smaller and lighter than your HID and run for considerably longer from the same size battery.

Don't/didn't Lumi do a 700 lumen HID?

I have a Light & Motion HID and a Light & motion Seca 700, the Seca is a fair bit brighter and has a better beam pattern and a better battery life.
Also bear in mind that some manufacturers (Hope is one, allegedly) claim significantly higher lumen outputs than their lights produce.

I think HIDs use more juice and need "igniting" which can cause on/off issues.

I think.

450 is a bit low. Somewhere between 550 and 750 lumens was typical, depending on which ballast was used to drive the bulb.

Theres no real difference in light output between my old HID and the Tiger lights LED I replaced it with, although the spread of the HID was a bit better IMO. That said, the Tiger light is completely bomb proof, doesn't need new bulbs every 18months or so to maintain light output, is lighter, charges faster and burns through the night if I want to ride that long and is markedly more vibration and shock resistant.

I guess you might be right - Hope claimed 450-500 for their 10w HIDs but I also have a NiteFlux one I use for helmet mount (as ballast is in battery so head is very light) which is 13w and probably 20%-30% brighter on high

I had a Lumi HID. Good light it was. But a £50 DX has almost exactly the same beam pattern and brightness, just a slightly wider beam......

surely the key thing is efficiency - how much light you get for your 'leccy.

LEDs are now getting more efficient than HIDs but its only the last year or two this has happened.

The main advantage of LEDs is their robustness tho - and small physical size.

In our group, when we were using HiDs there was rarely a ride which wasn't interrupted by somebody's light playing up. Now we all use LEDs and that seems a thing of the past.

They key thing for me is reliability. Big hits, fast chop and crashing are all handled better by LEDs.

In crashes HIDs nearly always use to shut off, and sometimes had trouble striking up afterwards.

As others have said outputs about the same, but my HID just got too unreliable after a few years. Plus the size difference is what does it for me, lamps smaller, battery's smaller, weights so much less, and it goes for ages (ohh-err)

LEDs are now getting more efficient than HIDs but its only the last year or two this has happened.

They are now way more efficient than HID (in the size used for bike lights - bigger HIDs are more efficient), and have been for rather longer than 2 years! I remember 3 years ago comparing my homebrew 3 LED light (which is rather antiquated and dim compared to what you get now) with a mates Lumi HID and he was shocked that it was brighter - yet I carried half the size of battery.

As others have said LEDs are also more reliable - not only that but you can also very efficiently dim them for extended runtimes, something that doesn't work well with any other technology.

Not all LED lights which claim the same lumens give the same quality of light. Some manufacturers use lots of old tech LEDs in a cluster, which give high lumens, but don't give any particularly high quality spread or penetration. New generation LEDs (i.e. Cree XRE Q5) perform much better, but burn hotter, so manufacturers using this technology have to use appropriate materials and have ways of venting the heat. This is what I've been told and I presumed that's why Trout Lights look the way they do.

I have 2 Lumi HID lamps - I have also converted a Lumi Halogen lamp to 3 x XRE LEDs. The XRE lamp is brighter than the HID lamp it also give a whiter light compared to the blueish tinge of the HID. LED are the way to go at the moment compared to HID's which have to be looked after - bulbs are expensive etc. I'm about to convert bot HIDs to run triple XPGs - reckon it should cost about £80 all in to convert both.

Personally, I think HID's have had their day for MTB lighting.

probably and when mine go phut I'll look to replace with led's - either by fittign them to the existing cases or gettign somethign that will work with my batteries. Until then they do me fine.

Zangolin, I'd be interested to hear how you get on with a conversion. I have a solstice HID and I think the bulb is starting to dim so may try an LED conversion too. Hopefully I can retain the battery as the HID would last over 5 hours so I should get great run time from an LED set up from it 8)

I had a Lumi HID. Good light it was. But a £50 DX has almost exactly the same beam pattern and brightness, just a slightly wider beam......

hmm. that doesn't agree with what i have seen. we have probably 2 sets of the DX light regularly turn up of a wednesday night, with another couple making casual appearances. my LUMI HID is now nearly 4 years old and is used once a week for all but probably july/august. The HID gives a similar spread, but the throw is noticeably longer. we get up around 25-30mph on a piece of singletrack going down to the pub so that throw is worth having!
for all the reliability/battery size reasons though, if i was buying now, i'd be buying LED. it's quite possible that when my HID dies i shan't even bother fixing it. i'll just get an LED head unit.