[Closed] Neat front light solutions?

Like the See.Sense Beam?

https://seesense.cc/products/tta-out-front-mount-add-on

It's a superb light

Or there are cheaper Magicshine lights with the same body with Garmin style mount
https://www.tredz.co.uk/.Magicshine-Allty-400-Front-Light_229151.htm

If your search for Garmin Action Cam mount you'll find a few options, once you have the mount then lezyne, exposure and others do adaptors that allow to to connect their light to a go pro style action cam mount. I have a similar set up to your picture but with an exposure light underneath my wahoo mount.

I use an exposure trace, GoPro clip for it, and a combined wahoo GoPro mount from raceware. Very small and neat, good for daytime visibility but not sure how suitable that'd be for night riding. Should be easier to find a cheap Garmin GoPro combined mount.

Buy a bontrager stem, get a duo blendr mount, an ion light mount, a garmin mount and a bontrager ion light.

Hmmm, all these solutions seem to rely on the light being mounted "upside-down". Presumably this screws up any beam cut-off and results in blinding drivers?

TBF I don't think you mentioned a specific European style road light with beam cutoff. But yeah you're correct the suggestions all rely on the light being upside down. Not an issue for a "normal" light as it doesn't have a beam cutoff.

This recent thread may be worth adding, some suggestions there

https://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/front-light-mounting-options-not-bars-or-helmet/

Presumably this screws up any beam cut-off and results in blinding drivers?

So like any other ‘normal’ light then 😉

Ideally, I’d like to mount the light out of sight below the stem.

Which light is it?
Do you have a fork crown?
Does the light have a remote button that you use?
Any boss/es on the fork/s?

Yes, I’m being a tart and don’t want to spoil the look of the bike

Surely a ‘tart’ would be wanting to very much ‘spoil’ the look? I recommend some gold-effect bling-mounts and a light that screams ‘XXXxpensiveXXX!’ 😉

Also this

I have a normal exposure out front mount, goes on the stem bolts, i use it with a halfords 1600, fitted with an exposure cleat.
Correct way up, nice and tidy, bang in the middle.
I went this route as I already had an exposure light.
Won’t work with a gps unit though.

As a few above - I've got a Gopro type mount on the underneath of a K-Edge garmin mount. I'm running a Joystick on it, but could equally have a Trace mount on there for further minimalisation.

As far as blinding drivers goes - you say you don't want huge numbers of lumens, so you're not going to be blinding anyone! Are you wanting a "to see with" light, or a "be seen by others" light?

There is no point in making anything, a lot of garmin/wahoo stem mounts with a go pro underneath; and a lot of lights mount via a go pro mount

For an exposure trace, a small plastic p-clip will allow you to mount to a mudguard mount, which looks very neat

you say you don’t want huge numbers of lumens, so you’re not going to be blinding anyone

Most bike lights today are more than bright enough to blind/dazzle other path/road users. By this I include lights marketed for general/road use yet are basically the same as MTB beam-patterns, ie round/symmetrical. This currently applies to nearly all lights sold in the UK no matter how expensive or otherwise.

It’s more the mirror/beam-pattern (or lack of) that dazzles. And the fact that a symmetrical beam needs to be pointed far ahead to be of any (even limited) use to the cyclist, yet requires to be pointed at the front wheel to avoid dazzling other road users.

Best summary I read is here (in response to a 750 lumen dazzler)

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 powered lights) use a mirror that casts the light in a symmetrical shape. This means light is cast up, down, left and right. Light cast above the horizon is what binds other road users. Light above the horizon is however great for trail riding as it lets you see overhanging branches and other impediments.

Car running lights (i.e. not high beams) are designed with a horizontal cut-off, where light does not shine above the horizon (actually a low percentage does, this called spill light). If the car light is aimed correctly, the the horizontal cut-off falls below oncoming road users line of vision. This is why you are typically not horribly blinded by oncoming cars, if they are a) using their running lights and b) have their lights aimed correctly. High beams do not have a horizontal cut-off, which is the primary reason you get blinded so badly.

Some bike lights (those that are approved for German roads) will have a mirror that has this sharp horizontal cut-off. They usually will usually be indicated by the some statement on StVZO compliance. Most dynamo lights (e.g., B & M, Schmidt, etc) will have this mirror design. There are also a few battery powered lights (e.g., some B & M models), but they are few and far between.

If you have a light with a symmetrical beam, you can lessen the blinding effect by pointing the light down (as suggested in @Batman's answer), however due to the symmetrical nature of the beam you will still blind road users more than if you had a light with a horizontal cutoff and was aimed correctly as there will still be more spill light above the horizon. This effect is also confounded by how narrowly or wide the symmetrical beam is focused. Wide flood lights will almost always blind, despite how much you aim them down, spot lights will blind less when pointed down.

Finally, total output does have some impact too, but it is also confounded with mirror design (e.g., high output with a horizontal cut-off may blind less than a low output symmetrical beam). What really determines whether or not you blind other users is the total amount of light shining above the horizon at their eyes.

In your case your 750 lumen lights are likely trail lights with a wide symmetrical beam. If you run them at full output you will likely blind others unless you severely aim it downwards.

link

I used a Lezyne ebike specific mount. Unscrewed the bar mount bracket & it screwed right on.
Out of the way of everything & looks tidy. Dead cheap too.
Only issue is a bit of shadow from the front wheel, but not really a problem.

Spoiling the looks not really an issue with the above 😛

I wouldn't like having my light that low down too

What are you saying about my Kona Rove?

I must admit, the paint colours on them have been much better since this.

If you go on anything remotely dirty with that Lezyne that low down, you won't be seeing much for very long. It'll be covered in crap in no time. My under bar lights get enough crap built up on a weeks commute and that's with full guards.

What are you saying about my Kona Rove?

Only messin! It's gorgeous 😀

I wouldn’t like having my light that low down too

May I ask why? I get that fashion/aesthetic mileages vary widely in both taste and scope, but am generally more curious/desirous as to optimal performance/function. There must be an optimal beam-pattern and unit-location for a front light for general road use.

I did a 25 miler (unlit roads) home the other night with a new fork-crown light-bracket. It (lower beam) cast shadows on even tiny gravel, so picked out the road-imperfections and hazards better than when mounted on the bars. Also virtually no upwards light-spill in my eyes (unlike when on bar mount). So it worked, but still illuminated some tyre so it would be even better further out front beyond the wheel (this will change when I get front rack). After a short while though, I thought about the light about as much as I would think about a front light when driving the car, ie not at all except for occasional switch to high-beam (via remote switch). In short, it worked. With a car’s headlights someone has (hopefully) already done all the thinking for us and so can drive around with dazzling people and yet see everything we need to see. Bicycle (road/path) lighting (at least in most countries) is IME still in the Dark Ages and basically a free-for all with little to no thought. Hopefully ebikes will begin to change this and we can inch towards automotive standards and that will trickle down. We may even catch up with the Germans 😉

Interesting blog about light-mount positions/options/optimisation:

https://problemsolversbike.com/article/finally-beginning-to-see-the-light

Hmmm, all these solutions seem to rely on the light being mounted “upside-down”. Presumably this screws up any beam cut-off and results in blinding drivers?

Simply rotate the mount so the Garmin is upside down and the light is the right way up!

Tsk, do I have to do all your thinking for you

🙂

The Halfords mount that came with my 1600 light has a Garmin thing on top and a GoPro mount underneath. Works really well for my (Cateye) commute light / Garmin setup. It's available separately for a tenner.

On the other hand it's unusable off-road (MTB) for me because the heavy 1600 light bounces around too much.

I use a K-Edge Xl Combo with an Exposure light bracket attached to it. In summer I keep a Sirius on there, in the winter either a Diablo or a Joystick dependent upon offroad/onroad. Mounting the light far enough back that it's balanced and wont try to rock itself loose on very bumpy ground means the Diablo with its fatter backside can't be angle down far enough for road use above a low setting. The joystick is fine and the Sirius even better as it has a little cuttoff on the top of the lense. They're all invisible to the rider, especially once you have a GPS on there, but even without, it's hard to know it's there.

Correction

With a car’s headlights someone has (hopefully) already done all the thinking for us and so we can drive around without dazzling people, and yet also see everything that we need to see.

May I ask why?

Just feels more noticeable higher up. (Sorry didn't read the rest of your post, don't have the attention span)

https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/lighting-spares/busch-muller-light-bracket-for-fork-crown-254mm-mount/

Just going to leave this here....

I use a K-Edge Xl Combo with an Exposure light bracket attached to it. In summer I keep a Sirius on there, in the winter either a Diablo or a Joystick

This. It's a great solution. I add an above the bars Strada for dark rides and extended duration. But the Joystick format is excellent.

^^ Same here but the mount is from JRC components and attaches to the stem faceplate (comes with longer bolts). Wahoo mounted on top, Exposure Sirius mounted underneath. Works really well (road bike)

@daffy @tired - either of you had issues with the light bouncing out of the bracket? Presume yours are also slung underneath, so the jaws of the light bracket are pointing down? On my road bike I've hit a badly potholed section of road at 30mph + (downhill!) and the light bounced out. It came apart but once put together works fine, got a few scratches. I now use a rubber band for added security but interested if there are better options.

I’ve never lost one in 30-40k km. I did in the past use the supplied lanyard as insurance, but the flapping of the lanyard really irritated me, so took it off. I do use the lanyard when on the MTB, but never on the road or gravel bikes.

@TiRed - I also use a Strada for longer, darker rides, but also have it slung under the bars (normal exposure mount, but upside down) as it’s out of the way and easier to toggle the button to dip the beam when riding on the tops - it just falls right where your thumb is.

TBF I don’t think you mentioned a specific European style road light with beam cutoff. But yeah you’re correct the suggestions all rely on the light being upside down. Not an issue for a “normal” light as it doesn’t have a beam cutoff.

Yeah, true but until I realized it involved mounting lights upside down, I didn't think it was relevant 😉

Anyway, I'll be buying a new light and I was looking for one with a beam cutoff, though they are not very popular over here (Canada) and obviously not worth it if mounted upside down.

(As an aside, I assume lights with a beam cutoff are more focused and need less lumens. Is this correct!)

(As an aside, I assume lights with a beam cutoff are more focused and need less lumens. Is this correct!)

Yes, the lens focuses the beam where you want it rather than scattering the light over a wide but useless area. I'd not buy anything but a StVZO light for road use in future. I was interested enough that I googled.

This looks like what you're after -
"The handlebar bracket is the micro-adjusting ratchet type, which you’ll either love or hate, though there are a variety of optional mounts available that let you position it in other ways, whether that’s out front, on the centre fork, or attached to a GoPro-style mount."

https://www.cyclingnews.com/features/best-stvzo-bike-lights/

But being cateye the mount is for their computer.

though there are various adaptors. nothing that can't be fixed with some epoxy to modify if nothing else turns up - the key is a light that's designed to work under the bars.

Cateye light to GoPro adaptor on eBay here.

I'm liking the look of this now. neat..

If you don’t want to dazzle drivers could you not slightly angle the light downwards?

The Cateye solution looks a bit messy. It seems to require taking the main mount off and adding two others, including a GoPro adaptor which needs a screw. And it's not waterproof but it does tick some other boxes....

If you don’t want to dazzle drivers could you not slightly angle the light downwards?

Yep, that's plan B....

As an aside, I assume lights with a beam cutoff are more focused and need less lumens. Is this correct!

I think so in general. Although StVZO are generally measured in lux for a reason.

With StVZO lights, it’s all about a different unit of measurement: lux. If lumens can be used to measure the amount of visible light thrown out in all directions, lux is the measurement of light at one point on a surface.

Jeczawitz illustrates this using a laser pointer: this is light concentrated to a point and so lumens aren’t applicable. Instead, the measurement is taken from the amount of light output on the surface at the end of the beam.

However, while lux is the dominant unit when measuring the output of StVZO bike lights, some brands do still use lumens.

https://www.bikeradar.com/advice/buyers-guides/stvzo-bike-lights/?image=2&type=gallery&gallery=1&embedded_slideshow=1

I currently use a Ravemen PR for road and gravel and it has some of the best of both worlds but even in ‘road’ mode there is nothing like the cutoff seen on StVZO or automotive lights. I’m looking to complement with something more road-orientated and more light-weight for unlit lanes and shortish (<50 mile) training rides.

I checked out the Exposure Sirius after reading someone's comment above about the Sirius having a ‘cutoff’, and was set to give that a look over vs the Ravemen CR1000 I had in mind. Just for a change.

But then I went over to road cc and checked out the beam patterns on the Sirius vs the CR1000 to compare and it seems that Exposure is much more of a round beam with no visible cutoff and little if any anti-glare towards the top of the beam.

So what’s going on?

Neither light is (or claims to be) StVZO* and while the Ravemen has a visible ‘sort of cutoff’ (even less in the roadCC comparison as they seem to have it in high/MTB mode. You can make out the ‘road’ beam underneath it though) it’s really more of a wide, anti-glare beam, while the Sirius just looks like a round MTB beam (although the housing does maybe protect upwards spill to the rider’s eyes, which it shouldn’t really need to do if the beam was designed not to dazzle/soill upwards?)

*I read an official Ravemen statement vs StVZO on a bikerumour thread which explains:

our lights don’t meet StVZO standards. However, our lens design, the first generation and the second one, both have significant improvement with anti-glare function than the other lights.

Why we don’t adopt the StVZO is because the standard is too strict and it will limit the output of the LED or the size of the light should be designed incredible big. That’s why you can’t find a StVZO light with high output on the market. Please visit our site for more info about the lens design. https://bikerumor.com/review-ravemen-cr1000-thousand-lumen-single-beam-headlight/#comment-3486814

So I’m looking now not at Sirius but at the CR1000 vs the Sigma Aura (or B+M Ixus Core but read it’s a narrow beam)

Although I think the long-term answer is dynamo lighting because decent battery lights for road still seem thin on the ground and usually suffer either short run times or are heavy as.

The Cateye solution looks a bit messy. It seems to require taking the main mount off and adding two others, including a GoPro adaptor which needs a screw. And it’s not waterproof but it does tick some other boxes….

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/254809713283?hash=item3b53d7aa83:g:BuAAAOSwqf5f2faA
plus
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/284630869570?epid=22019660939&hash=item4245526642:g:v-8AAOSwwwZh9fKR&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&campid=5337821651&toolid=10001&customid=91808X1545679X2a288bf58051d28a094c6f66eb5ebf18

would be neat.

I reckon the lower power version of that Cateye light is probably a better buy too - 70Lux instead of 100 but the same capacity battery which means it's 4 hours at 70 in high (against 3 hours at 60Lux in medium on the 100 version).

Any very focussed light has, in effect, a cutoff. You can see this quite clearly in the example of the Raveman vs the Sirius. The raveman is very floody and thus needs a cutoff, the Sirius is very spotty and thus just needs positioned correctly.

Just wondering whether anyone uses this type of combined Garmin/GoPro mount. I'll need another Garmin mount for my gravel bike anyway.

I'm assuming you just replace the top two stem faceplate screws with longer ones as supplied?

I guess only potential problem is the fixed angle which may or may not work

https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B07V6TY1YW/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apan_glt_i_JX9PGFXXCP4TBR2EVZS V"> http://Extended Bike Out-Front Mount, Bike Computer Combo Mount, Bike Handlebar Mount for Gopros Niterider Adapter, Sports Action Camera, Garmin's Edge(Black) https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B07V6TY1YW/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apan_glt_i_JX9PGFXXCP4TBR2EVZSV

Thanks for input so far!

(Similar to eBay links above but I'm in Canada so UK eBay links won't work for me and eBay delivery too unpredictable for my liking)

EDIT: STW doesn't like my Amazon link but it still works

either of you had issues with the light bouncing out of the bracket?

Never. I use a genuine GoPro Exposure adaptor and it is absolutely rigid with a Joystick.

You can get those combined garmin/gopro mounts from aliexpress for a couple of quid ish.

Any very focussed light has, in effect, a cutoff. You can see this quite clearly in the example of the Raveman vs the Sirius.

I didn’t know that, actually not quite sure what it means!

The raveman is very floody and thus needs a cutoff, the Sirius is very spotty and thus just needs positioned correctly.

A cut-off beam for road use (including ‘true’ cutoff beams as per StVZO) needs to positioned correctly. They are designed to be optimised for safe/non-dazzling use when correctly-positioned, as per automotive headlights.

But as for the Sirius and other bright, un-focused round spot /MTB beams when used to light the terrain ahead, how can one ‘correctly position’ such a beam/brightness and not dangerously dazzle others, without losing the primary function of all of those lumens (to light the way ahead)?

I have a bright round spot (for offroad use) and put it through a dazzle-test on a local level street just to satisfy my concerns/curiosity about using it on roads or shared paths etc .

It needed the beam pointed less than 12ft from my front hub in order not to dazzle someone ahead. This to my mind makes it useless/dangerous for seeing (yet still able to be seen by)

I've found RacewareDirect have a great range of mounts. Practically anything you could want. Have a couple for my Wahoo.

Had a small custom order I wanted printing recently too. Was a good company to deal with.

https://www.racewaredirect.co/

I had an ixus core. It had a very good cut off, it took a little to recalibrate. You could see the road in front of you but it still felt dark around you because i was used to floody lights. Could do with a bit more power for faster riding but overall it was pretty good for the price. Sadly got nicked off my bike along with a cateye volt