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Used to be happy with a P7 light. Not as bright as the 20W MR16 Halogen it replaced, but a whole lot more practical as the battery weighed half as much and lasted twice as long. Occasionally would double it up with a P7 torch on my head or additional light on technical stuff, until...
Bought Ton's Troutie Lumen Liberator off him this week, and just done a ride on the Malverns on it.
Wow! 😯
It's not so much the outright power (of which there is lots but I've seen hotter spots so to speak), but there is just a wall of massively useful light everywhere! Particularly like the downward spill that lights your front wheel up, which you don't get on other lights.
Anyway, reckon I did the descent from Worcester Beacon to the Wyche almost as quick in the dark as I would do in blazing sunshine! And this thing is over 2 years old, and he's onto bigger and brighter still now!
Cheers ton for the light, and cheers Troutie for a genius bit of kit! Said if buy one of your lights one day, sorry it hasn't been til now and even then it's 2nd hand! But I'm sold from now on...
We were riding til about twenty to eleven in the hills. Where are you to find such darkness?!
Set off from outside Back On Track Bikes at about 10:20, by which time it was dark enough particularly under cover of trees. By the time I was at the top of the Worcester Beacon just before 11pm it was pretty bloody dark even out in the open.
Descended from the top of the Beacon around 11:10pm after a sit down and gaze at the view, and it was definitely bloody dark!
Anyway... Will be over at Mayhem from Friday evening on... If you see me about, I will have my Maverick with my mate, you're more than welcome to give it a go if you wanna see what I mean about the Durance being a bit steeper. If I'm not on the Maverick, look for a Ti Genesis Altitude with a single ring on it, or failing that, probably managed to blag the use of my Dad's Bright Yellow Land Rover Discovery for the weekend so it'll stick out like a sore thumb in the campsite!
EDIT: Took this just after 11pm... It was dark!
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Sorry for crap iphone pic
Not your fault the whyphone takes crap pictures. 😉
Hi Mboy
Just back from hols and saw this thread then your email
cracking light and was my best for using the available lumens for lighting up the whole trail but sadly no more will be made .
mainly due to the world domination of the DX and chinese stuff also the advance of the leds .
I have ideas for a Liberator X4 and am playing around with a prototype but dont know if it is a viable product yet
in this world of cheap lights and less disposable income .
Tons old light can be tweaked software and led wise to bump up the lumens if you ever feel the need for more .
Aye it looks dark enough for testing for sure!
Thanks for the offer but I'll be working sat. I'm also up in Inverness so it's quite a bit away to MM!
Thanks for the offer but I'll be working sat. I'm also up in Inverness so it's quite a bit away to MM!
When you said "riding up in the hills" I'd assumed you meant you'd come down to Malvern for Mayhem. Ah well...
cracking light and was my best for using the available lumens for lighting up the whole trail but sadly no more will be made .
mainly due to the world domination of the DX and chinese stuff also the advance of the leds .
I've had a quality P7 light (not one of the cheap DX ones), and I've played with pretty much every budget light out there. NOTHING comes remotely close. Sure, the DX XML lights have a bright hot spot, but you get terrible tunnel vision like that. Like I said, I've seen brighter purely in terms of a concentrated spot (even an old Cree R2 torch I had penetrated further, but then that had the narrowest beam you've ever seen!), but this just gives a massive flood of light from your front tyre's contact patch right out to further than you need, and gives you all the peripheral vision you could ever want which pretty much negates the need for a helmet light to help you round tight singletrack switchbacks.
I have ideas for a Liberator X4 and am playing around with a prototype but dont know if it is a viable product yet in this world of cheap lights and less disposable income .
Well once you've done the prototype, get it on here for some evaluation... I've very much come round to the idea that it's not so much about the Lumen count, but it's about how useable the light produced is. "Conventional" cylindrical shaped lights (Exposure, Lupine etc etc) using the same style LED's as the Liberator give a cylindrical beam shape, just like a torch. Which IMO now is less than ideal. Car and Motorbike headlight beams are shaped to make them more effective for the application, why not Mountain Bike lights? The 6 in a row with different optics (I'm assuming?) and the downward spill makes a lot of difference.
Know what you mean about the less disposable income though. That has been what has stopped me buying til now, and I saw ton's light for sale! Been more skint than you can imagine for most of the last 12-18 months, but got a decent sized tax rebate the other week and decided to spend a small portion of it on a light at least. Actually bought an Exposure Maxx-D 2nd hand first (it was available at a good price), but then ton stuck this up for sale so I had to have it, and have already sold the Maxx-D on.
Tons old light can be tweaked software and led wise to bump up the lumens if you ever feel the need for more .
Tell me more. In the email I sent, I did ask about the output etc. Have since found out some info on it on a bikeradar thread, but are the levels reprogrammable? What are the 2 current settings? And how much brighter are the latest LED's than the ones in this beast?
I am not sure what's in your light could be XPEs or XPGs or even a combination of both .
you say 2 settings so its around the time of the switch in both leds and drivers ( latest had 3 settings )
Software drive current can be upped quite easily at the expense of runtime but again I am not sure what Tons was set up for He was going to use it for alot of commutes so run time might have been the set up drive current.
I would need to see it in the workshop to test .
Yep will certainly get the proto out there when its sorted.
I've got a Digital Multi Meter trout, what would be the safest way to test the current? Or do I need to pull it apart? If so, not such a problem, I'm reasonably competent with electrics... I remember you offered these as a self build too? How difficult to change the LED's?
I did ask ton if he knew what the settings were, he said he reckons it lasts up to 10 hours on low and up to about 3hrs on high. For me the low setting is slightly lower than ideal, but probably still a bit bright for onroad, would love a middle setting (but I guess that involves changing driver?), and the high is plenty to be honest. Guessing it's being driven at 1000mA on high? I see you can drive them harder, up to 1500mA, but the return on the extra current is negligible. To be honest, I'd happily put newer bin LED's in and drop the current slightly on the highest setting if I was going to change anything, so on an offroad ride, I'd never need worry about cycling into low mode at all unless I was stopped for any length of time.
...I love my Liberator. It is often out and about illuminating the Malverns!
Trout
Sent you an email mate. MASSIVE panic! Light doesn't work for some reason... 😕
At Mountain Mayhem now, and for some reason it just ain't playing ball... If anyone else is reading this, and has a trout light too, please get in touch...
Email is in profile and will be checking it regularly on iPhone.
Slightly less of a panic... Have managed to sort a loan light out... Have tested the battery with a DVM and it's at 16.2V. So probably something up with the head unit. Nothing that can't wait til Monday now anyway as thankfully seem to have secured a spare light for tomorrow!
Agh,mare! Well good luck.
Hi Mark
tried to call you 7.20 this morning
also emailed but guess you were asleep
All sorted now
Seems Malverns grit was to blame! Had I had a tin of spray contact cleaner with me, I could have easily solved it then and there!
Sorry for the panic one and all...
Trout have emailed you anyway, think it might be wise to upgrade to some of the newer twist/lock style connectors possibly.