2-MINUTE EXPERT
How Do You Ride Fast at Night?
2-Minute Expert is an NSMB series that distills technology and other concepts into short, easily digestible articles.
I have very fond memories my first night riding lights, but they're rose-tinted at best. The popular setup back then was a single halogen head lamp which attached by cable to a 6-volt NiMH flat battery carried in our hydration packs. The cables were thick and stiff and annoying, the battery packs were about 1.5 times the size of a deck of cards, and weighed two or three pounds. The hydrogen bulb's output was 15 watts.
That was 1999 and the shop deal I got on that single light was north of $150. In hindsight those lights were dim and rudimentary, but given that we were riding slowly down janky trails on tiny hardtails, our needs were modest and those old NiteRiders did the trick.
The modern landscape for lights is vastly different. For over a decade now, whenever we have tested lights, there are invariably commenters who are getting by just fine with a cobbled together homemade set, or something with unknown origins and questionable safety standards from a brand with a name that was spat out by a computer so it wouldn't violate any trademarks. As bikes and trails change, so have our standards. We're riding way faster and more smoothly during the day, and that translates to night riding as well. The rudimentary reflector designs and inefficient bulbs and batteries of 10 and 20 years ago have been replaced by lithium batteries, sophisticated LEDs and, in some cases, far better reflector designs. And yet, like with people shopping for cameras that put way too much stock in the number of megapixels instead of sensor size and capability, almost every time I end up in a conversation with someone about night lights, even with people who should know better, they invariably default to "how many lumens? 'cuz I need it to be bright, man". So, let's start there.
We titled this article "how do you ride fast at night" because obviously if you're night riding, you want to be able to see the trail, but you're also hoping to see it well enough to ride with confidence. This may come as a surprise to some of you, but with the right lights, you can ride almost as fast at night as during the day. We're not advocating for recklessness here, but it's true.
My night riding experience dates back to the late 90s, but I'm not a light expert. So I enlisted the help of Tom Place, one of the owners and engineers behind Outbound Lighting, to help with some of these questions. Tom lives in Bellingham, in no small part because of the riding, and has a background in LED fabrication and the lighting applications industry. Tom's partner at Outbound Lighting is Matt Conte, who is the founder, also an engineer, whose relevant experience is in automotive lighting optical design. Their combined expertise gives them a very good head start when it comes to designing lights for mountain bikers.
Tom boiled down the main points he thinks you should know into the following:
- Key to understanding all of this stuff is this: "How does my eye perceive light and why does that matter?"
- What is a beam pattern and how does it affect my vision?
- “Do I need a helmet light, a bar light, or both?” A common and logical question, so we'll break down the differences between the two and what to look for in each one, since bar and helmet lights serve different functions.
How does my eye perceive light and why does that matter?
Once you understand a bit about how our eyes perceive light, the night light picture starts to become a bit more clear. Tom told me that when someone says something is “bright” what they really mean is “intense” because it’s the intensity - the focus of light in a single spot - that causes eye strain to make it feel bright. We're all familiar with lumens, which denote the total amount of light produced but it's also important to understand lux, which is the intensity of light in a given spot in your field of view.
Tom put it this way: your pupils are shutters that automatically control how much light comes into your eye, and it takes time to adjust to the dark to see contrast between light and dark areas, so avoiding harsh spots and flashes is key for maintaining dark adaptation in your vision. Because of this phenomenon, there is a point of diminishing returns to the benefit of more light output from any light, because your pupils will constrict and let less light in so it doesn’t feel as “bright” to your eye. So, often times going from a 2,000 lumen light to a 10,000 lumen light might only feel twice as bright, not five times brighter, because your eyes are adjusting to the intensity in your field of view. As a result, you end up with a really suboptimal setup: a big, heavy battery driving an unnecessarily large, hot bulb. You can make something smaller, more efficient, and cheaper that will do the job just as well with fewer tradeoffs.
As a point of reference, cars can travel 100mph (160kph) comfortably with well-designed ~2,200 lumen headlights.
The LED array of Outbound Lighting's Trail EVO bar-mounted light is designed to cast a wide, even beam to help your brain read the trail in front of you as well as what lies in the periphery. You don't want tunnel vision, this light is designed to prevent it.
What is “beam pattern” and how does it affect my vision?
Beam pattern refers to the distribution of the lumens on the trail in front of you, which is not a flat surface (this is why shining a bike light on a wall to determine how it’s going to look on the trail is not effective), so you want to distribute the light where you need it so that you can interpret the trail and terrain while riding.
During daytime, you can see your entire surroundings and periphery, whereas at night you can only do that if your lights cover the sides of the trail, which makes the trail feel more like it does during the day, thus easier for your brain to interpret what it’s seeing and for you to feel balanced at speed. Having a bright spotlight can lead to “tunnel vision” which does not translate to reading the trail better or riding faster, and bright flashes from a handlebar light turning and shining off a trailside bush can further impact your night vision.
Your handlebar light creates shadows due to its lower angle and - if it's designed properly - wide beam, which helps you read the terrain in three dimensions and at speed, just like your eyes and brain are used to doing in daylight.
Why should I use a handlebar light?
Light from the bars casts shadows from trail objects, giving the trail visual depth, making it easier for your brain to process information and read the terrain in three dimensions at speed. Rather than using more words to explain this, let the image below do it instead - it clearly shows the difference between a bar-mounted and helmet-mounted light and how a light mounted beneath your eyes (ie. on your bars) has clear benefits.
Notice how the bar-mounted light on the right creates shadows, adding visibility in that crucial third dimension. Your eyes and brain will thank you.
What type of handlebar light should I use?
A very smooth, even beam pattern is paramount, because your bars are not always pointing where you're looking.If you are riding narrow trails with foliage then a narrowly focused bar light will constantly make intense reflections off that foliage and effectively strobe your eyes, causing your pupils to constrict, making everything look dimmer.
Wide beams allow you to see further around corners while also preventing this “dancing spot” syndrome by smoothing out the intensity changes as the bars turn, which leads to lower eye strain better vision.
Depending on the type of riding you do, you may want more intensity down-trail for high-speed sections or more width for super twisty trails. It all depends on the user and the terrain.
A final thought here is that you can have a more powerful light that is heavier on your bars without noticing it nearly as much because the weight is on your bike, not on your neck. This gives the designer more size and options to play with when figuring out the combination and layout of battery, reflectors, and bulbs.
A helmet light is important because it lets you see where you're looking even when your bars are pointed somewhere else.
Outbound's Hangover helmet light is a relatively small, self-contained unit that is easily affixed with a GoPro mount.
Why should I use a helmet light?
Helmet lights are great for filling in gaps because they’re always pointing where your head is pointing (and therefore where you're looking), so you can control what is lit up at all times, even if your bars are, say, counter-steering into a corner, directing your bar's light away from where you're looking.
Because you can direct the light on your helmet, you can utilize a narrower beam pattern, which requires less total light and thus less power, so the helmet light can be very lightweight and compact, which is important since it’s on your head and you feel it the most while riding.
Sure you could have a wide beam on the helmet and more power in an external battery pack, but because the light is placed above your eyeline, it makes the entire trail look flat because you can’t see any shadows, meaning that rock sticking up out of the trail won’t look 3-dimensional, which is fine when going slow but at high speed your brain is trying to process the terrain extremely quickly so you can react; if it’s hard to tell if the rock is sticking out of the ground or flat then you may be out of position on the bike and get hung up on the rock.
When designed and used together, a bar and helmet light will let you see and interpret the trail properly, letting you ride confidently and quickly. If you haven't ridden at night with good lights, you'd be shocked at how 'normal' it feels.
If I have to choose one, which do I choose? Why should I use both to go fast?
Here's what Tom had to say to this one: "If I have to have one light, I’m choosing a handlebar light with a very wide, even beam pattern because it makes the trail look the most consistently like the trail does in the day by giving it depth, so your brain can read the 3-dimensional terrain. Bar-mounting also allows for more power and a larger battery on the bike without feeling it on your neck or affecting your body balance".
With a handlebar light doing the heavy lifting for the periphery, the space around your wheel, and the main trail, a helmet light can perfectly complement that by filling in gaps down the trail so you don’t outrun your visibility. Same for seeing around corners in tight switchbacks - you want to spot the trail and your line as you look through the apex, but you can get away with a narrower beam on the helmet which is ideal so that it doesn’t overpower the handlebar beam (which would throw away that depth that is being provided by the bar light) while also allowing for a smaller, lighter weight package on your head so that everything is balanced.
Comments
BC_Nuggets
3 weeks, 3 days ago
This is an amazing article and explains what I’ve been doing wrong for years now. I see the 💡!!
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Velocipedestrian
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Me too! My standard has been dimmer on the bar, brighter on the lid for years. Time to experiment.
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OutboundLighting
3 weeks, 3 days ago
For science!
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Brighter bar with wider beam for sure, and narrower/not as bright up top, but don't discount the importance of the different kinds of reflector/light design as well when distinguishing btwn the two ;)
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araz
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I find that too bright from the bars relative to the helmet light creates exaggerated shadows that make terrain look rougher than it is -- medium sized rocks can start to look like huge chasms. I like the bar and helmet lights to be about equal brightness personally.
When I have ridden with just a helmet light, everything looks flattened out, like in the photo above. This has led me to going into big features much faster than I otherwise would -- so if the goal is to ride faster, maybe this is the way to go ;-)
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OutboundLighting
3 weeks, 2 days ago
So what you’re describing is exactly the point, but the terms used are important. We want the light cast onto the trail to be close to equal INTENSITY, which means we want the bar light to be BRIGHTER (more total lumens) because the beam pattern is much wider, covering a larger area, so you need more light to cover a larger area at the same intensify. Narrower beam on the helmet covers less area, so can use less total brightness to be in balance with the bar light. Obviously as things move around and you point the helmet different places the intensity changes with distance, but we start with the intent of balance. Having too much intensity from the helmet light will just wash out all the depth you get from the bar, as you point out, which is generally bad if you’re trying to read the terrain accurately, but could indeed give you a false sense of security and lead to sending bigger, which isn’t necessarily better if the terrain is super rough, but again this is where specific use case comes into play, as most people night ride on familiar local trails that they may know better, so shifting the balance of light output based on your preferences is totally fine, so long as you’re comfortable with it.
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araz
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Fair enough. I guess the goal is to find the right balance between the lights for each rider to feel comfortable on their terrain. I personally find myself riding a little more hesitantly when the shadows from the bar light become too prominent, but as you suggest, I'm mostly on familiar trails at night.
My comment about being faster with just a helmet light was mostly tongue in cheek, though I have hit some things at a much faster pace than normal in the past using just a helmet light -- thankfully without any negative consequences!
I do find that night riding does help me look down the trail, not at the stuff right under my wheel or the trailside obstacles I want to avoid. So in that way it does help me be a better and faster rider.
Velocipedestrian
3 weeks, 2 days ago
So, that went well.
Not a fair comparison since I was using a new bar light, but the brighter / wider / lower + head spot really did make for easier surface reading.
So much so that I'm tempted to up the technicality of the trails I choose for night rides.
Bonza!
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fartymarty
3 weeks, 3 days ago
By a complete fluke I've managed to get it about right with my current setup*. But it is nice having someone who knows what they're talking about give you the science on it.
* it has taken decades of night riding to get to this point though.
Two lights are a definite must. I can ride with one light but am a lot slower with one.
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Cougar797
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I've always used a small light on my helmet and the bigger light on the handlebar where I try not to run either on super high output. I'll say this setup has me riding at the same speed as I do in the day during most cases.
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Morgan Heater
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Ditto! I've always had a big bright light on my head, and a dim on on the bars. It will be interesting to switch it up and see if there's a difference.
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Andy Eunson
3 weeks, 3 days ago
One thing I used to get was a really stiff neck for the first handful of night rides from staring at the bright spot too much. That and when my yellow lab got in front I’d get an image of his butt and tail emblazoned on the back of my eyeballs like when you look at a bright light by accident.
Also a good time mention that when riding in a group do not aim that head lamp into another riders eyes. Something I learned immediately from underground miners when I was a geologist.
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Skooks
3 weeks, 2 days ago
My favorite trick is to shine my helmet light beam ahead of the guy in front of me, then slowly lead him off into the trees. Surprising this has actually worked!
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Bogdan M
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I've got this Outbound setup and it's just epic.
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Curveball
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Same here. Now they've released the Portal helmet light.
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DadStillRides
2 weeks, 6 days ago
Can anyone compare the portal to bontrager ion pro, nightrider 1100, Blackburn dayblazer 1500, etc?
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Todd Hellinga
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I ordered the Portal first day it was available, it and the Evo combo is very very good. First ride was night ride on Seymour and was riding trails I'd never done before probably not much slower than I would in the daylight.
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FlipSide
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I recently order the Portal DH combo too. I can't wait to try them.
I had a super old set of Gemini Xera with essentially dead batteries. These were awesome, but I can't wait to see how lights have improved in 12+ (?) years.
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Lacy Kemp
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Night riding is my jam and Tom and the Outbound crew have seriously upped the quality of the night riding game. Yes, I'm shilling for my friend, but their product is worth it. Gone are the days of mega clunky batteries and cables that somehow always found their way to my mouth (why!).
The only thing I disagree with in this article is the "If I could only use one light" question—I'd go helmet, all the way. The trails here are way too tight and techy to rely on the bar light, even if the beam pattern is wide. I've had plenty of rides where I was lazy earlier in the day and didn't recharge both lights and one has died on me. Every time it's the helmet light I'm slightly more petrified and ride at a snail's pace. I need the helmet more than the bars, no question.
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OutboundLighting
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Yet another reason for more nuance in all discussions today! I don’t disagree with you, this is where the single question without context provides and insufficient answer for all scenarios. I stand by my assertion, in general, but totally agree that in the PNW in particular, an argument can easily be made for helmet at the one if you don’t have two (but you should have two, and charge them 😝). PNW tends to be more built trail, so much less rough than a lot of east coast jank or southwest trails that are just sharp pointy rocks, so reading the trail with depth from the bar light is less critical. Also, most people night ride on familiar trails, if we’re speaking in generalities, so if you know every rock and root in your local system then you don’t have to process the depth of terrain as much while riding because you’re prepared for it, so you can get away with a trail-flattening helmet light as the solo. All good points to consider.
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Gage Lejay
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Agreed Lacy. The handle bar dips up and down, pitches and yaws with the compressions of the fork, rattles of the trail and the angle of the slope. So many ways to have inconsistent lighting. Bike dips into a compression then the run out is dark making you slow to the pace of the correction of the angle of your bike. With a helmet light you control that angle, peak into the hole then look ahead knowing you chose a line that will work and your next lines are illuminated.
How about this. Dip your bars into a corner or turn your bars and where is that light? Is it at the exit or beyond? One benefit of night riding is that it can teach you to glimpse a line, trust your bike will operate, and look ahead. Focus on the trail ahead trusting the bike in the line.
That being said I have been a convert to the dual Outbound setup for years and it is way better than a single helmet light. I 100% endorse getting both BUT if you can only afford one then get the Outbound helmet and save for the bar in the future.
Want a safe test? Go to the pump track at night and try both methods.
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Derek Baker
3 weeks, 3 days ago
So just closing my eyes is doing it wrong?
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Mark
3 weeks ago
One thing I find with bar mounted lights is that while there tends to be more depth of field, you can also end up with larger shadows that can hide key features/obstacles on the trail that you might want to avoid. That pic up there is a good example, as with the bar mount you don't know what's on the backside of the rock. What if there's a hole waiting to swallow your front tire or a pointy rock ready to chew it?
Also I get what Alex is saying to a degree and that light he listed is a wicked deal. But Pete brings up a great point about the race to the bottom in lowest cost, produced in China products. We also have to recognize that someone else is getting paid poverty level or less wages just so we can enjoy low-cost products. It's a feature part of capitalism that has had a negative impact on us whether we realize it or not.
Edit: Should also add I've generally run two lights for more spirited type night riding. Typically a flood light on the bar to give me a wide field of vision right in front of me and a spot on the helmet for distance and to see what's coming up ahead. I've also run the "headhunter" setup with two jaw mount lights on a full face, again one spot and one flood.
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Mammal
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I've always approached my light sets from a value perspective, because they're usually not in use very often/very long, and it's difficult to justify spending the cash for really nice battery-inclusive items that sit dormant for most of the year.
I've never been a fan of integrated batteries, as historically, the batteries are the items that lose performance over time. I've also moved away from backpacks while riding for the most part, so I wanted a helmet light that doesn't have a cord to manage or heavy satellite battery. I came across the OGT products (BC company), that use a single 18650 cell, and are also very appropriate as a multi-purpose head lamp. They're not as "intense" as some, maxing out at 1800 lumens each, but that's a range I'm accustomed to anyway. The OGT Lynx Double (I bought two) has a really good spread, good warm-ish tone, great adjustability modes, and is adequate for getting me out on night rides. The battery life is listed as 3.5hrs on highest setting, and I use them on a much lower setting for climbing, so I've never run into battery issues. The single 18650 cell means it's not too weighty mounted to the helmet, and I can bring a couple spares in my hip pack that don't weigh much at all.
They're definitely not going to satisfy the crowd that wants daylight at night, but I usually dial back my speed at night anyway, and don't actually need all those lumens. The OGT bar/helmet combo has provided what I need for night riding while being very convenient, versatile, and affordable.
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OutboundLighting
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Just to add a bit to this discussion on batteries, not negating your personal experience or light/battery preferences at all as you bring up some fine points, which is why it's good there are options out there for all different use cases, but: there's a common misconception that Li-Ion batteries just degrade sitting around over time, that after a few years it will be severely diminished, and I think most of this comes from the old days where Ni-Cd rechargeable batteries had a severe "memory" effect, and more recently everyone's experience with cell phones where just about everyone has had their phone battery life diminish significantly over a couple year span, however that comes from two main reasons: constant daily use and Li-Po packs. Generally the Li-Po cells don't handle crazy fast charging that people want with cell phones, and they lose capacity after far fewer cycles than typical Li-Ion cylindrical cells, so 365 full charge cycles per year (possibly more) and you're going to see a reduction in capacity. To your point about bike lights not being used all that frequently for the average consumer, even if you're a heavy user you're likely looking at a fraction of the number of charge cycles, on a cell chemistry that is better for longevity. Basically, under average annual use it should take 10 years to see a ~20% reduction in runtime, or literally using it every day for 3 years straight.
I can tell you that 19 out of 20 warranties we get for batteries are from improper storage, not degradation from cyclic use, where customers use the lights, run them dead, then stick them in a drawer for 6 months. Never happens to cell phones because no one goes more than 24 hours without touching them, haha, but for season night riding it's common, so I'll take this as an opportunity to say to anyone using any rechargeable device: keep them charged, especially if you're not going to use them for months on end. Fully charged our lights can sit for 2 years before they're dead, so seasonal use and storage is no problem at all, but if you leave them dead that is the fastest way to kill any Li-Ion powered device.
This is also why we cover battery replacements (shipping, service, all of it) for all our products, because we know the rate of actual issues is extremely, extremely low, and we just don't want customers to have to be worried about this.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Thanks for weighing in, Tom. I have definitely found it can be tricky to keep on top of proper battery hygiene especially over the years as things change (and different devices). Makes me wonder: does it make sense to consider having a brief, image only 'battery guide' molded into the shell that basically communicates 'don't store without charging first' or something like that? Seems like a universal set of icons for that kind of thing across different devices would start to be useful as we are surrounded increasingly by more and different types of batteries.
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OutboundLighting
3 weeks, 3 days ago
It's funny we actually got a legit, serious request from a customer the other day to put an audible alarm on our lights to remind them when they need to be charged. I can't imagine how much people would hate this haha, but it would certainly help those that forget or don't check. Having some standardized pictograms that are always there could be helpful, so long as people look at them and can make obvious sense of them. Honestly there is so much information I'd want to convey on the lights, we've contemplated even putting QR codes on them to scan to go straight to instructions or FAQ entries. Certainly good to put something on there. Maybe a blinking red indicator every once in a while to get people's attention if the battery is really low when it's off...lots of concepts here...
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Skooks
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Great info thanks. I was always told that it's best to store Lithium batteries at a medium charge level, as opposed to fully charged. Is that incorrect?
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OutboundLighting
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Another good question that requires nuance: if you’re putting enough thought and effort into battery management of your devices to set the storage charge to that degree, then absolutely, it’s always best to store Li-Ion cells in the 50-80% charge range. In practice, it’s hard to get customers to remember to charge their lights after a ride, much less to a specific capacity before storage, and the net effect of sitting at 100% charge for a bit is all but negligible. The worst thing you can do is leave them <20%, really anything that keeps them above that threshold at all times is going to be pretty good.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 2 days ago
We've written articles in the past about reducing pre-ride friction, aka the things that keep your uncertain self from going for a ride spontaneously, or when conditions aren't perfect. One category of importance is making sure your bike and gear are ready. In the winter, that usually means dry shoes and gloves (bonus points for clean), a lubed chain, and charged batteries for your lights.
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FlipSide
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Great point! I remember one of these articles (from Cam I believe) that made me realize I could still improve my gear preparation setup so that I am always ready to go for a ride.
Now that I just finished building my first fatbike, I really need to change my gear preparation setup to "winter mode". Thanks for the reminder! :)
Jotegir
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I recently bought a bunch of 21700 cells to replace the ones that are on their way out in my groups years-old bontrager light fleet. They were cheap enough to warrant a solid spot-weld try. I'll let you know how it goes.
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Andy Eunson
3 weeks, 3 days ago
15 watts and a battery! Luxuries. When we was young we had 1.5 watt bulbs in a Union globe with a sidewall Union generator on the front wheel because a rear mount went out when we skidded. And we were happy. Ya tells kids that today and they don’t believe it.
Always take a back up light because if your main light fails, it’s really really dark out there. I discovered by accident that a bar light with a wide pattern combined with a sort of pencil beam helmet light not at full power did work better. Now I know why. I never really understood why people would by some no name light with a shitty beam pattern and less than ideal reliability. You wouldn’t buy rock climbing gear or scuba gear based on price alone. I’ve always had top shelf lights because of what we put up with in the 80s for lighting.
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Peter Leeds
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I still have my Turbocat bar and helmet light system, haven't used them in years unfortunately. You're right about the backup....I always have a bar and helmet as a system with a small spare helmet battery just in case, but I never had a burnout on any battery. Sad they went under; the quality of the lights and mounting hardware is the best I have seen.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Yep. And even if you don't need it, your buddy might. Spare gloves, spare light, emergency blanket, a layer, a toque, a snack...it's backpack season.
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Mark
3 weeks ago
1.5W bulbs?!? You lucky bastard.
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jdt
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Two lights is wrong. Should always be THREE lights, with one as a back-up. If you run out of juice or have a mechanical or wire mishap, you always want that additional option to ensure you can get back safely.
Shout out to the Outbound folks. They make good products and stand behind them. Would buy again.
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slyfink
3 weeks ago
I've had a hard time squaring Outbound's approach with my experience. To be clear, this isn't me "throwing shade" (see what I did there?!) at Outbound, but rather, I'm borderline needing new lights, and I'd very much like to get them, but as I said, their approach doesn't match my experience:
For some context, I've been night riding since the days of homemade halogen lights in copper pipes, soldered to a home-alarm SLA battery... so not new to this!
In my experience, I've always preferred a tight spot that has a lot of throw to see what is coming up ahead when I'm riding fast downhill. the bar light is there to provide contrast. what I noticed is that the brighter the bar light is, the stronger I need the headlight to be. It dawned on me that is is because my eyes adjust to the amount of light closest to them i.e. my pupils close a bit, so they can't see what is being illuminated far up the trail by the headlight. The solution I've found is to run the bar light as a flood, on low, and tilt it up so it's not illuminating the ground too close to me. Then I run my headlight as a spot. I crank it up to max for DH sections, and leave it on low or medium the rest of the time.
I'd love to try the Outbounds to see if their approach works better, but it's an expensive proposition, especially when it doesn't seem to reflect my experience over the years. If they're still reading the comments, I'd love their perspective on this...
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OutboundLighting
2 weeks, 5 days ago
Ok, so I don’t think you’re wrong, I think this an excellent opportunity to talk about beam pattern.
You’ve been night riding for a long time, since the point where technology was only capable of making a narrow, round spot as a beam pattern, so the only thing really differentiating lights was brightness, and beams being equal, brightness is a viable way to compare two lights. When both helmet and bar lights are narrow spots, you rely on the helmet because the bar light beam is all over the place, not where you’re looking, but where your wheel needs to be pointing, which as a trail curves around isn’t always (and quite often isn’t) where you need to be able to see out ahead at speed.
Now, we can make any beam pattern we want, highly optimized to specific applications. You mention running the bar as a “flood” and helmet as a “spot” but I’m guessing that is, if anything, a wider angle version of a round symmetric optic, which means you’re projecting light wide to the sides AND up and down, causing the foreground to be higher intensity, which causes the imbalance and pupillary response. This is precisely why we make our handlebar light a super wide beam horizontally, but not vertically, so that the intensity of light on the trail surface is as even as possible from right in front of your wheel to way down the trail. You’re angling your standard round flashlight optic up to avoid the high intensity foreground, what if you could angle it down so you’re not sacrificing the throw down trail, but also without the imbalance? That’s our approach, basically.
This is also why we need the brighter light on the bars. Brightness is measured in lumens, which the amount of photons coming out of the front of the light, regardless of where they go. Intensity, measured in lux, is how many lumens hit a certain surface area. If you have two lights with the same brightness, but one narrow and one wide, the wide light will cover more surface area at a lower intensity. We want the helmet and bar light to balance as well as possible for intensify on the trail, so we make the bar light brighter and wider, and the helmet less bright and narrower, so you get the contrast you mention (which comes from shadows from lights sources emitting from different locations) to better read the terrain, instead of relying essentially on the helmet light for everything, which washes out all that depth in the terrain.
Happy to discuss further, as I’ve said before there is always an aspect of personal preference to any setup, so if you tried our approach with our lights (not just putting any random brighter light on the bars, but two lights designed this way purposefully) and didn’t like it, that would be totally fine, but I’d love to get you out to an event or a local shop with lights to try them out, for science!
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slyfink
1 week ago
thanks for the response! I'll talk to my local bike shop to see if there would be any interest. I think your offer of doing events with shops is a really good idea. It's now winter here, and the snow makes everything brighter, and the trails tend to me smoother since it's just a smooth ribbon of packed snow.... any light works in these conditions! but I'll raise it with the shop owners next time I'm there....
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Timer
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Tangentially related question, regarding night riding: Is disturbing wildlife an issue in the S2S area? I recently learned that wild animals can get into serious trouble if they have to expend a lot of energy fleeing from perceived threats in the winter.
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Adrian Bostock
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I can’t comment on NV because “winter” is very different in that part of the province then in the interior. I couple years ago our club(s) got approved to groom trails for winter use through a mule dear winter range. The main concern from the habitat officer was trail density. The approval is not a blanket approve to groom every trail in the network and there are some reasonable expectations around use. don’t let your dogs harass wild life ect. There are also no mule dear in the area. A few white tail and a couple moose who winter there regularly. I think that played a factor in the approval.
From much of what I have come to understand trail density, user speed and predictability are important factors. as well as off leash or uncontrolled dogs. It does not seem to be a simple equation of use = disturbance.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 3 days ago
This is a good question and it may take a bit but I'll see if I can get someone qualified to weigh in. But I'm guessing it's a lot different on many S2S trails than it would be in more remote areas and ones with well-defined migration patterns, etc.
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Jotegir
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I do an absolute ton of night riding and much of it is shuttling on fast and steep trails (the only thing we have here in the interior worth shuttling). One trick to riding fast is to hit a chute line that is steep enough the minimum speed is 'fast'! My group, being almost entirely comprised of current and former Trek store employees, almost exclusively uses Bontrager Ion Pro RTs, a great light for the money but not with a particularly wide beam pattern. One on the bar and one on the helmet works well.
I've read the Outbound blurb on the site a few times over the last couple years and their bar system is on my 'eventually' list, but for now I'll make do with the double Bontrager. I imagine it's more important on the North Shore - most of our tech where that increased definition would help has gaps of flow, steeps, or corners in between and isn't repeated like your trails - so if you know the trails you can kind of just send it at night and you'll come out OK. But maybe this is just justifying being a bit cheap and not being ready to spend the capital on the outbound light - I am sure once I get one I'll say "oh what a fool I've been".
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DadStillRides
2 weeks, 6 days ago
I also run the ion pro as a headlamp, but have been using the outbound trail evo on the bar. The Ion pro has been better than a couple others I've tried in the 1100 to 1500 stated lumen range. I wonder if the new portal is an improvement over what we're currently running. I value a long throw and powerful beam out of the helmet light for fast riding. While the low profile shape certainly looks like an upgrade, I'm not confident the throw and power is going to be better. I can see the value in wide beam for low speed tech maybe, but most of the time it's just added noise.
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OutboundLighting
2 weeks, 5 days ago
We have some shop employees at Fanatik that ran the Ion Pro 1300 RT instead of Hangover because they wanted more punch. They run Portal now, the intent was to cover that specific use case for those wanting more punch on the helmet. The extra width isn’t about noise it’s about peripheral visibility, helps with balance and not losing your line so easily with a narrow harsh spot is all. Still though, if you’re happy with the Ion, and don’t feel like you NEED anything else, then run it!
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Alex D
3 weeks, 3 days ago
> Tom put it this way: your pupils are shutters that automatically control how much light comes into your eye
Apertures, not shutters, and just like a camera lens, you get more depth-of-field and sharpness with more light. You may acclimate to lower brightness, but you won't see nearly as much detail. It's wild to me that an inability to drive or cool LEDs at high sustained brightness is considered a "feature."
I've been riding at night with a group that has a number of Outbound lights. They're fine. Not amazing, fine, and only if you can't be bothered to use an external pack. My light is a $40 Amazon special with a 6-cell pack (search "5000 lumen bike light") that puts the Outbound bar light to shame in beam spread and evenness, brightness, and runtime. It's the highest value-for-dollar of anything I've put on my bike.
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Jerry Willows
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I’m gonna call BS on this. The Chinese knockoffs are low quality can’t compare. Show us the beam patterns of both side by side.
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Alex D
3 weeks, 3 days ago
That's the beam from around 7 feet. It is deeply, stupidly bright. I lined up with a friend with an Outbound, had him set max brightness, then flooded right over it. Night to day. My Ituo XP3 (2400 lumens) with three wide optics has a more oblong beam shape, but it turns out that's only relevant when your spill doesn't light up the sides. This does.
It's not perfect, the battery mount is crap (opted for a frame bag) and it'll drop the brightness after fifteen minutes if you try to run all five LEDs with ambient above 60F. The top three (~3500 lumens), it seems to maintain indefinitely. No stake here, I don't care what you buy. Spend all the money. But for me, I've bought two and stopped looking for anything else.
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Jotegir
3 weeks, 3 days ago
This photo is extremely funny because of how utterly meaningless the circle of white light is without comparables in on the same white wall backdrop.
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Alex D
3 weeks, 3 days ago
You can see that the beam shape is round, quite even (despite a semigloss wall), and wide. If I had an Outbound light to compare and equalized the exposure, you'd see a dim, oblong oval of roughly the same width.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 2 days ago
If you're riding on flat, white walls, you may be right. Thankfully, we don't. Or I don't. Maybe you do.
Alex D
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Pete, I don’t appreciate the snark. This article was an advertorial for an audience steeped in oppressive groupthink. I see the same with WAO in any thread about wheels, never mind fifty other companies with competitive products. This light set is $40 with two-day shipping and easy returns. Why is it incumbent on me to spend $250 before you would deign to give it the time of day? Why is it so important to you to gatekeep? I provided the best beam shot I could in good faith and you threw it back at me. What’s your deal?
EDIT: https://www.amazon.com/Riding-Mountain-Bicycle-360%C2%B0Rotatable-Headlight/dp/B0D31QKQFH
Jotegir
3 weeks, 2 days ago
This comment has been removed.
Jotegir
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Pete offered to stretch the NSMB quarter four capital budget to pick up the light and give it a try on the condition you provided them with the link to the precise product you're talking about, which in the land of Amazon fakes and look-alikes, is a reasonable condition. You could even PM the link if you didn't want to post it publicly for whatever reason. I think that counts as giving it the time of day. Time of night?
Personally I love the beam shot (although not for the right reasons mind you), it just doesn't tell us very much in a vacuum. I'm guessing that's the source of Pete's seemingly light hearted snark - which is allowed here to my understanding, they keep letting me do it.
Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 2 days ago
To Alex, in reply: I'm not gatekeeping. You stepped in with a pedantic opening and continued with specious arguments and proceeded to basically spam the comments with praise about a set of lights that you claim is better based on successively worse criteria and no evidence other than your own opinion - to which you're certainly entitled.
We produce 2-minute expert articles as a way of helping brands connect with the audience and deliver some information that we think useful. No problem if you want to ignore what the experts have to say or even present an opposing view, but this is a brand manufacturing things here in North America that does things to give back to the riding community. I'd be a hypocrite to pretend I don't buy things on amazon but you're ready to die on that hill and in an environment where we're trying to support brands and people that move our sport forward, that's a little weird and sad. Say it once, then move on, don't double and triple down, it's just exhausting. That's why you got the snark.
No one asked for a beam shot. Even worse on a white wall. That you think that was useful to anyone is absolutely deserving of snark. I have three more lined up but I just edited the article about Caileigh so I don't give a shit what you think - there are more important things happening than worrying about whether I hurt your feelings. Good afternoon to you.
Alex D
3 weeks, 2 days ago
I added the link to my last post. I was *excited* to share a real value that makes night riding enjoyable to me. Past tense. The anti-China jingoism and snark leaves such a bad taste.
That's the gatekeeping. Oh, you don't buy into the notion that a light should start dim and get progressively dimmer? That brightness actually isn't a feature? And that $400+ is a reasonable amount to spend for your first night ride? Then take a long walk off a short pier. From authors ordinarily tickled to min-max, this is such a jarring response. The hill I die on is accessibility to people who don't have money coming out of their ears.
> No one asked for a beam shot.
Pete, the person above me LITERALLY ASKED for a beam pattern. (And how else would you show it? A shot into a random portion of my backyard? How would that show you the shape of the light?) Everything I've posted has been a response to someone else, which is more than I can say for you-- good faith or not, you ignore anything you can't rebut. What a prick.
Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Yeah, sorry but no. Send the link to the actual product. We'll be happy to try it. You're making big statements and I don't think they're going to hold up.
Also a large aperture gives more light OR more shutter speed for a given level of sharpness - but less depth of field.
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Alex D
3 weeks, 3 days ago
There's no link because I assume this comment field is spam-filtered. With the search I suggested, there are two brands (Roomark and Vastfire) selling identical light heads with modestly different accessories. (Roomark includes a GoPro mount.) Not hard to find. The LED configuration is 3 x XHP-50 and 2 x XPL.
You misunderstood the aperture comment. If an aperture decreases in size, the result is increased depth of field and, in this context, greater acuity from reduced optical aberrations. You don't want your eyes operating at a "wide open" aperture. Surely you've noticed that you don't make out details nearly as well at night as in daylight, no matter if they're in focus?
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Jotegir
3 weeks, 3 days ago
My friend has one of those! For $40 bucks its pretty good but suffers pretty severe lumen drop as things go on (even when running all the LEDs are on). I'm guessing their lumens either weren't tested at all or they measured the second they turned the lights on, not after 30s or so like I believe they're supposed to be measured.
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Alex D
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Every high-lumen light (except for one with active cooling that appears to be out of production) reduces lumens over time. Magicshine's 12000 model quickly drops to 3500 lumens no matter what setting you choose. This one has a noticeable and sudden drop from 3000+ to 1000 or so if the temperature sensor goes over ~70C (probable if it's mild out and all five LEDs are on high), but otherwise it's well-regulated. I typically use the top 3 LEDs for half-hour trail segments and haven't noticed a drop. It's always the brightest light when the group stops.
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Lacy Kemp
3 weeks, 2 days ago
Brighter isn't always better. I dislike a blown-out beam from my light. I've had lights that are brighter than my Outbound, but they don't provide as broad of coverage. Sure, we can all run spot lights, but why? You're missing a lot of trail that way and you're staring into a veritable sun. Regardless, no shade on trying to find a good deal. Good lights are expensive and sometimes you can get lucky finding something that works well that costs a fraction.
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Alex D
3 weeks, 2 days ago
This isn’t a spot light. It’s just more, everywhere, from a beam that’s more even. I don’t “miss” anything, it’s exactly the opposite.
If Outbound offered the same light tomorrow with twice the brightness for the same runtime, would you consider it an upgrade? No, right? You’re good?
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XXX_er
3 weeks, 3 days ago
another thing from the way back machine
if you are riding up a trail in a group or even just one guy ahead of you, use the light of the guy ahead of you and save your battery for the down
stop to change the modes on your light
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Tim Coleman
3 weeks, 2 days ago
While I like the sentiment in this article, I had to upgrade to brighter lights because the guys I rode with had Magicshine Monteer 8000s. Although the beam pattern of my lights were nice, and sufficient lumens for riding solo, as soon as the group congregated my eyes would adapt to the brightness of their lights. As the ride resumed I'd be blind as my eyes adapted to my light. I've since upgraded to a Monteer 8000 on the head as well, and I like it a lot. I'd love to try one of Outbound Trail Evo bar lights in combination.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 2 days ago
What were you running instead of a Trail Evo on the bar?
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Tim Coleman
3 weeks, 1 day ago
An older Serfas True 750 all in one. It's nowhere near as bright as the 8000 lumen head lamp, but the two different light angles help my eyes with reducing shadows and adding depth. I also point the bar mount closer to the front tire than my head lamp so it adds some depth and brightness on the trail surface.
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Pete Roggeman
3 weeks, 1 day ago
Oh, ok, I thought you meant you had to upgrade FROM Outbound stuff. Got it. Yeah, an older 750 Serfas is gonna be overwhelmed by those night suns. But I'm also willing to bet that nothing that claims to be 8000 lumens is anywhere close to that for more than a few minutes. Too much heat, too much power required for that to be practical or accurate. Annnyway, we'll have to get you some to try.
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Tim Coleman
3 weeks, 1 day ago
No idea how much light it puts out, but its ALOT. I haven't found them dimming or getting particularly hot, but I always climb on the lowest setting, and then go to full brightness for descending. With no sunset to worry about my night rides tend to be on the longer side. So they're only on full brightness for a few minutes at a time. Gotta dim them down or off as the group congregates to prevent blinding people.
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XXX_er
3 weeks, 3 days ago
I havent been night riding since the Halogen days where I carved up a brake lever asembly with a dremel to make a 2 light helmet mount and i never tried a bar & helmet setup cuz only 1 battery pack, these new lights look to be much better tech
I learned always carry a spare light of some kind incase the main setup shits the bed and don't try to switch modes while still moving or I might be riding in complete darkeness
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