MTB Lights 2022!

Don't hate me for starting to think about winter night riding already! My MTB lights are 10+ years old. The batteries are failing. I can get new batteries for the old heads, but they are fairly $$$ and the LED tech in my head units is old. I haven't looked deep into MTB lights for a long time now. I figured I would save some time and ask the Hive Mind what would be good options to look at. Especially given buying them in Canada with Beaver Bucks.

I'd be shooting for a smaller helmet mounted spot and a bigger bar mounted flood. My old man eyes want a lot of lumens and I need 2 solid hours of runtime...ideally more so I end up with 2hrs for a lot of years as the batteries age.

Obviously they need to be well sealed for rainy use! ;-)

check out the specialized flux 1250, they come with handlebar, gopro and helmet mount and are easily switchable inbetween the mounts with decent runtime and a wide cone of light

I use an Outbound Lighting set: Hangover on the helmet, and Trail Evo on the bars. On Low, the bar light lasts 8-10 hours and is plenty bright for me. The Hangover is maybe 4ish hours on Low. I'm very happy with both of them.

I use an Outbound Lighting Hangover on my helmet which is good for the speed/features I'm riding through the winter on high beam. I wish it were a little longer running for me, but there's an external power connector you can trickle charge it with that's decent.

Serfas True 1300 MTB is one of my favorite lights. It's super bright, has field swapable batteries and cheap enough you can get 2. If you can find the Serfas 750 is also brighter than it's lumens state and you can swap the lens for wide or spot beam.

Folks in my riding group rave about the cheap Amazon Chinese lights, but I'm not sold on either the value or the risk of a battery exploding in my house.

The Light & Motion stuff looks great too.. just haven't had the appetite to drop $400 for a light.

Another vote in for the outbound setup from me.

Thanks for the suggestions. I've started to look at them. After getting some pricing for new lights I did go ahead and order one new battery for my old lights. I figure I have 2 head units and 2 chargers so with a new battery I should get another 5+ years out of them even if one head unit or charger fails. So the price to performance seemed worth it. I'll use the old light as my bar mounted light. It's kind of a heavy head unit and the beam pattern works well there. Saves me from having to dispose of the old lights.

I'll get a new light for my helmet. Something newer/smaller, but probably just as bright as my old bar mount light given the advancement in tech.

My buddy let me know Light & Motion has a deep sale on right now. Not sure what that means with shipping to BC, but could be interesting for some folks and especially anyone on the US side of the border.

https://lightandmotion.com/collections/bike

Seems like a small thing, but gopro mounting and a Garmin Outfront handlebar mount was as big a step forwards as the lights themselves.
Being able to snap my light onto any helmet in seconds and the same for the front light into handlebars made a big difference to my night ride prep.

Posted by: DanL

Seems like a small thing, but gopro mounting and a Garmin Outfront handlebar mount was as big a step forwards as the lights themselves.
Being able to snap my light onto any helmet in seconds and the same for the front light into handlebars made a big difference to my night ride prep.

I've got a helmet set aside for night riding with the mount permanently installed [essentially a bar mount]. My bar light have an integrated rubber strap so they just pop on and off in seconds. I agree that a simple setup is pretty key to making night rides happen given the other challenges inherent in the activity.

ah nice, a dedicated helmet! I used to use the rubber straps but I always found them to get bouncy at exactly the time I didn't need them to so a solid mount became necessary

Posted by: DanL

ah nice, a dedicated helmet! I used to use the rubber straps but I always found them to get bouncy at exactly the time I didn't need them to so a solid mount became necessary

I had a helmet I didn't love for normal use/longer rides so it was perfect for the typical shorter night rides where things aren't ideal anyways. My lights stay put 100% with the rubber straps. They were well designed for ease of use and performance. That's why I felt okay buying another battery and keeping them going on the bar. 

I do have some other non-MTB commuter lights that use fixed brackets. My issue with those is I don't like to leave the brackets on my bars when not using the lights so that creates a bit of friction installing/removing them each time.

Outbound is superb. The quality of the light, spread and the auto dim feature are best in class.

The light I am keeping going is this ^^ Dinotte XML-4. An older light that puts out ~2K lumens for 90mins or so, but I can toggle it to a lower setting or off for the climb so no issues getting max lumens when needed for a full 2hr ride.

I like this Gemini Duo light. Victoria BC based company. 2.2K lumens with 2hr runtime. separate head unit and battery. On bar wireless remote.

https://gemini-lights.com/products/duo-2200-multisport

The Outbound Hangover is nice as well. ~1K lumens for 90mins. Integrated battery. Made in the US.

https://www.outboundlighting.com/collections/bike-helmet-lights/products/hangover-bike-helmet-light

The price is comparable between the two. The Gemini is more powerful with more runtime, but is heavier and has an external battery pack. I'm leaning toward the Gemini at the moment. The more lumens for longer is nice. The external battery pack means I balance the weight of the head unit or store the battery on my body. I like the wireless remote since reaching up to adjust a helmet light power setting is a PITA. I'll make a move at the start of Sept since that's when it'll start getting dark enough to need a light. These days my eyes are not as good in lower light so even dusk/gloomy riding in the forest I appreciate a light despite it not really being night.

Thanks for all the replies!