Each light set has two globes on it and you can get different spreads, if you get one narrow and one intermediate then when you have them on your helmet you angle the narrow so that it points where you will normally look (that depnds where you ride, MTB may be line of sight 5 m in front, on the road may be 15m) and you use the intermediate to light up your surrounds a bit more.
When you have them on your bars on the road it works well to angle the intermediate at the ground ahead so it lights up the surface and surrounds nicely and the spot can be used to make sure cars know your there, not in their eyes of course, but they are so bright that cars will stop and wait from way ahead, thinking you must be a motorbike.
had mine 2 years, had a charger stop working, replaced no questions. No other problems. bomb proof, super light and compact, actually cheap for what you get in my opinion.
This seems to be turning into the ‘buy the Ayups or get lost’ thread!
But a question- what do you do when you lock your bike up on the street? Is it complicated to remove the lights and untangle the cables? Here in Melbourne the pricks in the city take anything off your bike
At least with my cheap Cateye’s, it only takes two clicks to remove them.
The lights are held down with a rubber clip and the battery is attached via a velcro belt. It takes 5 seconds (or shorter) to take the lights + batteries from the bike… safe as houses.
Love my Ay-Ups. I use mine helemt mounted around town. Plenty of my mates use theirs bar mounted, try intermediate. I am Brissie based and the local Police have the new flashing units. I am more than happy with a solid beam.
If you order Ay-Ups, ask for Matt, tell him Gordy sent you.
Their service is excellent.
I’m finding riding home in the evening I ‘need to see’ rather than ‘being seen’.
Some of the areas on the bike path through Stones Corner/Greenslopes are not well enough lit and seeing the path is tricky. At one section there can be a few drunks and they can be difficult to see too.
I love the AyUps but it’d hard to justify those $$ when I won’t need them in 4 weeks or so…
i have only been riding with 1 or 2 knog frogs on the front for the last few years…
should probs be dead, but they are inconspicous on your bike when locked and ive never had mine stolen, and they are easily swapped between bikes.
although i usually ride with 3 rear lights as i feel them to be a little more important.
A seatpost mounted 5 LED (the long narrow cateye ripoff version) by some generic brand which has lasted me 2 years so far, a planet bike super rave light on my bag and a 1 LED knog styled light with an elastic band on the back of my helmet.
interested in AYUPs now that there will be a flashing mode available. I just dont want hassles when locking up.
Considering the price of other lighting systems, around the same brightness as Ay-ups, they are great value. You may find other uses for them.
hjb1000, they take a couple of seconds to remove and all is left is the mount, which is zip tied to your bars or helmet.
Recently purchased a niterider Mewt mini usb light for bike paths/winter training rides - not cheap ($260) but its bright, small, easy to put on different bikes and you can recharge the battery on a usb connection.
as bright as anything i’ve seen anyone else with, but only around 1hour run time, which is fine for me. only problem is complete lack of quality control at dealextreme. but they are relatively helpful when things don’t work.
the wife has just started riding with me to work, and she’s in need of a front light. i was thinking of passing on my current Cygolite Milion (around 15 months old) and upgrading/getting something brighter for myself.
this is kind of a stop-gap while i continue to buy bits and assemble my commuter (dyno front hub/3-spd rear hub/very bike path friendly/potential super-commuter)
i’ve narrowed it down to a few options. is it really worth spending the extra $100-$150 for the ayups (aussie company and all that) ??
I use them in all weather, and leave them on when I’m washing my bike (though I try not to get water on them, some inevitably does). The cables/battery placement is a bit cumbersome as I run a front and rear off the one battery, but I don’t care… it’s about safety.
i’ve got the niterider and have a few issues with it, was mounting the battery on the frame and light on the handlebars for a couple of months, and it seems to have weakened the connection between them so that occasionallyit will go out while riding and have to be switched on. also in the dark it can be really hard to align the light cord to plug into the battery, easily solved with a couple of white dots on each end i guess. also the low batteryindicator is pretty useless, by the time it comes on, you only seem to have 10 mins left at full, need to switch to flash mode, where it goes for at least one hour.
