I just received these nifty lights as a test sample from a fairly new company called Bike Brightz.
If you visit their website, you’ll notice that they have a glow very similar to a neon light, but in fact Bike Brightz are LEDs, and they don’t cost as much as the neon light company’s products. When you order, the package comes with a few zip ties, velcro, rubber gasket/grommet, batteries and the LED unit. The LED unit has 4 modes: constant, flashing-slow, medium, fast.
Price per unit is $19.99
Available in 4 colors – Red,Green,Blue,Yellow
I mounted the blue and red lights on my bike, and you can see that it’s pretty bright and it will get you some attention and will definitely be seen by motorists.
I installed one on the chainstay and one on the down tube.
The Bike Brightz do not get in the way at all. I’ll be testing these lights out on both off and on-road conditions to see how well they do.
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This looks awesome cool but I have a silly question: out of the four Bike Brightz colours, which one would be the most noticeable to a motorist? Yellow is the most visible colour to the human eye but would this be too similar-looking to the lights emitted by the street lamps?
Looking forward to your upcoming review
NICE! When I’m back on the road (darn health keeps sidelining me), I have these on my wishlist
I’d be hinky about using a blue light. I recall reading about some guy with blue neons on his car getting busted. Of course, the cops might have been looking for a Mickey Mouse reason to pull him over, but they are pretty protective of their blue lights.
@Ken — I had that experience with blue lights, too. When I owned a car, there were two tiny blue lights facing forward and two illuminating the rear license plate. I got a hefty ticket that I could NOT talk my way out of.
In Florida, F.S. 843.081 covers the use of blue lights…a no-no for anyone but law enforcement. I’d stick to green or amber…something to stand out from the red lights of nighttime traffic.
Also covered in F.S. 316.2397 Certain lights prohibited; exceptions.– Better safe than sorry!
These look great! I wonder how effective the red version would be as a tail/rear light?
Very cool. Been looking for something a bit more compact then the neon tube lights.
I’d definitely like to hear what the battery life ends up being.
Am seriously disinclined against any bike lights that aren’t rechargeable. (I love the USB version of Blackburn’s Flea F & R lights). I see that the Brightz run on AAA-batteries (“Batteriez”?), but low-current devices tend to dramatically shorten the life-span of standard sized NiMh batteries, which hampers my efforts to reduce heavy-metal post-consumer waste.
Make these sealed-internal rechargeable with at least 1000+ discharge cycles, and I might be interested. I’ll gladly pay a bit more for the enhancement.
I wonder how weather-proof (particularly waterproof) these lights are. Only 30 hours in flash mode is not a very long battery life, but I could use rechargeable batteries…
30 hours of battery life doesn’t sound like much, especially when you compare it to a standard rear blinkie. But look — this thing is WAY more intense…the pool of light is pretty sizeable. And, 30 hours is one 1-hour-long dark ride for a whole month. That’s plenty.
@Jamey: Rechargeables may not survive as long in low-drain applications as they do in others, but it is still a million times better than using disposeables. I’ve amassed a pile of NiMH AA and AAA batteries for all the lights on my bikes and haven’t had any failures yet, and not one has wound up in the landfill (knock on wood).
How would these Bike Britez compare to the Down Low Glow?
And off-topic: When did y’all get this new look?
Mad,
I used to have a the DLG, and I gotta tell you, its just as bright.
We launched the new look on the 1st of the year. You like?
The 30 hours is for blinking mode, but their site interestingly leaves out the the runtime for continuous mode.
Jamey, do you have a reference regarding low-draw usage reducing NiMH lifespan?
Yeah, I wouldn’t use blue lights ESPECIALLY in concert with red. If the cops don’t get you the folks that think you’re a cop will.
This is their response to a question about steady mode battery duration.
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Phil,
In steady mode the lights will last about 6 hours. In fast flash mode the lights will last up to 30 hours. This is based on using high quality alkaline batteries. If you are going to use rechargeable NiMH batteries the time will be decreased and varies according to the quality of the NiMH. You could expect 4 to 5 hours out of NiMH.
Thanks for the question,
Bike Brightz
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While not optimal, it seems reasonable.
they look a bit chunky and crude to me. fibre flares are pretty cool but i dont blame people getting these as fibre flare are taking so long to roll out their blue, green and yellow colours