On 2017-03-10 11:45, jbeattie wrote:
[...]
If you're riding a lot during the day with a DRL then you really
should consider a dyno light. I was riding with my son this morning,
and we passed a guy with a DRL, and I thought that it was
unnecessarily bright for a DRL -- and goddamn if it wasn't a
round-beam Supernova E3. The two of us were DRL-less, although I was
personally in need of recharging.
To some extent. I found that when car drivers in an urban area are
particularly inattentive and I switch my front light from 3.5W to 8W
that does get their attention much better. A dynamo can't muster that
much oomph in normal city riding.
On county roads I always ride with full LED power. I found that oncoming
vehicles see me earlier and veer right a bit to give traffic in my
direction more room and thus me a better clearance. Flash mode would be
as bright and save 50% power but that is very annoying to others.
When my front rim is up I will look for a complete wheel or wheel set
with a hub dynamo as long as the cost for the front wheel is under $100.
The value of such a dynamo is limited in this day and age of powerful
Li-Ion batteries. My bigger battery has 60Wh of usable capacity which
means I can ride over 5h with the ship fully lit, music blaring and all
that. A typical dynamo goosed to 5W or so would need at least 20 hours
of solid riding to recharge such a large battery when depleted.
Realistically all a dynamo would do is extend the battery runtime and I
could reduce the size of the battery. That is an advantage but not a big
one because the weight saved by removing two or four 18650 cells is not
that great considering that the hub dynamo adds weight back.
If there'd be a way to goose a dynamo to 10W that would be a different
story. One has to keep in mind that some cyclists want more than just
light. In my case it is just an MP3 player but others have a GPS and a
smart phone. Easily another 3-5W.
With or without dynamo I'll never ride without a battery because then
it's lights out when waiting at an intersection. Very bad at night.
Now, about the bicycle air conditioner ... :-)
--
Regards, Joerg
http://www.analogconsultants.com/