From: Quinn <quinn@cs.uwa.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Lights
Organization: The University of Western Australia
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1
     <Bs4yFw.41s@research.canon.oz.au>
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 02:24:18 GMT

Just to let you know that I'm talking from experience I commute for
about 30 minutes at night (plus lots of other general night
rides) in all weathers.

Mark Pulver, mpulver@research.canon.oz.au comments bitterly on
lighting systems:

>Speaking about Cateye light products, which I've been using for the last
>3-4 year.  They're junk.  Both the non-halogen and halogen models. They
>need constant maintain... cleaning/adjusting contacts.

I have to disagree with you here.

I've been using a Cat Eye HL-200 for at two years now and apart from
a few custom modifications it has been excellent.  I've also used the
matching taillight which has also been excellent.  And each cost me $17.
Not a big investment over that period

The custom mods involved soldering wirewrap wire from the contacts
directly onto the globe.  Any light that's permanently mounted to a
bike is going to suffer from vibration and weather effects that
ruin contacts.  So solder those wires.  [It's a bit of a bummer when
the globe blows but they last a long time.]

>Battery life of the halogen model is good only for a couple a weeks
>(but only really effected for the first few days).

What do you want?  A couple of weeks battery life sounds like a good
deal to me.  Every two weeks you recharge the batteries.  No problem.
(Better than my PowerBook which has a couple of hours battery life (-: )

btw most batteries have a slight peak in the voltage
curve when you first start using them.  This fades to a reasonably
steady level after a while which slowly drops off (until the battery
dies when it starts to fall away quickly).  Alkaline cells can
register as much as 1.7 V when you first use them.  This would explain
why your lights are brighter when you start.  The only solution is
to move to NiCads which, although they are less powerful (rated at 1.2 V
as opposed to the 1.5 V of carbon and alkaline batteries, have a very
flat voltage vs time curve.

>In the meantine, I might soon try some rechargable in it, just to save
>some money.  Of course, I would need to sets of batteries because
>rechargables die quite quickly.

You're not using rechargables!  Well that might explain you complaining
about the battery life.  Get some.  And when you do try and get the
ultra heavy duty ones.  My NiCad D cells (Dick Smith of all things!) are
rated at 4 Ah which is a huge improvement over the 1.5 Ah of my last set.

I can't understand your comments about NiCad lifetime.  I've been
using this set of D cells for more than a year now.  If you commute
every weekday replacing them every two years or so is not expensive.
My Walkman NiCads have been going since Year 10 (ahh, 1983) and only
now one of them has kicked the bucket.  The trick for long lifespan
is (IMHO) to make sure you fully discharge them before recharging.
[But I've seen advice contracting this so... it works for me.]

There are two problems with NiCads.  The first is that they are
less powerful (1.2 V vs 1.5 V) than normal batteries and thus your
lights are less bright.  My solution to that was to retrofit my
headlight with a halogen globe.  The halogen is rated at 0.5 A as
opposed to 0.3 A of the normal globe.  A lot brighter.  This eats
more power though.  4 Ah / 0.5 A = 8 h -- at 30 mins per day that
yields 16 days riding (in an ideal world).

The other problem with NiCads is their very flat voltage curve.
They maintain 1.2 V right up until they're flat and then just
fall over.  It's a real problem when your 20 minutes from home
and everything stops.  I've got an emergency set of lights (Vistas)
that I maintain for just those situations.

One other thing:  don't leave NiCads charged "on the shelf" and
expect them to stay that way.  NiCads have a half life of a few
weeks.  Solution:  use alkalines (shelf life measured in years)
for your emergency backup lights.

Quinn "The Eskimo!"   <quinn@cs.uwa.edu.au>  "Real Coke, Diet .sig"
Department of Computer Science, The University of Western Australia
  -- A fully battery power pedaller.
Newsgroups: aus.bicycle