What to Consider while Buying new bike lights?

Bicycles are becoming the next passion for youngsters, adults and even, the old age people are fond of them. If you are planning to make a purchase very soon, for yourself or someone else, you need to be very cautious.  Especially, for the bike lights, you cannot take any risk. Read on to know more.

Whether you ride it for a fun or you keep it to stay fit, your bicycle is an all-time companion of yours. Driving through the ups and downs, you enjoy every single moment spend along it. Therefore, it forms a special part of your life. Are you planning to change the old one? Or want to gift it to your son, whatever the reason is, there are few facts you cannot escape from. It is related to the lights on your bike. Lights offer safety while driving. Thus, it is important to consider the quality of bike lights before making any purchase. Let’s find out, what all you need to check:

1. Brightness: Lights are meant for showing the path in the dark. Hence, they need to produce enough bright light. Nowadays, LED is being used in the bicycles generally. Whenever you buy a new bike, make sure it features at least a 1-watt bulb. If you are a regular bicycle commuter, it is ideal for maximum visibility on the tail light. Secondly, if you are considering lumens, then it should be 250 lumens (the commuting lights). 

2. Battery Power: Brightness matters a lot, but battery affects the brightness of your lights. Thus, you cannot ignore the battery power. It has a significant impact on the intensity. A couple of lithium Watch batteries will give you 100 hours of run time. You can switch to the AA or AAA batteries. They offer 24-hour run time and are available in 1-2 watt. 

3. Quality: You will get a wide range of bike lights, varying in quality and price. It is advisable not to compromise quality. You must go for the best quality LED’s.

4. Functionality: The choice of lights will depend on the way you wish to use it. For example, if you want to vary the luminance, you need flashing lights. Similarly, if you want to make your bike extra-ordinary, you can go disco flashlights too.

5. Uses: Choose the light, which goes perfect with you bike. Among the various designs available, pick the one with proper set up bracket. It will now become easy to attach it to the seat post, backpack, handlebars, or helmet. 

If done with these points, you can drive off to your destination. Remember, driving safe is must!

Accessories for Mountain Bikers – What Do You Really Need?

Mountain bikers live off the edge and push their bodies and their bikes to the limit. In this post, we will list out a handful of important accessories that you will need to keep that adrenaline pumping and the journey unending. Bikers, who have a habit of venturing into uncharted farther territories as they push their own physical limits to the extreme, require a spate of bicycle accessories to help them last the thrilling ordeal. While some bikers may not consider them as essential, it is still helpful to have along with you the following:

Hydration packs – Several companies in the market offer hydration packs. When you choose to do some serious mountain riding, it is essential you remain hydrated and therefore choose a pack that enables that. Most packs today exist in the range of 70 oz to 100 oz. For longer and tougher rides, it is suggested you carry the 100 oz model. 

Spare tubes – Consider yourself in the middle of nowhere, having to sit by the side of the track until help comes through, with a flat tyre. This situations can arise anywhere, when least expected, and an extra tube is therefore essential to keep along the journey at least to a point where the other can be taken care of. 

Levers for use – A tube is no good without the tools to carry out a stitch-up on your puncture. It is impossible to carry out a patch-up on your wheels without having the appropriate levers to assist with the mechanics. Always keep some handy. 

Mini-Pump – Once you are done with your patch-up jobs, you need to refill the tubes, and that is when you need a mini-pump. In any case, a mini-pump is essential for long journeys. 

Multi-tool – A do-it-all gadget is important as you never know when you may have to unscrew something or cut into something. 

Bike Lights – Your bike must have good quality front and rear lights. Magicshine is the leader for bicycle lights in the UK. Coming from the house of trustable brand like Magicshine, their bike light accessories are essential when your riding adventures are set to extend into the darker hours of day. Some riders take upon the challenges of riding in the night, while some may end up having to deal with it circumstantially. In any case, bike lights are a must-have. 

PowerLinks – The risks of your chain breaking out there in the open grow severe as the terrain becomes difficult. It is important that you have a couple of powerLinks handy, to be installed with the help of a multi-tool kit. So whenever your chain breaks, you don’t have to carry the cycle on your shoulders; you can just install a new powerLink to reconnect the chains. 

First-Aid Kit and Nutritional supplements - When you are cycling for hours, you will naturally lose a big chunk of calories. While the whole objective of the cycling mission may be knock off calories, the body requires a re-supply to keep the energy level going and power in your legs. It is therefore essential that you pack in nutritious food packets, fruits, energy drinks and just about everything that can help you keep going. A first-aid kit is also essential to mend any injuries or bruises that you might suffer on the trail. 

Women's Tour 2014 – A Giant Leap in Women’s Cycling Championship

The inaugural Women's Tour starts from Oundle in Northamptonshire and will mainly take place along the East Midlands and East Anglia, before ending the four day event in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk. Highlighting the importance of the event, the Dutch cyclist Marianne Vos showed her gratitude and excitement as the event promises to draw mass audiences like the London Olympics in 2012. She added that the populace in Great Britain has a special esteem for the sport and with such awe-inspiring spectators the race will surely be a fantastic affair.

As the 2014 Women’s Tour embarked on 7^th May in Great Britain, the Dutch cyclo-cross bicycle racer Marianne Vos perceived it as a landmark event. In an interview with BBC, Vos expressed her enthusiasm for the experience and described it as her dream. She said it was my dream to drive the women’s cycling to a higher level and the familiarity of such event with big organizations makes her feel pleased.

Termed as the finest cyclist of this generation, Vos is repeatedly compared with the legendary names like Eddy Merckx. Being the UCI Women’s Road Cup winner for five times in six years, Marianne considers the tour as an important milestone that corresponds to the impressive pace with which women cycling is progressing. Moreover, she portrayed the tour as important event on this year’s calendar and will be huge success that will certainly provide women cyclists with an experience of a lifetime.

Analyzing the tour as a vital sign of progress, Marianne said that the event will be a new chapter for women cycling, Accompanying her was the English cyclist Emma Pooley who is a former British Road Race and an active member of Le Tour that focuses on promoting such events to provide better opportunities and equality for women. Lizzie Armitstead, who has won a total of five medals at the UCI will certainly be the hometown favorite for the event. However, weighing upon the importance of the event, Lizzie said that the event is a resultant of some great efforts from Marianne and Emma. Besides this, Lizzie classed the two cyclists as powerful women and expected to work together to take women's cycling to the next level.

Bike Light Accessories Add Fun and Safety to Your Ride

Riding a bicycle is a great past time for some, for some it is the best way to remain fit and for a few it is the finest way to commute low on emissions and without the worry of rising petrol prices. No matter what category of bike user you are; bike light accessories is one thing that will make bike riding comfortable and fun for you.

Bikes have seen a renaissance in the recent few years in the United Kingdom and Europe. Many manufactures and designers have come up who are making bikes to meet the needs of the youth (who are considered the widest users of bikes in the UK and Europe). Students and young office goers are using bikes to commute to their schools, colleges and offices.

Riding bike is fun, healthy, emissions free and cheap as compared to other forms of transportation, but it is the most unsafe way of commuting, especially in the dark, rain or overcast conditions. Because it is an unsafe way of transportation, many parents and well-wishers are worried about the safety of their wards. The best way to be safer on the road while riding a bike is to have bright powerful lights installed on the front and rear of the bike. Having lights on the bike makes it that much easier of the rider to ride, and for the other motorists on the road to locate the rider.

What are bike light accessories?

Installing bike lights on to front handle or the rear of the bike isn’t the only way out, there are numerous bike light accessories available out there that can make being visible while riding fun. There are many bicycle accessories manufacturers in the UK, and Magicshine is one of the finest names in the business. Bicycle accessories or bike lighting or bike light accessories as you can refer them to include, everything from helmet mounts, mains power chargers, Y cables, extension cables and O-rings.

All these aforementioned accessories are provided by Magicshine in the UK and can be easily purchased from Bike Lights UK store. These accessories make it easy for the lights to be installed on the bike or be used in such a way that the road ahead is visible and the vehicles on the road can also see the rider.

Some Bike Light Accessories to Make Riding Fun and Safe

·         Mains power chargers: The battery used to power the bike light is rechargeable. Being rechargeable, it is important to have a mains charger handy so that the battery can be charged on the go.

·         Helmet mounts: There are ways to install bike lights onto the front bars and the rear of the bikes, but not everyone likes it that way. For who would like to wear the light on their helmet, helmet light mounts with Velcro strap are available which allow you to wear the light on the helmet.

·         O-rings: ‘O' ring allow you to fit bike lights to the bike's handlebars (both standard and oversized).

·         Y cables: Y-cable lets you run 2 bike lights off the same battery.

Vintage bike lights

People who have a classy and vintage taste like to have everything that they possess have that touch too. From dressing and accessories and from home interiors to their most serious belongings can be seen with a vintage touch. Still some other people like to have that vintage touch in few of the items that they have. Vintage bicycles are one such possession. They are as classier as are the vintage cars as they are a great reminder of a biking fashion which even today is in passion of many bike riding lovers.

To compliment the vintage bikes the vintage bike lights are prefect bicycle accessories. Some can be seen as a launch by some bike lights manufacturer whereas some are customized by the bikers themselves. There is a huge fan following of the vintage bike lights lovers and they make it sure that their vintage bike lights have that sophisticated look in their every aspect. The bulbs of such lights are given the shape of the old time. Even the lenses are made bit convex in shape which you do not see in the modern bike lights. The exterior body is made in a silver or gold look which can be given by using simple materials. These vintage bike lights are generally seen attached firmly to the bikes but even the mounting mechanisms work well when customized to their shape. All in all, vintage bike lights are a good and nostalgic section of the bike lights that are still in demand and use. To have a look at the best bike lights you can go to http://www.bikelightsuk.com/ and view top bike light brands.