I took a time out in the shop this morning to make some new light brackets. The only thing better than caffeine in the morning is jumping out of bed and making an idea into reality with your hands, at least for me. The idea of chain ring light brackets is not new, a little google-fu will get you some results like this:
Working from this as a starting point, I went through my piles of old chain rings and decided that the diameter of chain rings in the mid to high 20’s best matched the shape of the headlight. After a bit of cutting, filing, and polishing this is what I came up with:
I am pretty happy with the way they came out. Both lights will be mounting to a Nitto Mark’s rack, in different ways, so I made two different length brackets.
Backing up a bit for those not familiar with these types of lighting systems, one is likely to ask why even make a bracket? Why not just mount it upside down? The lights are made with a fairly advanced optic that focuses the light in a rectangular beam with a cutoff that keeps the light on the road and out of the eyes of oncoming traffic. The optic housing interface is further designed to be most water-resistant in the upright orientation. This all works out fine for 90% of the intended audience who mount these lights to the fork crown of an average city bike. The challenge starts with the crown mount location when you use a front bag or basket. The lights beam is obstructed in the competition for real estate. So a bracket needs to be used to move the light under the rack and forward so that the light is not blocked by the front wheel or hanging out in a spot where it can be easily damaged. Surprisingly there is not much on the market to solve this problem.
I am waiting for some additional hardware to be delivered so I can keep this project moving. Later in the week I should have this much further along.
Great great idea! I bought a used handmade mixte a few months ago and have a SON28 on it – I think your idea is ingenius! I’d love to purchase some of these brackets when you get to that point.
Pam in Ventura
Rob – have you seen the “hanging attachment” type of eDelux that Compass Bicycles carries? http://www.compasscycle.com/lighting_edelux_hang.html
You can read more about it here (summary: Jan Heine worked with Schmidt Maschinenbau to develop an “upside down” mounted version – NOTE it lacks a tail light connector and the daylight sensor)
http://janheine.wordpress.com/2012/01/09/edelux-headlights-for-hanging-attachments/
The hanging edluxe is the business, but the price point is a bit high for many people IMO. The B&M Cyo line will get you pretty close to there for almost half the price, and the Lyt line is really better than most people have ever had with a battery light and hits the street at $30 or less. The problem with the later two is the shape of the plastic housing for the under-mount and the fact that they would need a complete redesign for the inverted mount. Thus the bracket hack.
I know the eDelux is pretty sweet, but to get more people out, particularly at night, better easy lights will help. In urban and suburban settings a Lyt mounted well, under a wald basket would go a long way in keeping people on their bike for those rides under 5 miles.
As an aside, the beauty of these systems is choice, sweet Son hub or nice Shimano. eDeluxe or Lyt. There is a range of approachable price-points and solid performance that the LED and dynamo tech is bringing to the table. The Rambler will work gracefully with any combination, you can build it up top of the line, or go shimano and Lyt as you personal budget dictates.
My name is spinfile-names.dat and I am studying spinfile2-studies.dat and spinfile2-studies.dat at columnspinfile-address_data.dat-3 / columnspinfile-address_data.dat-1.