Tumble & Fall HALO Front Light

Dark nights and dark mornings are here for my commutes, so it’s an ideal time to test and review light sets. High Peak Cycles stepped up and asked me to take a look at the T&F ‘HALO’ lights. They are a 2000 lumen light with separate power (battery) pack, good burn times claimed and a budget RRP of £99.99 – given the specs. The warranty and the fact that unlike some of the cheap imported lights – these won’t burn your house down if you leave them on charge overnight – add to the appeal.

Once unpacked the quality and accessories are good. Aside from the main light and battery pack you get a helmet strap and head torch. Some basic instructions/ info are included in the box. First job – charge the battery up. Plug in and when red light turns to green (approx. 4 hours) we are good to go.

Fitting on the bike was very straightforward. The battery pack is a neat size and the neoprene case is well designed so you get a nice secure fit. The light is a simple design where you sit the light onto your bars and then use one of the two supplied O-rings to hold it in place.

A nice feature is that the connection point (from light to battery lead) clicks in place and then screws shut, so you know it is watertight. Settings are straight forward. Left button controls the outer Halo ‘rings’. Press once for a ‘solid’ halo (shown below) and twice for ‘flashing’.

Press the right button and you can cycle through the main lights. Press once for low, twice for medium, three times for high and four times for ‘flashing’. One long press switches the lights off. The two lights (or halos) operate together.

So, lights on and out in the dark early mornings and evenings to test them. The test week saw temps down to -3 early on and later in the week very heavy rain which presented no issues to the lights. I ran the T & F Halo light alongside my Hope R2i light as I’m very familiar with it’s settings. I concentrated on using the ‘main’ lights on the halo. I stopped to test the lights on an unlit rural road. This is without lights (yes, seriously) …

Halo Setting one. This gave a similar strength to the Hope 40 lumen setting.

Halo Setting 2. This gave a similar strength to the Hope 200 lumen setting.

Halo Setting 3. This is the 2000 lumen setting. The picture doesn’t do the power justice as it was considerably stronger than setting two and was more powerful than the Hope on its highest 1000 lumen setting.  It’s very bright and too powerful for constant road use.

In use for my commutes I found setting one was too weak. I would be well suited to well lit roads, but is best considered a ‘be seen’ light only.

I found that setting two/ medium was just about sufficient for most of my commute, but did not cast enough forward light when I got to unlit roads or when I was travelling over 20mph / downhill and needed better warning of pot holes or grids. I needed to move to setting 3 (high / 2000 lumen) for those times. The full charge (mainly setting two) lasted 5 hours 26 minutes. The display then turned from green to red and the light died 15 minutes later, giving a total burn time of 5 hours 41 minutes which is a bit better than the claimed time. Never a bad thing!

I’m currently checking the burn time of using setting 3 (high power / 2000 lumen) and will add that information to the review in the next few days. *Update 22/11/16 – The light managed just over 2 hours on full 2000 lumen power. That was spread over three rides with a ‘gap’ of over a week between ride 2 and 3 as I was out of the country/manflu for a week. On full power the display light went red to warn of low battery, then shut down within a couple of minutes. 

After a week with the T&F Halo lights I’m impressed with the user friendliness and burn times. The output on high (2000 lumen) is very good. It’s a shame medium setting wasn’t just a bit stronger, but where necessary it’s just a case of switching to high setting then back to medium. The main light itself is only 98g (very light), so my next step is to try it out offroad as a helmet light.

I did have one niggle. Part of keeping costs down is the main light fixing. This is built into the light so you sit it onto the bars, then use a tight o-ring to keep it in place. As it’s a pre-machined size it was a little too small for my road bike bars. It sat in place ok until I rode over poor surfaces (vibrations), or pressed a button to change the light setting. It then moved forward a touch so it pointed down to the road more than I want. This won’t be an issue on thinner bars.

Overall, the T&F Halo lights do everything you would want for a set of lights at this price point – and a bit more. If you are looking to spend £100 on a set of lights then these should be at the top of your list.

LED Lenser XEO19R Front Light

In June 2017 I/we (a team of four) have entered ‘Mountain Mayhem’ which is a 24 hour cross country race held every year in Gatcombe Park. AFTER getting our entry confirmed we worked out that each one of us would be doing at least two or three ‘night laps’. As Gatcombe is a mixed wooded course which takes 45 mins to 1 hour per lap depending on conditions (and rider!) then lights I have (an old Lupine Edison HID and a Hope R2i) would fall well short of burn time with not enough time between laps to recharge. We needed a powerful light with a burn time of over 2 hours 30 mins from one charge to be safe.

One of the team (Dave Robinson) runs his own business (Garage Tool Services) and sells LED Lenser products. He got a couple of LED Lenser XEO19R Lights so that we could see if they were suitable. I got one to test and review and have now run it for two weeks on my work commutes (road bike).

The LED Lenser light is sold in to different markets so comes with an array of accessories enabling it to be used for biking, walking, running or pretty much any activity you can think of. Full retail price is £249.

First job is to charge the battery pack up. Red is bad, blue is good!

Once charged I used the bike (bar) accessory to mount the light. I preferred this to helmet mount for road use as it could be pointed down toward the road to avoid dazzling other road users. I taped the bike first …

Everything fits easily and is very secure. The two silver levers (one each side of the light) allow you to alter the focus of each light. Move forward for a ‘spot’ light or back for a very broad spread of light.

The multi button on top of the light allows you to control the lights either together (pressing the orange central button) or separately (left button for left light, right button for right light). The rear button (if pressed for five seconds) locks the unit for travel purposes. The front button (if pressed for two seconds) activates ‘BOOST’ mode which is a eye watering 2,000 lumens.

I had a quick play with the light to get used to setting it up. It’s quite simple with the light to hand…

One press puts the lights(s) on low setting. This is approx. 300 lumens. Two presses puts on high setting which is approx 1000 lumens. Three presses puts on ‘Optisense’ mode. This is ideal for walking as it senses when you look down and dips the light output (for looking at a map or GPS). Four presses puts on ‘flash’ mode. Five presses switches off.

The are three other settings via the button. ‘Lock’ and ‘boost’ have been explained ^^ above. The last is ‘Variable’. If you hold central button (for both lights) or either left button or right button for two seconds the lights(s) will allow you to decide how bright you want them. Lowest setting is 150 lumens upto 1000 lumens.

After ten minutes of playing around the myriad of settings all make sense and from there on it’s simple to set the light up exactly as you want it. For me, using on roads at 4.30am in the Peak District (some unlit) I decided to try two different settings.

This is just off Woodhead Road at 5am in the morning. No street lights, so literally pitch black. A great place to compare the Lenser settings. Daft I know, but to get an idea of just how dark it is this is a photo taken just before I switched the Lenser on …

I had the left light on setting two –  1000 lumens (and spotlight). I had the right light on setting one – 300 lumens (and broad spread).

This setting was perfect for my country commute and gave a burn time of five and a half hours. I found this ideal as it gave plenty of forward light when moving fast downhill (30+ mph) or on unlit roads with the 1000 lumen spot, yet lots of peripheral light from the 300 lumen broad light. A great combination.

I tried both lights on 1000 lumens. One Spotlight and one broad light. You can see the additional light. In truth this was too bright when I got onto roads with some street lighting despite the Lenser being tilted down toward the road.

This setting gave a burn time of just under 3 hours … which also included me playing with the light to get used to settings and testing ‘boost / 2000 lumen’ mode quite a few times.

Speaking of which this is the 2,000 lumens. The picture doesn’t so it justice. I haven’t yet got a burn time for this as I will need to test it off road. It’s far too bright for using on road and will see me getting abuse!

Overall the power of the light and burn times have been very impressive. I still intend to use the helmet mount for an off road night ride (I’ll update the review with that), but I’m confident the light is good enough for our Mountain Mayhem race. One charge will be sufficient for the two or three night laps.

I did run the Lenser alongside my Hope R2i to compare. Hope say the R2i is 1000 lumen. It has been measured above that (1,300 to 1,400) and is a perfect commute light (as it’s battery is built in so no additional pack). With the Lenser set on 1000/1000 lumen the Hope was enveloped and added nothing. At these settings the Hope would run out after one hour and the lenser would last for three hours.

It’s easy to see how the Lenser can run for 10+ hours on one charge by cycling through the settings. One light on low (300 lumen) and one on flash would be fine for most urban requirements and would increase burn time significantly.

Downsides – Only one. There are no obvious warnings that the light is running low. Not a biggie as you soon get used to burn times and it’s very simple to recharge after every ride, but worth a mention.

Would I recommend the Lenser – Yes. I’ve been impressed enough to buy the unit I’m testing.