I was looking at getting this from winstanleys but they couldnt tell me what actually came in the box, did it come with a handlebar and a helmet mount or just 1 of them?

I was looking at getting this from winstanleys but they couldnt tell me what actually came in the box, did it come with a handlebar and a helmet mount or just 1 of them?

It comes with both. Detailed breakdown in the manual:
http://cdn.hopetechnology.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/R4LEDInstructionsManual2012_Complete_Iss2.pdf
(this looks like the older manual, but mine definitely came with a separate headstrap and helmet mount (these share a bayonet fitting) and a handlebar mount.

ezB

It’s about as uuseful as 5th Gear doing a road test comparing an Aston Martin with a Skoda Superb. You get what you pay for in quality, but it doesn’t mean the Skoda isn’t useful. And the Aston Martin is out of most people’s budget.

Disagree. Your analogy is flawed. If Skoda/Kia/Whoever advertised their product as being twice as powerful as the Aston then you might have a point but they don’t. Or if the engines just seized after 30,000 miles and you just scrapped the car. Or if they randomly burst into flames while you were re-fueling.

The Aston costs 5 or 10 times what someone in a decent job can make in year, drinks fuel and is incredibly expensive to maintain, so it is out of most peoples reach. £150 – £200 on a bike light isn’t beyond most peoples means.

A better analogy would be to say a Chinese light is like a Chinese chainsaw. Cheap to buy, may or may not work well. If it breaks you might as well bin it, oh and it might just fail catastrophically resulting in a very serious injury.

Do you have to wiggle the connectors between the charger and battery to get it to charge?
My older R4 is like that and my mates got the point where it wouldn’t charge at all.

One of my batteries seems to be like this – more of a twist of the connector than a wiggle just to make sure the charging light goes red.
RM.

Bang on!
I’m wiggling the charging lead under my desk as I type!!

like a Chinese chainsaw. Cheap to buy, may or may not work well. If it breaks you might as well bin it, oh and it might just fail catastrophically resulting in a very serious injury.

Yes, I could have greatly exaggerated the point, I suppose. 😆

Well, first ride out, and I can provide some real-world results:

1) Lights were running for about 1hr 45 mins on a mix of Max and Medium (the highest and lowest settings in “race mode”)
2) Battery level indicator reports 3/5 power remaining, which is superb, especially as this is the first cycle of the battery
3) Illumination is much better than my old lamp. Perhaps the photos in my original post give an idea of this, but on the trail, the light is more evenly distributed and has a much wider throw. At no point did I think I was underlit, or missed not having a head lamp
4) Battery and lamp didn’t move an inch despite some good cobble action
5) A good measure of the lamp’s performance – I came within 2s of my best Strava time on my favourite downhill section…in the dark! 😀

Night riding FTW!

I have entered the fully dark commuting mode 👿

My recent ssx2 will get helmet fit and an r4 will go on the bars.

Thanks to Daern for the thread, I hope the hope is as good on road 😮

I have entered the fully dark commuting mode

My recent ssx2 will get helmet fit and an r4 will go on the bars.

Thanks to Daern for the thread, I hope the hope is as good on road
Judging by a couple of slightly annoyed looking motorists this evening, I think the R4 might by somewhat overkill for the road! That said, with the lightweight battery pack and the power dialled down, the runtime should be awesome.

It’s a handsome thing – would look nice on any road bike, but obviously a green one would match it very handsomely 🙂

I hope the hope is as good on road

Point it down a bit, one of those in the eye of a motorist is like 10 suns blinding them all at once

Interesting thing, the whole bike light topic.

Seems that it’s one of those things that a lot of people think you should spend as little as possible on, whereas if you are looking for some handlebars, seatpost or set of wheels people will generally recommend higher end offerings, over cheaper variants that will work (to all intents and purposes) just as well.

I used my Moon XP1500 on the road a few weeks ago (first time to try it on-road) and it’s way too bright. You have to point it right at the ground as the spread is so wide and/or point it right towards the ground.
I’ve mounted it on the bike and wandered down the road to look back at it and it is ridiculously bright. If I use it on the road, I turn it down to the min setting and point it at the ground.

It s abit like shoes. I can buy some shoes that cost £10, they fit on your feet, you can walk in them, they keep your feet warm.

I can also buy some shoes for £60,
They do all the same things, feel nicer and look at lot better.

I can also spend £200 on shoes, they’re the same as the £60 shoes, just have a fancy badge.

Now, you have a choice. The more expensive shoes will.most likely last longer, and fit a bit better, and have a nice finish.

If you just want shoes, then buy £10 shoes. If you want lovely shoes, buy £60 shoes. If you have money to burn, buy the £200 shoes. They do the same thing, just differently.

Those who bought the £10 shoes will bang on about how awesome they are for being so shrewd although they wear out in 6 months of normal use, the £200 shoe buyers will bang on about how much better their shoes are and about how great the brand is. While the £60 shoe buyers go for a walk.

Replace £10 with eBay, £60 with Gloworm, exposure, hope, £200 with Lupine.

Stumpy01 – How do you get on with the Moon XP1500, see they are cheap(ish) on Merlins at the moment.

Im after a light that I can use on my road bike but also for lighting the local MTB trails, is it too bright on the lowest setting for the road? Not keen on buying a Chinese copy and the XP1500 seems like a good deal to me.

Luminator is a great light, cheaper and brighter than Hope. Mine has been more reliable than the Hope Vision 4 it replaced which twice had cable issues. UK support too not that I’ve needed any.

rickon – Member

Those who bought the £10 shoes will bang on about how awesome they are for being so shrewd although they wear out in 6 months of normal use, the £200 shoe buyers will bang on about how much better their shoes are and about how great the brand is. While the £60 shoe buyers go for a walk.

Mmm. But then the R4’s a really good example of how you can buy a light from Fluxient or Magicshine that produces pretty much identical light, from the same LED setup, in a smaller and lighter head unit that while it’s not nicely machined is functionally better, and which is more reliable, and comes with an equivalent quality charger and battery (that you won’t need to fanny about with the cable)… And costs less than the Hope to boot. But which people buy the Hope anyway because they perceive it as better.

(the Hope does have a superior bracket)

i bought the hope r4 to supplement / supercede the ssx2 for my 50km/day road commute on B and C graded roads [no lighting].

my 2009 hope vision [4 LED] still works and is still used offroad on helmet.

no issues here with hope kit.

+1 for the Lumenator.

For road use it’s good on the low setting and dipped, with really long run times. For offroad use it has plenty of grunt in the higher settings and a decent beam pattern. Have used it recently in some pretty torrential conditions and it’s been fine. Cabling (particularly the coupling) appears water tight and problem free so far.

IMHO best combined with a Hope universal bar mount instead of the supplied o-rings as it allows you to adjust the light angle left and right: http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/hope-universal-handlebar-mount/rp-prod23533?utm_source=Google&utm_medium=Shopping&utm_name=UnitedKingdom&gs=1 (you’ll need to replace supplied screw with a M4x10mm screw to fit the Hope mount to the Luminator body).