That there Exposure Revo light

Now that they seem to be available… has anyone baught one yet?

I’m sorely tempted to, but just would like to hear some more real world stories about them first.

Yes, it’s good.

Some comments on this thread if you scroll through.
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/my-ideal-commuting-light-would-be

Cool.. thanks for the link, I’d not found that one in my searches…

And it’s certainly getting good things said about it.

So how does it do on the lower speed side of things.. if I’m wiggling in and out of trees a lot, does it still manage to get a decent light output?

Robdeanhove is going to be able to answer that better than I but once you’ve got up to speed then it doesn’t drop off and lose that much power if you slow down.

However if you stop or the first part of the ride is an uphill twisty slog then the light output won’t be as much as if you’ve done some decent speed before hand.

To be honest I haven’t taken it off road yet, but there seems to be plenty of light available from using it on unlit (pothole strewn) roads.

Pair with a helmet mounted light to get better visibility in the twisty stuff? So you can see where you’re looking rather than the bikes pointing?

Just finnished fitting mine and not been out yet.
Just a little unsure if the cable connection to the hub will cope with winter off road use

And maybe it’s just me , but no off switch

Just a little unsure if the cable connection to the hub will cope with winter off road use

Well it hasn’t shorted or broken in the rain, but I can possibly see it being caught by a twig/bush/branch if you don’t locate it cleverly/sensibly.

I used mine for for the 800miles of the EWE which was 99% off road. It rained for what seemed like the entire time for the first 8 days and the bike and I were outside 24hrs a day. Mine has also just done the BB200 (for which it also rained) and it now gets used commuting, off road and on, to work every day come rain or shine, as well as on regular Tuiesday night tear ups with my friends in the woods, and I’m definitely not under powered with my front light compared to them. Aidan Harding & Steve Heading also did the EWE with one, we all used the standard SP hub Exposure connector and they were all fine (which is more than can be said for the rest of our bikes and the riders!)

Regarding the hub connection, as well as all that use, mine’s done a dozen of so river fording misadventures and seems as robust as I could ever hope for, it’s well hidden by the fork and hub, my original dynamo light did several years, with the same connection, through the winter salt and rain and I’ve never had one fail on me.

Off switch? I generally leave mine on as the “drag” is so negligable I just leave it on. If I want to I can pop the cable out the back. However I must confess that pulling the cable isn’t ideal and I did cut the cable and pop a switch into a second cable that I made up for a second bike, but I tend not to use it as I can’t think of a reason I’d want to be less visible to traffic on the road or reduce the illumination of the trail in front of me off road ;-). I guess this got missed off as switches are not super robust and, for a bombproof, super reliable light and what is expected of a dynamo, a switch might be the weakest ling (this is purely speculation though!)

Here’s a bit more on my dynamo setup CLICKY LINK[/url]

Commuter SS bike & dynamo standlight – it’s bright!

Standlight illuminates the RedEye rear light too. Clever.

Robdeanhove any chance of a picture showing how you’ve ‘located’ your connection in relation to hub/fork?

Plus the link doesn’t work. 😉

NEW CLICKY LINK HERE

I have the connector pointing back up at about 45°, but this varies between different forks.

Connector on a Rock Shock fork(tiny picture but you can zoom out to a much bigger one that’s not appropriate for this thread on my blog link above)

Connector on my SS rigid fork:

Thanks.

*heads off to move his connector behind fork* 😉

USB charging? Do you just need a particular lead and where from*?

*vauge memory that Exposure/USE list one.

Well… now I have you lot to thank for a big hole appearing in my bank account!!

😀

Thanks for all the responses..

Blimey… Wiggle are quick these days.. ordered it yesterday and it was on my desk at work today!!

Anyway, been having a fiddle with it, and should the hub be rather notchy? Or is this something that is only noticable when it’s not built into a wheel?

I really like the idea of this for my 26″ commuter, only problem i see is the lack of 20mm axle option on the hub for off road riding – maybe will be addressed in later versions.

funkynick the hub will feel slightly notchy but it’ll be barely noticeable once the wheel is built up and attached to your forks

only problem i see is the lack of 20mm axle option on the hub for off road riding

Was what I was initially thinking, but actually when you look at it in more depth, it’s clearly designed more for as a powerful commuter and night time road rider light than a proper MTB light. The Cree XPG’s are very underdriven, only producing 200 Lumen’s each, rather than the 400 they’re now capable of at 1A+ current on battery power.

VERY tempted to try one for my road bike though, given I work for an Exposure dealer (so get staff discount) and have a spare 28H Open Pro kicking about I could build a hub up into.

do you think mrs TR would understand if i bought one of these instead of the coffee table she wants for the living room ? 😀

Was what I was initially thinking, but actually when you look at it in more depth, it’s clearly designed more for as a powerful commuter and night time road rider light than a proper MTB light. The Cree XPG’s are very underdriven, only producing 200 Lumen’s each, rather than the 400 they’re now capable of at 1A+ current on battery power.

I’m going to have to disagree with you there. I should state at this point that

(1) I am sponsored by Exposure
(2) I use a Revo off road regularly, including racing
(2) I was involved test riding the Revo during its development

The light was designed very much as a MTB light. Making it a kick ass capable light for road use is straight forward, hence there are plenty of less powerful lights out there with lower specification of LED, standlight and light output.

Making what is the brightest dynamo light that you can buy, with the most powerful standlight by several orders of magnitude, that remains usefully bright for riding on for many times longer than any other standlight, was very much a case of developing a product for off road use. It just so happens that this makes it even better for using on the road for winter training, touring & commuting!

I can assure you that the Revo has absolutely been developed as a MTB light. However a happy coincidence is that it also makes it a great road & commuter light too, particulalry with the ability to power, and provide standlight power to, their Redeye at the rear. I mean, why wouldn’t you make your light capable of both. If you try one of these off road next to one of their competitors, you will pretty quickly see the difference between the Revo and a light that has been developed only with the road in mind!

I believe the under-driving of the XPGs comes from the way in which the dynamo itself produces power (a constant 500mA) and how that can be provided to the light so as to deliver maximum efficiency of light output vs. power drawn from the hub. Driving fewer LEDs harder is both far less efficient as their is less theoretical light output per Watt from the LED at a higher drive current, plus the additional heat output reduces the real light output further. The high efficiency they achieve, plus the efficiency of their hub (which is also extremely light) is the key to making the power loss so small as to be completely trivial.

That dynamo lights have come of age and are now not just MTB capable but MTB specific, is shown by the fact that not only do Shimano, SP and Schmidt now make a range of centre lock and 6-bolt dynamos that were not availalable only a few years ago, but Shimano make a dynamo that is part of their XT groupset, which is specifically an off road groupset, I am supported by IDC & SP with their dynamos, specifically for my MTB endurance racing background, to ride and race their dynamos off road, and Schmidt have now bought out a QR15, disc compatible, dynamo:

Are you still using a stand-alone charger or can you charge USB devices from it using this?

http://www.exposurelights.com/product/000084/boost-cable/

Are you still using a stand-alone charger or can you charge USB devices from it using this?

http://www.exposurelights.com/product/000084/boost-cable/

Yes, I am still using a stand alone charger. I don’t know the answer to whether you can use the boost cable, but the only product that is mentioned in the official stuff is the redeye rear light, you have a good question though!

Cheers Rob.

SJS are asking £270 for that Schmidt Qr15 hub. Ouch.

SJS are asking £270 for that Schmidt Qr15 hub. Ouch.

Ouch indeed!

This is why I am crossing my fingers for a QR15 dynamo hub from SP, ideally a version of the PD-8 hub, which can be had for a (comparably) paltry £85 in normal QR format from IDC HERE

I’ll back up what Rob says – the Revo saw me thru Dusk Til Dawn this year with no other light source at all.

I used to use a Supernova E3 triple. That matched the Revo at speed but the low speed flicker of the E3 through the twisty stuff made it unusable. The standlight of the Revo is an entirely different beast.

I drive my Revo off an XT dynamo hub. QR currently but would be interested perhaps in 15mm or upwards!

SJS are asking £270 for that Schmidt Qr15 hub. Ouch

Which means they have just pretty much copied the rrp in Euros. If they were converting the price to pounds as perhaps they should it would be about £50 cheaper than that (so still the wrong side of £200 for most people).

That Schmidt hub is also heavier than the SP dynamo hub and has more drag I believe. However it is made in Germany and does have a 5 year warranty.

Cheers for the in depth input on the hub rob.

I see where you’re coming from on it being designed as an MTB light in the first place. I just think that the price of the non QR hubs right now will be a put off, though hopefully if that changes and a 15mm or even a 20mm compatible dynamo hub is available soon as you suggest it may be, for a reasonable (ie. sub £100) price then it will make much more sense.

I can see that for 24hr racing it would really make sense. 800 Lumens is plenty for something like Mountain Mayhem or SITS for sure. The only time I ever want more is for fast technical descending on steep terrain, where something like a 6 pack or my current Trout Lumen Liberator comes into its own pushing out more than double the number of lumens of the Revo. That’s the main reason I initially thought it had been designed as a light for night time road riding probably.

Just need to get over my pathological hatred of QR’s on MTB’s then maybe!

“If you try one of these off road next to one of their competitors, you will pretty quickly see the difference between the Revo and a light that has been developed only with the road in mind!“

Yeah, the latter will have a traffic-friendly cutoff beam 😉 (Not that I’m knocking the Revo, but I’d still love to see Revo power mixed with a B&M reflector.)

“That dynamo lights have come of age and are now not just MTB capable but MTB specific, is shown by the fact that … Shimano make a dynamo that is part of their XT groupset, which is specifically an off road groupset“

Being unnecessarily pedantic, that’s not quite true, at least as I understand it: The XT dyno hubs are, I believe, actually part of the XT trekking/touring groupset, not the MTB groupset. Herman the German (who is probably the biggest market for dynos) is well into function over form, so he loves his big flat-(or butterfly-)barred touring bikes with discs.

Is there anyway of attaching this above the brake caliper on a road bike so that it frees up space on the handlebars like the B&M Cyo?

Bend the end of one of the B&M or Schmidt v-brake light mounts over so it’s horizontal and then screw the Allen bolt through it into the bottom of the light?

Or if you have lowrider bosses get an ID/Passport fork light adaptor bracket that screws into it and mount it there?

I’d imagine that a cylinder with a 31.8mm OD and a 4mm (?) ID with the same width as the mounting part of the Cyo (or similar) would let you mount it onto a standard bracket – not an off the shelf part, but a trivial job for a friendly engineering shop.

Is there anyway of attaching this above the brake caliper on a road bike so that it frees up space on the handlebars like the B&M Cyo?

The cleat on the bottom of the Revo is held on my a single bolt. Just buy someone else’s fork crown mounting bracket and screw the Revo to it.

In fact, the Supernova fork crown mount would do nicely:

Bracket for fork crown:[/url]

Compatible bracket for base of light:[/url]

Or bend one of these[/url] to an appropriate angle and bolt your Revo directly to it:

Ordered mine today, with the plan of building it onto a reasonably light wheel for 12/24hr solo racing,as well as winter commuting and trainign. Love the idea of not worrying about charging lights all the time and a desk free from charging cables.

will keep you posted.

After reading this thread i am also very much wanting a Revo. Thanks for all the great information.

Now having ridden with mine a few time. It’s great the even off road
I still have a helmet light but have mostly had it turned off except for fast downhill
And long (1 mile long off road climb).

Don’t notice the drag at all and built with a crest rim it’s light enough

Great to hear it’s not just me using this off road, and that people’s experiences match mine

it’s light enough

The hub plus the (87g!) light is lighter than an equivalent battery light and a normal, non-dynamo, hub 🙂

Yes, the dynamo weighs a little more than a bare battery but, with a battery light, you still need to add a front hub to your bike too! 😉

It is a great bit of kit. Here’s mine still glowing 15 minutes after I stopped riding(!)