Can you get a good front light for night riding for under £50?

Im just getting back into biking and want to get a light so i can go night riding with a few mates. They have all brought £200 hope lights, but i cant afford anything near that price. Have you guys got any suggests for good lights for around or under £50
Thanks a lot

Search for the words, DX, bastid, and torch on here.
Sift through all the threads and buy one you like.
Or, if you don’t want a two week wait, and like having a UK warranty, just get one from smudge off of here for £67.

Some of the 900lumen (alledgedly) torches on dealextreme are bright enough to get out night riding.

For about £30 you can a torch, batteries and charger.

Something like this

Ultrafire

I use one on my helmet but have used it on its own and its ok.

Yep there appear to be loads of options.

I just got one of the alleged 1200 lumen trustfire torches for £25.80 posted, it arrived in three days from purchase. Bear in mind you will also need batteries and charger, but I already had those for my 900 lumen bastid. The 900 plus a smaller bar mounted light has been enough for me, but the 900 + the 1200 will be better.

I’ve got one of the 1200 lm lights from Dealextreme for £28. The battery pack isn’t quite as waterproof as claimed though, so the usual precautions will need to be taken. Or the MJ-808 although it may push you just over your £50 budget.

The dealextreme one above is much better than using a torch and batteries, plus it’s cheaper. Ideally you’d want two though as they’re not that well built.

I’d go for one of those £28 ones from DX + a torch for your hat

thanks for all the suggests, ill get looking into all of them

Some of the 900lumen (alledgedly) torches on dealextreme are bright enough to get out night riding.

For about £30 you can a torch, batteries and charger.

Something like this

Ultrafire

I use one on my helmet but have used it on its own and its ok.

I did an 80 miler overnight ride on the SDW using just one of these… it’s perfectly fine IMO.

The delivery times for the Deal Extreme £30ish bike lights are quite long at the moment (i.e. after Christmas) so it might be better ordering from the Lightmalls or Manafont, see below.

http://www.manafont.com/product_info.php/titaninum-fiinish-1200lumen-cree-xml-t6-3mode-memory-bicyclelightheadlight-418650-battery-pack-inlcuded-p-8034

http://www.lightmalls.com/ha-iii-cree-xml-t6-3-mode-1200-lumen-led-bicycle-front-light-kit

http://www.lightmalls.com/upgrade-bicycle-light-lm-cree-xml-t6-1200-lumens-bike-light-kit

There’s a London based seller on ebay
1600lm

2400lm

The current Trail Running magazine (issue 5 Winter 2011) has a group test of head torches. the LED Lenser H7 at £50 gets a “Best Budget Buy”: with 170 lumens. It can be worn on your head but not sure if it can fit on a bike helmet.

i bought one of the deal extreme lights, alleged 1200 lumens, and while the light itself is absolutely fine, the charger was not.
it melted within 5 minutes of being plugged into the wall.
i spent approx £32 on the light, but had to find a charger for it (thanks smudge!).
now, ive still only spent a total of £42, but tbh, if i was doing it again i would spend the bit extra and go with a uk seller.
(smudge is highly recommended btw)
as for the light itself, i dunno if its 1200 lumens, but theres no problem seeing the road/trail with it.

I bought one of the DX ones, it had a loose connection on the charger connector from the word go, so rather than wait weeks for a replacement I soldered a new one on. Now a month and half a dozen rides later the battery is shot. Not impressed.

My charger and battery melted on the first day too. I think the £30 DX lights have crossed the acceptable price/quality trade off, and I’d personally buy better quality.

Just the charger that’s pants? I already have a couple of good quality LiPo chargers so that’s not a big deal.

I think the magicshine/bike ray (titan), and clone lights from china are a bargain. I have several. Only one of the chargers has gone belly up out of four, which is accepatble to me. The magicshine charger I have has done a hundred charges for sure…

Ive just got an ssc p7 for £15 of dx, superb light. gonna try a t6 xml next.
I went for senybor 2800 protected battery cells and an xtar wp2 II charger.
£40 in total, and now rigged up for a selection of 18650 torches 🙂

All you need is 2 of these .
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/ebay-cree-xml-20-torch-out-of-the-box-pics-review

Amazing little things , very bright and amazing value when compared to Exposure / Hope / L&M etc