The Cold War of Lighting
POINT YOUR LIGHTS DOWN FFS
DON’T DAZZLE
DROP YOUR LIGHTS!!!
It’s that time of year again! Light season is upon us, and the industry would have you think that brighter/flashier is better. It’s not. Please enjoy a past rant about bike lighting, and how to do it right! Scroll down for the latest workshop news 👇
Jeepers, it's a war of attrition with lights out there - everyone loses. How short-sighted to think “my epilepsy inducing strobe light will make sure a driver sees me” when you're blinding fellow road users at the same time, potentially increasing danger all around you.
Point your light DOWN, not straight ahead. You will still be visible to those around you, thanks to city street lighting (paid for by our taxes).
You need lights to be seen, not to see.
Flashing lights are good to get attention, but they make it difficult to gauge distance. This is where having a solid beam helps. A solid beam makes it easier to tell how far away something (or someone) is.
There are some lights that incorporate both solid/flashing - the Pixel by Beryl is the best in my opinion. You can switch between white and red, and it has a solid/gentle flashing function. This light performs double duty and is a great backup light for when your front or rear light runs out of battery. When I'm feeling fancy, I attach it to the hub of my wheel instead of the bars/seatpost, and it whirls around and around, attracting even more (good) attention. We don't sell it but you can get it here.
CAVEAT: Lights are a legal requirement in the UK (helments are not), so you do need to have something!
For those of you who cycle on the canal towpath or through a dark park, yes of course, you'll need a strong beam to see where you're going. In that case, point it DOWN.
And if you simply cannot part with your warehouse rave strobe or WW2 searchlight, just point it DOWN FFS.
Use lights that are a surprise, not an assault
Think about it: if all the lights on the road are white, you think your single flashy white light is gonna make you stand out? Get something deee-lightful. (See what I did there)
SOME FAVOURITES
Wheel Lights: I used to ride a Claud Butler mixte with 27 x 1 1/4” wheels with LED lights encircled. I genuinely had cabbies stop me because they wanted to compliment me on my wheel lights! If a cabbie is happy to see me, that's saying a lot. The ones I used to use are no longer in existence but there are many options on the internets. I cannot vouch for any of these, but they are all rechargeable and look ok.
Colour changing wheel lights x 2 - rechargeable
Rainbow Wheel Lights - rechargeable
Some sort of hub light that changes colour - rechargeable
Coloured Lights: I've had this cheap & cheerful rainbow light for YEARS and it's great for getting attention (not in a bad way). Kids love the changing colours.
Pentagram light - ‘tis the season 🎃 - rechargeable
Cute lil stoplight rear light - rechargeable
I don’t know if it’s me getting old (I’m 44 now) or if car headlamps have gotten brighter? In any case, I am eyeing up some yellow lensed driving glasses to prevent strain and dazzling.
Something I've heard of but never seen (yet): pointing the light AT YOUR OWN BODY (not your face obvs). This lights you up as a human, would probably scare the bejesus out of a driver looking in the rear view mirror, and have the desired effect of someone handling a 1 ton vehicle to slow down and watch out.
🍑 SADDLE FITTING RESUMES 🍑
We were pretty swamped for a month, so the library had to close until our current members found their dream saddles. The good news is that several of them have, so we have reopened the library for new butts.
ONE SPOT LEFT!
We’ve got one spot available for Friday’s test class: How to Replace a Spoke & True a Wheel. Only £50 instead of £75 as you’ll be helping us refine our content (we’ll get in touch for feedback at the end.)
Snap that up before you snap a spoke!
We are holding a test class for Level 1 of our upcoming Wheel Building series: How to Replace a Spoke and True a Wheel.
You will leave knowing:
The root causes of spoke related issues
The methods used to measure and replace a single broken spoke (not for the entire wheel)
How to remove and replace parts blocking spoke entry (i.e. cassette, disc)
How to true a wobbly wheel to get it nice and straight (and when truing won’t help)
How to prevent future spoke problems to save some moneyyyyy
This is most recent number of people who have been killed by bombs dropped by the IDF. They are not showing signs of stopping. This is beyond ‘an eye for an eye’, this is genocide.
Join the next march for Palestine this Saturday the 28th. Last weekend’s march had 100,000 people there.
Christina from Cyclista Zine has put together a comprehensive list of works to help shed light on what is happening in Palestine and why. Haymarket Books have made their books on Palestine free to download. And if reading isn’t your thing, the video at the bottom is a good explainer about how we got here.
I am sharing this because the mainstream news is not. I am sharing this because I have a Palestinian friend whose voice needs to be heard. You can also listen to and follow Rania here. And I will keep sharing because this issue is not something happening “over there”. Our tax dollars fund warfare - there is a specific department called the UK Defence & Security Exports whose sole purpose is to sell weapons. Our pensions invest in munitions. The continued violence is the result of our governments misleading us, keeping us exhausted, pitting us against each other - they are distracting us and they want us to be silent.
Last week I shared ways for you to write your representatives - if you haven’t yet done so, details are here (scroll to the bottom):
Here are some new folks to follow on TikTok and Insta for a wider perspective.
Sim Kern is an author, and has been putting out a plethora of reels explaining Zionism and patiently answering questions.
Saffana Monajed is a copywriter who is pulling up the curtain on the war propaganda machine. As someone who studied mass media at uni, I’m particularly fascinated by her break downs. Watch all of them here.
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I’m gonna have to sit my parents down for a talk: they think that the ‘issue is quite complicated’ but I’m pretty sure they’re not gonna like $100 BILLION of their tax dollars getting sent overseas.
Coming soon: a list of bike-specific boycotts.
Ride on,
Jenni x
I will never, EVER tire of that Star Trek gif in reference to lights on your bike! 😅
Make some of these :) https://youtu.be/j8_vDtgyQBM