Extra lights for Urban Arrow Family e-bike - help needed

Kamerat

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The Urban Arrow Family is a transport bike intended to transport my kids to and from kindergarden. It looks like this https://www.urbanarrow.com/en/family and has only a small light in frojnt and a small red light behind the seat. More light needed.

Today I saw a bike on the street were the owner had attached a light on each side of the front and extra red light behind. Any ideas??
 

Steve K

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cool bike! I've seen that sort of cargo bike before... I think the English translation of the German term is "box bike"? I hadn't seen e-bike versions of them, though. That ought to help with any hills.

As far as lights, there are a lot of ways that you could go. To some degree, it depends on how easy it would be to attach lights to the bike. I would probably start by adding small bike lights front and rear, and maybe an amber light on each side for extra visibility. You might want to visit the local bike shop and see what sort of lights are available and what they cost.

Another option would be to buy a 12V rechargeable battery and wire up some marker lights sold for use by trucks. It's more complicated, but should provide quite a bit of visibility!
 

Kamerat

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Thank you for the idea! I will be researching marker lights and 12V rechargeable battery now. I could even make one switch to turn all lights on. Would be perfect. If anyone has experience with this I'm interested.
 

samsavvas

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Do you want the extra lights to make the outfit more visible to other road users or do you want them to assist your own navigation when riding? That is, 'to be seen' lights or 'to see with'? And if 'be seen', are you looking to enhance your daylight visibility or just night time?

There are many, many options for 'be seen' lights. You can buy truly excellent bike-specific white and red (front and rear) warning lights and spend anything from minimum to maximum! Not sure what is available in Norway but I've found that Cateye are always a pretty good bet as are the Azur (or Tioga) 'twin' lights which can be found pretty cheaply at Eu online stores. I run such lights using AA and AAA Sanyo rechargeable NiMH batteries and they've proved very satisfactory.

Planet Bike also make excellent lights and I've become fond of their 'Grateful Red' even though it's not quite as bright as others. I like the large size and it's reflector. Don't forget the benefits of reflectors either! Yellow or silver reflective tape on frame tubes and looped around a handful of spokes is an extremely effective way to get motorists attention after dark.

For extra day-time visibility I think the basic equation is 'extra light' as you have to compete with sunlight, reflections and general visual clutter! I'm probably a bit out-of-date but I'm not sure that many 'blinkies' prove adequate as 'be seen' lights during the daylight hours. Maybe some of the 1 watt PB Superflash or similar lights might be OK but I'd tend to go for a much more powerful design that used the full potential of high-powered LEDs. Cheaper examples are the taillights and headlights from Magicshine. The headlights won't meet many Eu 'anti-dazzle' regulations for night use but they can be very effective in daylight hours.

And as Steve has suggested, it's pretty easy to roll your own given the plethora of cheap Chinese-made automotive lights available (although they will require a larger 12v battery).

Sam.
 

angerdan

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rdonber

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I would go to a local bike shop and check the available lights that might fit.
 

angerdan

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Seems likt the TO isn't following his own thread anymore. Anyway, even local bike shops in germany aren't good filled with up-to-date lights. Anything new has to be ordered, so buying online would save the need to go to an shop.
 

Kamerat

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Hi, I´m following the thread, not just very active... Thank you for the replies. I actually havent resolved the light issue yet. The solution I would assume is to change out the front light with a cheap chinese solution and the backlighte with the same. The Bosch system dont let me connect more light to the batteri without problems.
 

PhillyRube

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Aug 3, 2004
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I mounted a couple of Feniex T3 emergency vehicle lights on modified reflector mounts. Powered it by a China battery holder that uses 6, 18650 rechargeable batteries. It also has a USB lead to charge your cellphone if you use it as a gps.
White in front can be used as a headlight,but I have mine flashing, szme as red in back. I have a mount on the handlebars and I slap in one of Vinh Nguyens modded 18650 powered lights as a headlight as well.

Photos at this link:

https://elightbars.org/forums/threads/t3-bike-lights.89183/ in
 
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