# Snowboarding at night...



## Mattaus (Mar 29, 2011)

Hi all,

My names Matt and I am totally new to the whole “light” scene, so please have patience with me!

I’m not going to lie – I joined these forums because I have a very specific problem that I have been working on for the last week and am at the point where I need help from people who know their stuff. This forum is oddly specific so the way I see it is you guys know what you’re on about.

So here are the details. A group of friend’s and I are all going camping in late July to a winter resort in Victoria here in Australia. The plan is to camp above the snowline for something very different from our usual ‘sun, surf and sand’ style adventures here in sunny Queensland. We are all keen snowboarders, and not getting the opportunity to do so very often we are eager to make the most of it. Seen as we will be above the snowline, and in a national park camping amongst the trees we have decided that a spot of night boarding (weather permitting) is on the cards.

Nothing major – we will have a Banshee Bunjee and a few shovels so hope to build some small run and jumps to have fun on outside of resort hours. It will obviously be dark so a lighting solution has been called for. We’d love to use our 2 Honda generators for power but it turns out here in Australia they are banned in national parks. Very annoying. 

So to bring my long winded story to a close my question is how would you guys go about lighting for this situation? We are unfortunately budget minded at this stage as a few of us are uni students or broke home owners 

I know nothing about preferable/reliable brands, what kind of lights are best for what application, how bright a certain amount of Lumens are etc. Lets just say I’m completely clueless. For the record I have this plan at the moment: A deep cycle battery (preferably 100Ah or more but holy hell they are expensive) and a few LED flood lights along the following lines: 

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/4-x-18W-LED-...ccessories&hash=item45f75166ae#ht_2047wt_1139

We’ll require at most 3hrs use a night for a total of 6 nights. The ability to recharge the battery is still up in the air but if we decide we need to be able to do it, we will sort it out.

I guess I’m hoping there are some snowboarders/skiiers roaming around these forums that may have a better idea than me, but obviously anyone who knows their stuff is welcome to teach me! 

Your guidance and assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,

-Matt.


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## badtziscool (Mar 29, 2011)

Wow. That's a tough one. Lighting up about the size of a football field for 18 hrs without generators to snowboard. I really can't think of anything either. I guess if you guys are doing 3 hrs at a time, then the deep cycle battery idea might work, but I think you'll have to be careful with what type of light you choose. A lot of led lights are on the blue side and it just kills your depth perception, especially in snowy conditions. And I think depth perception is pretty important if you want to land those jumps.

Also. those lights on ebay are rated at 1300lumens. That's a good amount of light but lumen ratings are almost always overrated unless it comes from a reputable manufacturer. So lets give them the benefit of the doubt. 4x1300 = 5200. Automotive headlamps put out about 3000 - 6000 lumens depending on the technology. So given that, you can estimate how bright it'll be. Do you think that's bright enough for you guys?


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## Mattaus (Mar 29, 2011)

How big are American football fields? Because when I read football field I think Rugby which is 100m x 50m (109y x 55.5y) - definitely way bigger than what we will need to light up.

If we use the banshee bungee the run up and jump will be pretty tight. Maybe 30m long max? 5 or so meters wide.

Really good point about depth perception as well. I guess we should aim for white or yellow light? I've only been snowboarding once at night and that was at a purpose built park in Japan a few years back. From memory the light on the clear runs was white but at the jumps/rails etc it was yellow. Didn't think anything of it at the time...

Thanks for the comparison to headlights as well, that helps me a lot. based on that assumption I think it will be bright enough but we won't have all 4 lights pointing at the one spot. In all likely hood they'll be pointed at the start, the run itself, the ramp and the landing zone. This brings about other issues like mounting them (probably use some telescopic poles and a tripod or 2).

Maybe I should get my hands on one light and see how bright it is in the back yard and work from there...


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