I've been watching some of my pals put Clearwater lights on their bikes for years and when I've ridden with them at night have been amazed at how much light they can throw down the road. I've never pulled the trigger on buying them because, well, I still have one more kid to send to college and they are pretty crazy pricey - or so I've thought. Their mid-range solutions are several hundred dollars and the top end of their products are over $1,400 for a pair of 10,000+ lumen lights. *choke*
Over the past few years I've seen a few friends go with a much cheaper option like the Denali lights and there's a company I've only learned about recently, RubyMoto, that is making what looks like really high quality, very high output Clearwater competitor lights for much less. OK, that has me intrigued and thinking about spending only $400-$500 vs. a mortgage payment for the Clearwater lights. Then I rode at the BRPR with BillGsa following me around with his $20 add-on lights from Amazon and will say that there's no way you're going to miss seeing those things if being conspicuous is your goal.
That leaves me with the question - Lumen ratings all being equal, what makes one set of lights worth 20 - 50x the price over these pretty robust looking lights I can get on Amazon? I've sent both Clearwater and RubyMoto that very question and I'm waiting to hear what they have to say but I find myself motivated to add light to my ride. I've been caught out at night in the woods on a dirt road where it was darker than the inside of inside of a well digger's boot, and hey, I own a GS so putting shit like this on my bike is practically mandatory. So, I've started experimenting.
Being conspicuous is a nice goal but I'm looking to have lights so bright that I have to turn them down to 50% power when there's a fire ban in the area. Dazzling light to oncoming traffic is OK but I'm feeling the need to light up the night. I already had the BMW OEM add-on driving lights on my GS that I'm sure made me a bit more visible but did little more than light up the ditches about 20' in front of the bike. After a bit of research, it seemed advisable to start with an an intelligent accessory control module like a Hex EZcan to enable CANBUS control of whatever lights I put on the bike. Before installing the EZcan, I did a BMW CANBUS lightectomy:
Aside from pulling off all the Tupperware on the bike, the EZcan install was pretty, uh, easy. My first experiment was following in BillGsa's footsteps and ordering a set of $20 lights that claimed 12,800 lumens of output and I mounted them up to the posts that previously held the BMW lights:
Yeah, I know. They're ugly but so is a GS so with that in mind, they're attractive in a weird functional sort of way. By the way, that is a mind-set that is required of every GS/GSA owner so don't judge me. I got out last night to see how they'd perform and while I didn't set any bushes on fire on the side of the road - yet - I felt like I got a considerable improvement over the headlight/BMW add-on light solution I had before. That was $200 for the EZcan controller and $20 for the lights. Hence, my question - are expensive add-on lights worth the difference in price? What am I missing?
Now that I have the platform for mounting any 2 wire light set on the bike, I may go experimenting in the more premium priced aisle of the scooter lighting stores but only if they'll let me send them back if they're not much better than the $20 lights. I'm left wondering if these companies like Clearwater have been caught by the Chinese and are being price crushed by lights made by slave labor and currency manipulation? I'm all about buying American even for 2 - 3x the price but I don't see Clearwater dropping the price on their $1400 option to less than $100.
Over the past few years I've seen a few friends go with a much cheaper option like the Denali lights and there's a company I've only learned about recently, RubyMoto, that is making what looks like really high quality, very high output Clearwater competitor lights for much less. OK, that has me intrigued and thinking about spending only $400-$500 vs. a mortgage payment for the Clearwater lights. Then I rode at the BRPR with BillGsa following me around with his $20 add-on lights from Amazon and will say that there's no way you're going to miss seeing those things if being conspicuous is your goal.
That leaves me with the question - Lumen ratings all being equal, what makes one set of lights worth 20 - 50x the price over these pretty robust looking lights I can get on Amazon? I've sent both Clearwater and RubyMoto that very question and I'm waiting to hear what they have to say but I find myself motivated to add light to my ride. I've been caught out at night in the woods on a dirt road where it was darker than the inside of inside of a well digger's boot, and hey, I own a GS so putting shit like this on my bike is practically mandatory. So, I've started experimenting.
Being conspicuous is a nice goal but I'm looking to have lights so bright that I have to turn them down to 50% power when there's a fire ban in the area. Dazzling light to oncoming traffic is OK but I'm feeling the need to light up the night. I already had the BMW OEM add-on driving lights on my GS that I'm sure made me a bit more visible but did little more than light up the ditches about 20' in front of the bike. After a bit of research, it seemed advisable to start with an an intelligent accessory control module like a Hex EZcan to enable CANBUS control of whatever lights I put on the bike. Before installing the EZcan, I did a BMW CANBUS lightectomy:
Aside from pulling off all the Tupperware on the bike, the EZcan install was pretty, uh, easy. My first experiment was following in BillGsa's footsteps and ordering a set of $20 lights that claimed 12,800 lumens of output and I mounted them up to the posts that previously held the BMW lights:
Yeah, I know. They're ugly but so is a GS so with that in mind, they're attractive in a weird functional sort of way. By the way, that is a mind-set that is required of every GS/GSA owner so don't judge me. I got out last night to see how they'd perform and while I didn't set any bushes on fire on the side of the road - yet - I felt like I got a considerable improvement over the headlight/BMW add-on light solution I had before. That was $200 for the EZcan controller and $20 for the lights. Hence, my question - are expensive add-on lights worth the difference in price? What am I missing?
Now that I have the platform for mounting any 2 wire light set on the bike, I may go experimenting in the more premium priced aisle of the scooter lighting stores but only if they'll let me send them back if they're not much better than the $20 lights. I'm left wondering if these companies like Clearwater have been caught by the Chinese and are being price crushed by lights made by slave labor and currency manipulation? I'm all about buying American even for 2 - 3x the price but I don't see Clearwater dropping the price on their $1400 option to less than $100.
and needs for riding in the dark. Thank you for doing the ground work searching for a good product. Looks like your GSA only needs a 120mm barrel hanging off the front end to have a bonafide alternative to the M1 Abrams!
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