Let the light shine…oh crap!
As I try to keep my wife happy by not spending all of our money on triathlon items, I often look for the cheapest item I can find, and most of the time I pay dearly. The Bell Bike Light is currently being used by my kids as a flashlight, rather than its intended purpose.
The Bell Lumina light kit comes with a headlight and tail light and will cost around $25. The headlight has four bright LEDs that can be used in two different modes, flashing and constantly on. The tail light has five red LEDs with four different flashing modes and a constantly on.
The lights are actually quite bright and I would feel comfortable using them at night while riding my bike, but there is a huge problem with them, I couldn’t get them to fit on my bike. The headlight is designed to fit the 26 mm diameter handlebars. My bike has the larger diameter handlebars and therefore, made my purchase worthless. A major issue that I have with Bell, is it did not state anywhere on the packaging what size handlebar the light would fit. I had to buy it and the find out it wouldn’t work.
I had a similar problem with the tail light. There is a part on my seat post where the stem was the proper size for the light, but I would have to remove my saddle bag to make it work. It was all too much of a headache to deal with, and unfortunately my kids got their hands on the lights before I could return them.
I acknowledge Bell doesn’t market toward the high-end cyclists, but it would be nice to know if their products will work on your equipment without having to break open the packaging.
The Bottom Line ~
Ultimately I was disappointed with this product. The Bell Lumina may work for you depending on the size of your handlebars and seat post. If you have a completely standard size bike, which are typically older models the light may work. I was never able to test out how stable the lights are. The lights are quite bright and seem to last for a long time on the one set of batteries I have used, but flashlight use, as opposed to the jostling of a bike can definitely affect the durability.
Do you have an experience or comment about this product?
Please help fellow athletes by leaving a comment and let us know what lights you would recommend.
