See.Sense Dublin Trial (possible cheap lights)

coward

el tel wrote: »

Nope. The street shall remain a mystery! Actually from what I have see See.Sense do a fair amount of promo work around there and neighbouring streets.

I was looking around Dublin on google maps - but then, as you point out, they have other similar images. Such as this one:

similar-image-1

And that same woman appears here:

another-image

If it were Dublin it would probably say "Lána Bus" instead. So that brought me to Belfast as they use a photo of the Lagan Weir too. I found that spot where the woman was here:

google-map-1

So got the right city. The best road I could find matching the original photo was this:

google-map-2

I'm not 100% sure - but I've convinced myself that when those shutters go down and it's dark then it looks very like the photo.. (and I can get back to work.. )

Hope all those links work, if not, Hill Street, Belfast!

Unknown Soldier

Not sure what is going on with these trial type lights but anyone else reading this, don't be put off investing in the See.Sense lights. The full retail ones, or the recent kickstarter ones.

They are really, really good. The battery life is exceptional and what they do... is what you would want from a rear, and possibly front light. You are seen, and they help you bee seen when light/traffic changes.

I have been pondering over the last year whether cars have been giving me more space overtaking because of the "hype/news" of cycling and unfortunately some cyclists deaths, or because I have been using the lights.

I'm nearly sure its the lights.

I just use them as lights by the way, I don't use the ap or have them call my mum etc etc

I run them at 40% btw.

Gerry

cython wrote: »

If you don't want them "hobbled" then pay the full price. I was fully aware of this limitation and if they're going to sell a product for <50% RRP as was done here, I can't blame them for building in a mechanism to make sure people contribute to the data gathering, otherwise its just a cheap light with no reason to keep contributing, especially if it irritates people as much as claimed on here.

As for a safety issue, again it was made clear up front that this limitation existed, so in the same way that you should have a backup light if the light battery died, perhaps knowing of this limitation you should consider your phone in a backup light strategy too.

In case it wasn't clear from my post, I have the normal lights without the hobbling feature. As per other posters I don't have to use the app very often.

Hungrycol

I have to start/stop my strava app anyway so starting/stopping the light through their app is no biggie.

I don't use the crash thing cos my Mrs. Hungrycol got freaked out when she received the message on the first day unnecessarily. Same for Theft alert cos at home my bike is likely out of range of my phone, but see.sense promote it as a cafe stop theft alert anyway.

I like it, but then again I have four back lights on my bike, I have a big fear of being hit from behind.

Bambaata

I havent been able to connect phone to app at all unfortunately. Tried all the steps they suggest, anyone else have this issue and manage to resolve it? I managed to conect using the normal app before the app changed to tot trial version but not since

nthside_cycle

Have to disagree with the battery life, I think the battery life is poor on these and they run down quickly. I use them set at 100% as the purpose is to be be seen, one morning going to work app was showing 54% left on the light and within 20 minutes the battery had run out and that was set at flashing mode and that was after 80 minutes of use, I did send an email to see.sense on this and said they look into this issue. So to ensure I get to and from work with the lights working, I now charge them every day.

Bambaata

Might be something with yours? I changed mine to 60% weeks ago and still getting the blinking green when i turn it off, using it about 40mins a day for the past 3-4 weeks

el tel

coward wrote: »

el tel wrote: »

Nope. The street shall remain a mystery! Actually from what I have see  See.Sense do a fair amount of promo work around there and neighbouring streets.

I was looking around Dublin on google maps - but then, as you point out, they have other similar images. Such as this one:

similar-image-1

And that same woman appears here:

another-image

If it were Dublin it would probably say "Lána Bus" instead. So that brought me to Belfast as they use a photo of the Lagan Weir too. I found that spot where the woman was here:

google-map-1

So got the right city. The best road I could find matching the original photo was this:

google-map-2

I'm not 100% sure - but I've convinced myself that when those shutters go down and it's dark then it looks very like the photo.. (and I can get back to work.. )

Hope all those links work, if not, Hill Street, Belfast!

Good sleuthing, you are practically there.
It's Gordon street, which runs onto Hill Street as you can see below.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@54.6021772,-5.9267167,3a,75y,272.31h,77.06t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1scjubUoBEO7kB1f-oQ-4WAA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

coward

el tel wrote: »

Good sleuthing, you are practically there.
It's Gordon street, which runs onto Hill Street as you can see below.

Sorry for going a bit off topic - just one last campaign for Hill!

I'm not convinced, el_tel - apologies if you were the photographer! I did look at Gordon Street and what puts me off this one are the bins - not sure you could park bins at the end of Gordon and block the other road. And also the windows at the end just don't match up for me. And the kerb on the right - almost flush with the road - not raised much.

I could find more matching points for Hill. Especially the little roof over the door on the right in the original image you quoted.

https://imgur.com/a/HuK9q - compare images

LeinsterDub

Has anyone encountered these lights yet? I've been behind them on the bicycle twice this week and I have found the incredibly distracting. The brightness is too much and the changing pattern keeps drawing your eye to them?

Anyone else?


https://seesense.cc/pages/dublin

Borderfox

LeinsterDub wrote: »

the changing pattern keeps drawing your eye to them?

That's the idea

ED E

As somebody who uses bright lights they are very bright.

LeinsterDub

Borderfox wrote: »

That's the idea

Perhaps I should have expanded. What I meant to say was when I am preparing to make a manenvure and I'm checking my surroundings if the pattern of the lights change it draws my eye to it meaning I've had to start the process over. I've been stuck behind these lights twice because of this. Now when I say stuck I mean 10-15 seconds.

Weepsie

Mod Voice - threads merged. No need for an new one

Been behind a few. Only distracting thing was me going, oh they're doing the trial too.

andy69

ED E wrote: »

As somebody who uses bright lights they are very bright.

Are you guys talking about the brightness of these in darkness, or daylight (or both)?

Just got one myself and only use it for daytime - finding it pretty crap to be honest.

LeinsterDub

andy69 wrote: »

Are you guys talking about the brightness of these in darkness, or daylight (or both)?

Just got one myself and only use it for daytime - finding it pretty crap to be honest.

I can't say I've noticed them in daylight hours but during darkness they are quite annoying to be behind at the risk of being accused of hyperbole I think they are perhaps unsafe for other cyclists.

andy69

LeinsterDub wrote: »

I can't say I've noticed them in daylight hours but during darkness they are quite annoying to be behind at the risk of being accused of hyperbole I think they are perhaps unsafe for other cyclists.

yeah with up to 250 lumens they'd be fairly blasting out the light, and the flash patterns are fairly attention-grabbing ones alright!
Probably their light was reacting to car headlights which might have been approaching yee, so the intensity increases then.
The user can just drop to a lower brightness level with their phone app, but someone would have to tell them...but that mightn't go down too well with people sometimes

Kaisr Sose

Personally, I can’t stand flashing front lights. They are annoying to unsafe. If they were beneficial to road safety and being seen, surely cars would come with them as standard.

A strong (bright), well diffused, constant beam wins any day.

andy69

Kaisr Sose wrote: »

Personally, I can’t stand flashing front lights. They are annoying to unsafe. If they were beneficial to road safety and being seen, surely cars would come with them as standard.

A strong (bright), well diffused, constant beam wins any day.

...the posts from today were about rear lights though , that's why I was asking, as I have just bought one myself and was expecting it to be a lot more visible in daylight so I was curious to see if they had seen the issue in daytime use

Weepsie

Use the app to control the brightness. At 100% should be easily spotted during the day. I have it at 10 or 20% in the evening generally

Chiparus

Kaisr Sose wrote: »

Personally, I can’t stand flashing front lights. They are annoying to unsafe. If they were beneficial to road safety and being seen, surely cars would come with them as standard.

A strong (bright), well diffused, constant beam wins any day.

So a police car with a constant blue light would be more attention grabbing than a flashing light?

tomasrojo

I don't care much for flashing lights anymore.

I've been behind people using rear lights with an accelerometer (is that how they work?) so that they get brighter when the bike is slowing down. That, I definitely like.

Borderfox

The Varia radar does that

Kaisr Sose

Chiparus wrote: »

So a police car with a constant blue light would be more attention grabbing than a flashing light?

Riduculous comparisson. We are talking about head lights used primarily for illumination - emergency vehicles don’t have flashing blue main headlights

magicbastarder

i was trying to figure out what you were trying to say - your first post seemed to suggest that the function of car headlights is for being seen, the second post seemed to suggest they're for seeing.

for most cyclists (with the obvious comment that most cyclists out at night are in urban or suburban areas), the primary function of lights is for being seen. for most motorists, the primary function of lights is seeing. comparing flashing lights on bikes to flashing lights on cars doesn't really lead to any conclusions.

anyway, FWIW, for me - two steady white lights on the front, one steady and one flashing red on the back.

magicbastarder

that said, i was mulling over the other evening whether some motorist would see me coming towards them and decide not that 'there's a cyclist with two lights mounted six inches apart on the handlebars', but 'there's a car coming and it's still a few hundred metres away'.

Grassey

magicbastarder wrote: »

that said, i was mulling over the other evening whether some motorist would see me coming towards them and decide not that 'there's a cyclist with two lights mounted six inches apart on the handlebars', but 'there's a car coming and it's still a few hundred metres away'.

I've a 1600lm solid front light, with a flashing 300lm light beside I must really confuse them by that logic!

I also have 2 rear see sense lights, but they clearly aren't bright enough given the amount of close passes coming into roundabouts, etc, and the curses from other commuters when I stop at red lights.

Annie get your Run

magicbastarder wrote: »

that said, i was mulling over the other evening whether some motorist would see me coming towards them and decide not that 'there's a cyclist with two lights mounted six inches apart on the handlebars', but 'there's a car coming and it's still a few hundred metres away'.

Precisely. We need to be seen as something different on the road. We are competing against the many other type of lights on the road at night time. Some of my commute is on dark unlit roads and for that stretch I put my good light on solid so I can see the road and turn on my back up light on flash so oncoming cars can still tell I'm on a bike (I think flashing lights are synonymous with bikes).

The other evening coming through the park there was a guy in front of me with an extremely bright back light - not a see.sense. It was annoying me with it's brightness so I overtook him but not for one second would I begrudge him the light - our main goal on the roads is to stay alive - if bright lights help us to do that then so be it.

magicbastarder

for me, the only section on my commute where i need my front lights to illuminate the road is generally on griffith avenue. though with the frosts at the moment, i'm waiting to see if the leaves coming off the trees improves the lighting along the road.

Kaisr Sose

magicbastarder wrote: »

i was trying to figure out what you were trying to say - your first post seemed to suggest that the function of car headlights is for being seen, the second post seemed to suggest they're for seeing.

for most cyclists (with the obvious comment that most cyclists out at night are in urban or suburban areas), the primary function of lights is for being seen. for most motorists, the primary function of lights is seeing. comparing flashing lights on bikes to flashing lights on cars doesn't really lead to any conclusions.

anyway, FWIW, for me - two steady white lights on the front, one steady and one flashing red on the back.

Confusing me now.

FWIW. Constant front is my pref. I regard the flashing ones as dangerous and distracting. A light does not have to flash for it to be noticed. As far as I can recall, the RTA/ law states ia front light may flash no more than once a second, however there are lots that flash more than that. They are thus illegal on Irish roads.
To the poster that has the 1400lm beacon. That’s not something for a public road. Totally OTT.