Product Review - Ay Up Lights

As most people are aware, I choose to ride most of my products because I strongly believe they are the best products available for the riding that I do. Lights are no exception. After using Vicious Power Arc HID lights for the past couple of year (I still believe they are the absolute best HID riding light on the market to date bar none), I was given the opportunity to test a relatively newcomer to the lighting market world, AyUp. Once again an Australian company (very important to me) and once again producing a product that excels in what it sets out to achieve. I was initially blown away by the physical size and minimal weight. This is what attracted me to investigate further on their function and practical use as a new enduro racing light.

AyUp have set out to achieve what no other lighting company have - to produce an extremely lightweight lighting system practical in just about every way possible. What I mean by this is that most other LED lighting systems over volt the LED to produce more light, AyUp run the LED’s at their specified voltage of 7.4. As a result, the LED’s don’t heat up, therefore there is no need to use cooling fins, excessive amounts of alloy, etc to keep the LED’s cool. This design also allows Batteries to be half the size/weight for the same burn times.

Because AyUp don’t over volt the LED’s they aren’t the brightest LED lights on the market. But, by no means is this a negative thing. I strongly believe mountain bike lights have gone to the stage where they are too bright – where you can see forever but get into some sand or a little rock garden and all you see is brightness, no track contrast. It is now time for manufacturers to move away from making their lights brighter and concentrate on making them lighter and run for longer.

Running the AyUp’s with intermediate beam on my bars and narrow beam on helmet and I can see clearly what I’m riding into. I like to call this usable light. I have now raced with AyUps in four 24 hour events and the only time I would have liked to have the Vicious strapped to my helmet was at the Worlds during a 90km/h fire road decent (although I’d ridden it 6 or 7 times in the light knew there were no obstacles to worry about).

Another interesting point with the AyUp’s as a dual system (one light on bars one light on helmet) is that they are still lighter and have a longer burn time than most single system items on the market. All this from a company who are continually pumping money into improving their products, from more styles of batteries, to bags with solar charging panels for adventure racers and the list goes on.

As a result, I’m more than happy with my lights, and very happy that AyUp are sponsoring me. But I would be using these lights regardless of sponsorship. An Australian company owned by mountain bike riders.

I Usually run the larger 6 hour battery with the extension lead running under jersey and into my pocket. You don't even know it's there.

I you use the 3hour battery in this way, this half of the system weighs 200g.

With the 6 hour battery, it jumps up to a whopping 250g.

The Vicious Power with a five hour battery come in at 600g.

Handle bar setup with small 3 hour battery, very small, can hardly see it from the top.

With the six hour battery you can still mount it comfortably under the stem,

Product Review - Crumpler Sinking Barge

This is the first products review for my blog. I plan on doing them every now and again when I come across a product I truly believe to be innovative and worthy of a giant plug.

Over the lasts few months I have been doing a lot of traveling. I was fortunate enough to be given a Crumpler Sinking Barge backpack before we left for the US and I must say it has been brilliant. It is designed to carry both a laptop and a digital SLR with spare lens and flash in padded comfort. When you consider the cost of these digital devices, a good bag to carry them in is essential. The Sinking Barge is one of very few bags on the market designed to carry these two items in tandem reducing the need for two separate bags. I found it perfect to use as my carry on bag when flying that way I could keep an eye on my stuff or even pull them out for a bit of a play. There is even enough spare room in a separate compartment for other travel essentials.

Once at my destination, removing the laptop for day trip type stuff gives a bit more room for other things and accessing the camera is a synch with the clever design of the compartments. I found myself wanting to take my camera with me more often than I normally would because the bag does not reek camera bag and is extremely comfortable on all contact points. The padded camera compartment can be Velcroed out, giving more space if the camera isn’t required, making this bag one of the most versatile bags I have ever seen. If you have a large laptop, or a professional sized SLR, never fear because it also comes in a larger size, the Customary Barge.

I couldn’t do the bag justice in front of my camera, so I borrowed these images from the Crumpler website.

As most of you probably know, I have been working as a bicycle courier for the past ten years. A lot of this time has been spent with a Crumpler satchel strapped to my back. These bags are made bomb proof and if you ever were to have a problem with it, the boys and girls at Crumpler would get it sorted out for you reel quick.

I think Robyn was thinking about replacing me with a bag.