Running trails at night. LEDs...

wfo9

wfo9

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I've never done it (except taking the easy way down at the end of the day). Figured I might dip my toes in and give it a try soon.

So, I was thinking about adding some LEDs (no big light bars up on the rack... (more or less a hidden setup)... Curious what others have found to work. Not so much brand... but style and position. Do you find floods, spot or a combo to be better.

I don't plan to night wheel at speed, mainly trail runs with rocks...

I was thinking two small 6 or 8" pods behind my sotoshi style grill. Then some rock lights around the frame.

Trying to decide between floods, spots, or a combo for up front.
 
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Running trails at night -> the normal kind where you are constantly in low range and generally doing less than 5mph; additional lights are actually a handicap.

Regular headlights work just fine once your eyes have adapted to the darkness on both sides of you that are not directly lit up by the headlamps.

Add on lighting (especially up high) just keeps blinding your trail partners.

Also - keep your lights on low beam. That gets the light focused on the ground and is less likely to blind your partner.
 
I have an unmolested SoCalTrail light bracket I'd part with. Never used. Made to mount lights behind the grill.

Just have to decide what lights you want, drill the holes on the bracket based on your light, and then paint.

Thats an idea...

PM if you're interested.
 
Ron4RNevada said:
Running trails at night -> the normal kind where you are constantly in low range and generally doing less than 5mph; additional lights are actually a handicap.

Regular headlights work just fine once your eyes have adapted to the darkness on both sides of you that are not directly lit up by the headlamps.

Add on lighting (especially up high) just keeps blinding your trail partners.

Also - keep your lights on low beam. That gets the light focused on the ground and is less likely to blind your partner.
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Interesting perspective. I was thinking at least rock lights would be useful with a little extra flood up front. I had no intention of putting anything up high...

The few times I have been out at night it has been a struggle even on the easy trails to see what is coming.
 
opplanet-atn-ps-15-night-vision-goggles-head-gear-01.jpg
 
wfo9 said:
I've never done it (except taking the easy way down at the end of the day). Figured I might dip my toes in and give it a try soon.

So, I was thinking about adding some LEDs (no big light bars up on the rack... (more or less a hidden setup)... Curious what others have found to work. Not so much brand... but style and position. Do you find floods, spot or a combo to be better.

I don't plan to night wheel at speed, mainly trail runs with rocks...

I was thinking two small 6 or 8" pods behind my sotoshi style grill. Then some rock lights around the frame.

Trying to decide between floods, spots, or a combo for up front.
Click to expand...

Hidden behind the grill = FLoods or Combo....
Frame rock lights...probably best to go to the FJCRUISERFORUM and peek about, they use them heavily....

But wait, I'm from South Louisiana, not many big rocks here! :lol:
 
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I don't drive trails at night on purpose. No scenery. Trail finding can be difficult during the day and nearly impossible at night. I have light bars which help, but I mainly use them at higher speeds to spot and avoid wild life.
 
Jeremy556 said:
I don't drive trails at night on purpose. No scenery. Trail finding can be difficult during the day and nearly impossible at night. I have light bars which help, but I mainly use them at higher speeds to spot and avoid wild life.
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Yea, its not ideal at all. Mainly just thought it would be fun to screw around a little and extended more runs until after the sun goes down. Everything about wheeling is unnecessary self inflected challenges aimed at destroying the truck anyway, so I figured why the heck not add to that.
 
Jeremy556 said:
I don't drive trails at night on purpose. No scenery. Trail finding can be difficult during the day and nearly impossible at night. I have light bars which help, but I mainly use them at higher speeds to spot and avoid wild life.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I've never wanted to night runs on my trips to Moab or Colorado as I would be missing the awesome scenery I drove 18 hours to see. I hadn't thought about it, but I bet trail finding IS really hard at night. One thing I've noticed while looking at Moab area trails on Google Earth is all the side trails going everywhere and branching off the main trail.
 
1engineer said:
I did several mountain bike night rides last season. Incredible how different trails are at night on a bike.
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I MTB at night all the time here in the summer. It's tons of fun and really helps with the brutal heat in the summer. It also makes trails I'm tired of feel new again. However, its really hard on trails that you don't know inside and out. Even then, the shadows can play interesting games with your head.

I've noticed it really helps to have a light on the bars and one on the helmet. Not only does the helmet put the light where you are looking, but the two different angles help with the shadows. I've also noticed that too much light is a bad thing on some trails. We have a lot of white limestone rocks here and extreme light output causes significant reflection and all the detail go away. I think my bar light puts out 600 lumens and my helmet light does over 1000. I usually run the helmet on med and the bar on med or high. Sometimes I kick them both on high if I'm really moving good.

I figure my use case for the truck would mostly benefit from rock lights and some floods.
 
Jeremy556 said:
opplanet-atn-ps-15-night-vision-goggles-head-gear-01.jpg
Click to expand...

Its funny you mention those...

I've been mulling over making a pull/fold-down transparent LCD screen to place in front my my normal field of vision like an HUD.

One of the many options I was thinking for the HUD set-up was no light operations mode to be used in conjunction with a set of IR LED lamps and one or more cameras.
 
BlackWorksInc said:
Its funny you mention those...

I've been mulling over making a pull/fold-down transparent LCD screen to place in front my my normal field of vision like an HUD.

One of the many options I was thinking for the HUD set-up was no light operations mode to be used in conjunction with a set of IR LED lamps and one or more cameras.
Click to expand...

Planning a getaway are we?
 
BlackWorksInc said:
It never hurts to be prepared for anything... Be it a foreign military invasion, alien assault, zombie apocalypse, and/or not wanting to light up the side of a mountain for the Black Helicopters to find you...

:ranger:
Click to expand...

I just wear a tin foil hat and I'm good...
 
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