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Outbound Lighting --- Hangover --- Discussion

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Discussion starter · #61 ·
Yep, always the risk of competition coming in and swooping things up. Currently the lightest of the lights is 135g or so, going to 21700 adds another 35g right off the bat with the battery, not to mention the larger case and such, so can probably estimate that they'd be sitting at almost 180g unless they completely restructured the lights all together. We are right at the limit of potential weight reduction for a high power light. I could probably squeeze another 10g of weight out using some different design approaches, but even thermally conductive plastics are about the same density of die cast magnesium so even different materials won't change things much.

And quite frankly, I'm not too worried. If they come out with a new 21700 then okay their runtimes might be close to what we can offer, but their beam patterns will still be circular spots.

Now if they come out with 21700, with USB-C, and a really nice properly engineered beam pattern at a cheaper price point and feels as nice as ours.... okay maybe I'll be worried, but at that point I'm going to let our customer service, dealer programs, and ability to pivot and make changes fast be the key differentiator. And if it got to that point it'd be awesome. Means that more people are taking night riding seriously, enjoying it, and the ability to compare lights is going to come down more to how well one can judge a lamp by runtime, constant output, beam pattern width, depth, peak intensitys, color, etc. instead of just reported FL1 lumens and runtime, which we all know suck.
 
#63 ·
Got mine on order as well to replace my aging Exposure Diablo. Coming from the Diablo I'd like to put in one request. A 1 hour bright mode. I get a ton of rides in early fall or late spring that require less than an hour of light. It'd be nice to max it out for those rides. I also using it splitboarding at night, which also require less than an hour.
 
Discussion starter · #65 ·
Velodonata said:
Damn, Instagram really doesn't want us to see those beamshots!
Click to expand...
I've been itching to post on here all day. :) Finally got a chance to get to the desktop.

So here are some of the near production-quality prototype optics. We are already going to tighten things up a hair to bump up the peak lux on the hotspot, but we are about 80% where we want to be in terms of the beam quality and intentions.

Remember, this is with around 800 lumens, being pushed through hand-polished optics rather than production grade PMMA so the quality will only get better from here. The light being compared starts with an N, ends with an A, rhymes with Lumens, and is the similar price point model. So using around 1000-1100 lumens depending on who you believe.

Can see a similar philosphy that I like to follow. Little wider and smoother hotspot, but more mid-range fall-off and lots of foreground illumination to make the surrounding areas appear more well lit and allow your eye to take in more information. We are able to get a lot of the ambient lighting due to the blended TIR approach. It's mostly uncontrolled scatter but it's even enough that it's not an issue in terms of strong artifacts.







Note this last one. That's JUST hangover, that's not the Trail Edition turned on (you can tell since the status lights are off). I think helps show that the light on it's own will actually be a decent bar light too.

So yea. We are pretty amped about this. We know what to improve on as production starts up. Tooling has been getting cut, and we are finalizing the SMT schedule. Working on business financing to get over 2000 (potentially 3000) units to start so that we won't run out again in the fall.

In the last 5 weeks we have had over 400 pre-orders. Initially I was planning on maybe 1000 units to start, never thought the demand would be this strong!
 
#66 ·
Outbound said:
I've been itching to post on here all day. :)

So here are some of the near production-quality prototype optics. We are already going to tighten things up a hair to bump up the peak lux on the hotspot, but we are about 80% where we want to be in terms of the beam quality and intentions.
Click to expand...
:thumbsup: Are you still shooting for a 80 lux max. or something higher? Beamshots look good. Thanks!!!
Mole
 
#67 ·
Wow...Are those beam shots of the comparison light correct? Is there really just dead black space with what looks like no light bleed/scatter to form a perfect circle of tunnel vision type light? I am assuming that the light I’m looking at is the same one that starts with a N and ends with an A 1200 lumen light running on boost mode.

The Hangover is coming together nicely and is looking to be able to stand proudly on its own legs.
 
#68 ·
Here's the thing about trying to take photos of lamps that you are trying to display to show throw; No photo is ever going to be able to display what the eye sees in real life. Particularly true if the lamp also has a great deal of spill ( Which ) this ones does without a doubt. That's because the camera will react to the close in spill and effect the display of the distance throw.

In the last photo can you tell us the distance from the bike to the last skinny little tree on the right (?) From the last photo I can detect a semblance of a central hot spot although it is blended very well with the rest of the beam pattern ( very well done if I do say ).

Although I know that the Hangover lamp is not in it's finally stage of design I can't help but think that a little extra power ( maybe 1000-1200 lumen ) might be the better way to go. 800 is not bad but on those fast MTB down-hills I'd feel better having a bit more power to increase the distance throw. With the lamp I currently use on the helmet ( Wiz XP-3 ) I usually cruise with the lamp in my medium mode programmed somewhere around 600-800 lumen although I have no way to measure that so that is my ball park est. Most of the time I'm quite happy with that. I only turn on the boost mode when on the most technical of fast-moving downhills.

A couple more comments; With the limited battery size / capacity a wireless remote would come in real handy with a lamp like the Hangover. That's because when you use a lamp that is using a self-contained battery you want to be sure to only use the amount of light ( power ) that you actually need for the moment ( so you don't run out of power prematurely ). To do that without a wireless remote means you will be reaching up to the helmet on a regular basis. I do this with my XP-3 because it doesn't use a wireless remote but since I use an external battery it's not a big deal to use the mid-mode as much as I want. Also in keeping with the same thought ( being conservative with the battery ) would be a nice touch if you could program the modes for the output that you ( the user ) find the most useful.
 
Discussion starter · #69 ·
cue003 said:
Wow...Are those beam shots of the comparison light correct? Is there really just dead black space with what looks like no light bleed/scatter to form a perfect circle of tunnel vision type light? I am assuming that the light I'm looking at is the same one that starts with a N and ends with an A 1200 lumen light running on boost mode.

The Hangover is coming together nicely and is looking to be able to stand proudly on its own legs.
Click to expand...
Yep, circle beam patterns tend to do that. However the iPhone being used does have the limitations that it can't pickup the low-light scatter that occurs from bounces off trees, or even the lenses itself. So it's not quite "pitch black" in person, but it's very very dark and has that sharp cutoff.

Prettyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy close on that guess of which light it is. However this can also extend to really any bowl-type reflector since by the inherent nature of the design, you'll end up with a sharp ring unless you put some heavy filters on the outside of the lens.

That is where the blended TIR approach comes in handy, it allows for a mix of concentrated directed light, but also provides some scatter to fill the surroundings.

We have already made some larger design changes to the lens, should have legit production samples in 3 weeks or so, and once we green-light that we'll have 3000 units about 4-5 weeks after that. Main change is that we are severely reducing the amount of facets on the front, potentially going to a smooth face. Tweaked the actual TIR design a bunch based on the feedback that Tom provided to get a smoother beam with a little more punch. Actually pulled the overall beam pattern in about 5* on each side and changed the distribution a bit.
 
Discussion starter · #72 ·
Mestapho, it might, I can't guarantee anything given I haven't tested it.

Status update with the Hangover.

We have all the suppliers lined up. Hard part samples are arriving next week and we'll have about 30 units floating around getting tested and reviewed. We are doing all the SMT, PCBA, and final assembly at mHub in downtown Chicago. Awesome small startup accelerator that caters to hardware, been invaluable so far in helping to scale the business.

We are still on target for early-fall delivery. I don't want to promise a specific date until we have the hard part samples in hand and approved. Since any small changes might set things back a few weeks.

With that in mind, once we approve the hard parts we are going to drop the Pre-Order pricing from 30% off to 15%. So only another week or so to save the most!
 
#73 ·
Awesome update. Thank you for that. Will this light also have the “limp” home feature where it cuts light output and is not user controlled to enable/disable that feature? I know there was discussion in the road/trail thread of your other lights and you said you will have to further investigate possible changes etc. Will those changes also be incorporated here? Any chances for user upgradeable firmware for changes/feature enhancements so we don’t have to send the light back to you?
 
Discussion starter · #74 ·
cue003 said:
Awesome update. Thank you for that. Will this light also have the "limp" home feature where it cuts light output and is not user controlled to enable/disable that feature? I know there was discussion in the road/trail thread of your other lights and you said you will have to further investigate possible changes etc. Will those changes also be incorporated here? Any chances for user upgradeable firmware for changes/feature enhancements so we don't have to send the light back to you?
Click to expand...
We'll definitely be improving the software to make sure there is a true override. This won't be nearly as aggressive.

As for future software updates. Solid.... maybe? Since there is a USB plug it certainly opens up the door to that, however we are still programming the boards via pins on the PCB itself. So I would have to check if we even have traces going to the USB to allow for future updates.
 
#75 ·
I just placed my order for a Hangover!

This will be my very first bike light. I've written MTBs for a couple decades and dirtbikes even longer. Although I've taken my dirtbikes out at night (w/ stock headlights) and had some fun, I've never been out at night with a MTB. So, I recently decided this winter it was time and began researching.

Since it was my first light, I wanted to keep the cost low to learn if I like riding at night and what I wanted from my lights. So I set my price point for a system around $100 and around a 2 hr runtime. Pretty quickly I homed in on a system of 2 NR Lumina Micro 850s. For $95, I could have 1 for the bars and 1 for the helmet. But, I'd need to add $15 for a GoPro mount for the helmet application. Doing further searches I stumbled across a YouTube video posted the Outbound Road and Trail lights. I was really impressed with the Trail and Trail/Road combo, so I looked up this company I had not heard of yet. That's how I found the Hangover.

As a product development engineer, I appreciate the information and detailed design discussion on the website and in this thread. Also, I totally followed the logic behind the decisions made to arrive at the design (Must Haves, Trade Offs, etc.). My experience riding dirtbikes at night also told me that the light carpet and brightness gradient vs round w/ hot center approach was much more effective.

So, I placed my order while the 30% off price was still available.

The Hangover may not be my final solution, but I'm pretty certain it will be part of it. It will certainly be a great start point and I doubt I'll be disappointed.

Thanks everyone, especially Outbound Lighting, for having the discussion. It was a big help in my decision process.
 
#77 ·
Outbound said:
Yep, always the risk of competition coming in and swooping things up. Currently the lightest of the lights is 135g or so,
Click to expand...
I am using now ~7 Years Zerbas H600 on my Helmets.
They are ~39 grams with 18650 cell what is 45 gram you have a total of 84 grams.

A empy cell is to change with a handle.
The beam looks similar to your beamshots what you have posted.

Zebras a offerd in 6000K, 5000K and 4000K high CRI options.

Zerba always update there lights to actual LED generations.

At moment XHP50 Series what give you in compare to your light 2 Hours in 800 Lumen coz the LED drains only 1,5 Amps do deliver that Output.

there are a lot of other Helmets lights like the Zebras on the market.

Outbound said:
Now if they come out with 21700, with USB-C,
Click to expand...
Also long time Existing,
Acebeam H30 what ist 80 grams, wit 21700 cell 144 grams.
about the XHP70 the real runtimes and outputs.

1150 Lumen for 3 Hours.
or 2200 Lumen for 1,5 Hours.

And now the Question coz i dont understand what you write.

You put into this light 6x XQ-E HI LEDs right?
i have measured this LED on the highes bins some years ago an never reach at ~300-350ma current 100 Lumens output in a light sphere.

or if it is easyer,
This LED not Reach 100 lumens/1 Watt Power.
6 of them together need more then 8 Watt on Power to Reach 600 LED Lumens.

if you try now,
to reach an Real Output of 800 Lumens in Front of your Light it will cost you ~ 3 Amps or~10-11 Watts energy.

a single 18650 have ~10 Wh capacity.
the other sad think, 6 of this LEDs have in total a lower eff then a Single XM-L2 LED.

On your Website i read that You say your light with this LED types gives 800 Lumen for 2 Hours with a single 18650?????

can you explain how you get over 20 Wh from a 10 Wh cell?
 
Discussion starter · #78 ·
stu06 said:
Hi Matt,

How does the Hangover beam pattern compare with the Seca 2500?
Click to expand...
The Seca 2500 will definitely outpunch this thing on lumens alone. However the beam pattern should be fairly similar. Seca is good in that it has a nicely diffused yet punchy pattern. I would wager that Hangover will be a little bit tighter since I have designed this with fixed helmet mounting in mind, so the beam pattern doesn't have to be as wide as something mounted for the handlebars.
 
Discussion starter · #79 ·
lostplaces said:
I am using now ~7 Years Zerbas H600 on my Helmets.
They are ~39 grams with 18650 cell what is 45 gram you have a total of 84 grams.

A empy cell is to change with a handle.
The beam looks similar to your beamshots what you have posted.

Zebras a offerd in 6000K, 5000K and 4000K high CRI options.

Zerba always update there lights to actual LED generations.

At moment XHP50 Series what give you in compare to your light 2 Hours in 800 Lumen coz the LED drains only 1,5 Amps do deliver that Output.

there are a lot of other Helmets lights like the Zebras on the market.

Also long time Existing,
Acebeam H30 what ist 80 grams, wit 21700 cell 144 grams.
about the XHP70 the real runtimes and outputs.

1150 Lumen for 3 Hours.
or 2200 Lumen for 1,5 Hours.

And now the Question coz i dont understand what you write.

You put into this light 6x XQ-E HI LEDs right?
i have measured this LED on the highes bins some years ago an never reach at ~300-350ma current 100 Lumens output in a light sphere.

or if it is easyer,
This LED not Reach 100 lumens/1 Watt Power.
6 of them together need more then 8 Watt on Power to Reach 600 LED Lumens.

if you try now,
to reach an Real Output of 800 Lumens in Front of your Light it will cost you ~ 3 Amps or~10-11 Watts energy.

a single 18650 have ~10 Wh capacity.
the other sad think, 6 of this LEDs have in total a lower eff then a Single XM-L2 LED.

On your Website i read that You say your light with this LED types gives 800 Lumen for 2 Hours with a single 18650?????

can you explain how you get over 20 Wh from a 10 Wh cell?
Click to expand...
Hi!

Seems odd that this is your first post on this forum, plugging a bunch of products that no one really recommends around here because they aren't designed for biking, and trying to say my numbers are illegit, but I'll go through them anyways.

Weight: We are right at 100g with the 45g cell battery inside, along with a magnesium die cast housing so that it can actually dissipate the heat. So an actual housing/lens/electronics weight of 55g. The nearest competitor is the NR Lumina and the L&M Urban that are around 135g, so it's significant.

In our market research we found that most people don't want to be carrying extra 18650 cells, have a separate cell charger, and would rather have high speed USB-C charging. Also part of why that Zebra light is probably 16g lighter (nevermind the mass needed to have the built in gopro mount on hangover).

The zebra light looks like a nice running light or something, not sure how you would securely attach that to a bike helmet.

Also the beam pattern is not similar. The Zebra light and all those other lights you are mentioning are using bowl reflectors. By their very nature (and because they are off the shelf) they will form a harsh cutoff on the edge of the beam and be circular in nature. Only way to escape that is a lot of secondary light shaping via lenses and stuff.

We are indeed using the XQ-E Hi chips and they do perform to their datasheet. The engineer helping me on the electrical is a former CREE labs R&D manager. He knows his ****, is anal about making sure the specs are right and meeting his targets.

Perhaps you were testing knockoff chips, or testing with a bad heatsink and not doing the proper steps to really ensure that you can actually get full efficiency out of the lights. We aren't running this at the full 320 lumens because the efficiency would fall off way too quickly since the heatsink would overheat.

Needless to say, we have already tested with the chips running at the proper current/voltage to hit 800-900 lumens and it has lasted for the claimed 2 hour runtime with very little droop. This method of using lots of low power LED's to boost efficiency and improve the beam pattern is proving to be good.

We are invested in a high quality LG Chem battery that matches the power consumption of the light. Not cheap at all, in fact the second most expensive part in the light behind the PCBA but a high quality battery is absolutely essential in this type of product.

We are looking like we SHOULD start being able to assemble and ship product by the end of September. Things are well underway. :)
 
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