Bikeray Speed II review

[colleen c]

I received a Bikeray Speed II for review. Before I get to the review, first off is the disclaimer:

The package was sent to me free of charge for review. Bikeray covered the light kit and shipping.

I have no affliliation with Bikeray beside being a customer in the pass with the purchase of the BRIV.

Bikeray contacted me by referal and through PM we agreed to have me do the review.

If I left anything out, feel free to remind me to include into the disclaimer.


A little bit of info about the reviewer (yours truely...me )
I do have some knowledge with electronic and electrical. I also work in an industial job which allows me to have some access to tools and testing device. I do not have any ideas of how I became interested in bicycle lights or flashlights but it is what it is

Now on with the review:
The packaging of the box was neat and everything was in order. Included in the box was the light, 2 o rings, battery, charger, battery cover/holder, extension cable, and a pouch. The first thing I notice was the helmet light holder was not the typical velcro. It was made of straps. The other thing that's worth noting was the battery was encased in a soft green rubber molding and there was also a nylon pouch for the battery. The light head had a color of blue anodizing. Included in the kit was a pouch that allows you to carry the battery and light. Pictures of the packaging.

[colleen c]

Pictures of the battery

The battery has a green molded cover encasing the battery inside. I asked BR if this battery is submersible. They told me it should be but not for a long period of time. Upon inspection of the battery I noticed a cover in the back and took it off. Inside was the battery. I was going to do a underwater test with the battery but after seeing how the cover was slipped on to the casing, I decided that it is best not to unless I silicone the seam.

[colleen c]

Pictures of the light head

The light head is blue in color. The cable exit from the back. It has 5 vent holes on both side and one large vent/draain hole on the bottom. The mode button is large and easily operate even when wearing glove. The indicator light is green and bright. That probably does not matter if you have it on your helmet. On the bar might be another issue. The light cable measure 9.5 inches. The reflector is smooth and the led looks center.

I tried to remove the bezel to see what is lurking underneith the housing. First thing I notice is that the bezel is tight....very tight. This is the first light head unit where I cannot remove the bezel. I used my homemade spanner wrench and long needle nose but still it did not bulge. Just to give you an idea of how tight the bezel was screw on, I tried to used a channel lock with some rubber pad that are use to open jar lids. No success with those also. As a matter of fact, the channel lock worked through the rubber padding and left a small burr on the bezel. That is how tight the bezel was screw on. Unless the thread is reverse thread, I think I will try again when the light head heats up and hopefully the house will expand enough for the thread to have some clearance and loosen up a little.

I do wonder about the integrity of the O ring under the bezel if it is that tight. Hoefully it is not split or smash too much.

[colleen c]

More to come...including beamshot, lux measurement, battery testing and temp testing.

[scar]

So colleen, are you a male or female? Does not matter, just curious as there are not many females that hang out in this forum and BikerRay referred to you as a female in one of his posts. What kind of riding do you do? I am thinking mostly road based on your previous posts. Do you prefer to run a bar light, helmet light, or both? I am thinking I saw a picture of your bike with like 4 lights mounted to the bar. What part of the country are you from?

Sorry for the questions, but they will help me understand your review better

***

[colleen c]

So colleen, are you a male or female? Does not matter, just curious as there are not many females that hang out in this forum and BikerRay referred to you as a female in one of his posts. What kind of riding do you do? I am thinking mostly road based on your previous posts. Do you prefer to run a bar light, helmet light, or both? I am thinking I saw a picture of your bike with like 4 lights mounted to the bar. What part of the country are you from?

Sorry for the questions, but they will help me understand your review better

***

Aw, nothing better than the feeling of a thread derailment, but that's OK. It come to me as no surprise someone will ask this of me. I get asked this all the time on the Internet, but in real life in 3D, the question never arises. It come to me as no surprise that we female don't hang around forum group that are more specific to the male gender. It is assume that we do not take interest in such subject. In reality, I know of many girlfriends who are quite technical and even some of us sare in the labor force. You should see the expression of the new male employee when they see the female forklift driver cruising around in a forklift that's capable of lifting 12,000 lbs

There are limted pictures of me posted on some public forum group and on facebook. That there alone should answer your questiion.

When I was young, my mom had to work weekends while my dad work on his ford which was something he always had to fix. I was the third hand to hold his lights. I aquire most of my skill watching him in boredom swearing why would anyone want to do that type of work at all. Well that was until the 80's when the engineering field was a hot thing to go for. I tried to get my degree but failed and instead of a MS, or EE degree, I ended up getting a MRS. When I enter the work force for a double income for us, the highly skilled labor force paided soooooo much waaaaay more if you know what I mean? Well hopefully this helps you or other members understand where I am coming from.

My primary riding is commuting. Spending countless hours in the dark just because of these odd works hours that are so traditional of the industry. This is where I got my interest for lights. Twice I had been closed to assault by vehicle and when I spoke back to one driver, he wanted to come out and teach me a lesson in manner. Luckily for me, I had a good helemt torch that was a SST50 which shine him up light a movie star when he opened his door. I already had my C3 Taser in my hand and he backed out. This is another reason why I have such interest in LED lights.

Was this disclosing of info helpful in anyways? I surehope it does

[scar]

Wow, sorry if I offended you by asking about you and what type of riding you do, but I do that with ALL of my potential customers. I like to understand where they live and what type of riding they do as that is very important as to what type of light they are looking for. I don't treat a female customer any different than a male customer, but rather as each customer is an individual and has their own needs.

Pictures of you on the internet, no thanks, not interested. What interests me more is why I should take your review of this product above anybody elses reviews? Why did BikerRay pick you for the review? Do you have any special skills/knowledge It does sound a little biased being that you already own a BikerRay light.

So here is where I was confused with who you are. You are posting on a mountain bike site, your profile says your favorite type of riding is downhill but you just said you are commuter. When I look at the history of your previous posts they have all been in the Lights and Night Riding forum, nothing in any downhill forum, commuting forum or even in your local area forum. Kind of stange to me as I post up in many different forums as all aspects of both cycling and lights are my passions.

So to your question if your disclosure helps, somewhat. Now I know you are a commuter and may be looking for different results from a light than the majority of people that post on this site.


****

[BikeRayUSA-Michael]

What interests me more is why I should take your review of this product above anybody elses reviews? Why did BikerRay pick you for the review? Do you have any special skills/knowledge It does sound a little biased being that you already own a BikerRay light.

Greetings Scar,

We were referred by a forumer because, of Colleen's DIY Integrated Sphere Thread where she has tested a decent amount of lights. She is getting good feedback on how to make the sphere better by fellow forumers. We asked her if she would give it a shot in the sphere and she offered her full review on our SPEED II as well.

[colleen c]

Wow, sorry if I offended you by asking about you and what type of riding you do, but I do that with ALL of my potential customers. I like to understand where they live and what type of riding they do as that is very important as to what type of light they are looking for. I don't treat a female customer any different than a male customer, but rather as each customer is an individual and has their own needs.

Pictures of you on the internet, no thanks, not interested. What interests me more is why I should take your review of this product above anybody elses reviews? Why did BikerRay pick you for the review? Do you have any special skills/knowledge It does sound a little biased being that you already own a BikerRay light.

So here is where I was confused with who you are. You are posting on a mountain bike site, your profile says your favorite type of riding is downhill but you just said you are commuter. When I look at the history of your previous posts they have all been in the Lights and Night Riding forum, nothing in any downhill forum, commuting forum or even in your local area forum. Kind of stange to me as I post up in many different forums as all aspects of both cycling and lights are my passions.

So to your question if your disclosure helps, somewhat. Now I know you are a commuter and may be looking for different results from a light than the majority of people that post on this site.


****

Naw, no offense at all Scar, I'm sure there are others who also wondering where I got my knowlegde with these stuff. I guess that's what happen when an individual enter the technology world.

BTW, I lived in the East Bay in the Bay Area in a city. It can get hard to find trail here to ride sometimes. On top of that, the trail are closed every night. When I took up commuting two years ago, I stop going MTBiking. Commuting takes up most of my weekday time and my weekend are spent for catching up. I have not rode my FS Navaro Float 2.0 bike for a while now. Maybe I need to dust it off again

I am a former customer of BR. I only used that light for three months before going with something else. The one thing that did interest. Me was the throw of the Speed II. I think I posted in a thread here from Gemini suggesting a dedicated thrower light. BR offer me a chance to do a review of their light which is has the potential to be a thrower and I accepted it. I have many other throw torch that I can use as comparison. This will be a unbias review.

[BikeRayUSA-Michael]

Pictures of the light head
I tried to remove the bezel to see what is lurking underneith the housing. First thing I notice is that the bezel is tight....very tight. This is the first light head unit where I cannot remove the bezel. I used my homemade spanner wrench and long needle nose but still it did not bulge. Just to give you an idea of how tight the bezel was screw on, I tried to used a channel lock with some rubber pad that are use to open jar lids. No success with those also. As a matter of fact, the channel lock worked through the rubber padding and left a small burr on the bezel. That is how tight the bezel was screw on. Unless the thread is reverse thread, I think I will try again when the light head heats up and hopefully the house will expand enough for the thread to have some clearance and loosen up a little.

I do wonder about the integrity of the O ring under the bezel if it is that tight. Hoefully it is not split or smash too much.

Hi Colleen,

Thanks for the quick response of getting a review started . We apologize for not informing you that we seal the bevel to prevent tampering of the lighthead and voiding of the warranty. The O-ring is not damaged unless someone tries to take the bevel off. Even then, it might not be damaged if took off. We are hoping that when you do get it off - the o-ring is not damaged because, that will look bad . But we understand that you want to look underneath the housing. We are hoping that you can get it off without damaging the O-ring with the tools you have. We also seal the battery casing - We shipped out a number of lights that day from our pre-orders and didn't seal yours - for that we apologize.

[colleen c]

Greetings Scar,

We were referred by a forumer because, of Colleen's DIY Integrated Sphere Thread where she has tested a decent amount of lights. She is getting good feedback on how to make the sphere better by fellow forumers. We asked her if she would give it a shot in the sphere and she offered her full review on our SPEED II as well.

Those result should be in by tonight. I had to let the battery charge fully. I will be taking an inital reading then another reading after the lighthead heats up after 10 minutes with normal cooling while taking relative reading on the Sphere.

I did a intital preview test yesterday and the inital numbers put the Speed II as about the same as the MS XML which is typical of most single XML light. However, the peak lux at one meter was more than the MS XML which indicate a better thrower. In comparison to my better throwing torches like my 2.8A KD C8 where I shimed the reflector out for maxium throw or my Maelstrom X10, the Speed II did not seem to have better throw than those. I will have some numbers tonight.

[colleen c]

Hi Colleen,

Thanks for the quick response of getting a review started . We apologize for not informing you that we seal the bevel to prevent tampering of the lighthead and voiding of the warranty. The O-ring is not damaged unless someone tries to take the bevel off. Even then, it might not be damaged if took off. We are hoping that when you do get it off - the o-ring is not damaged because, that will look bad . But we understand that you want to look underneath the housing. We are hoping that you can get it off without damaging the O-ring with the tools you have. We also seal the battery casing - We shipped out a number of lights that day from our pre-orders and didn't seal yours - for that we apologize.

Well that explain the Bezel. I thought it was me for doing something wrong like holding the channel lock backwards...duh Ok lucky there were no damage done. As a side note for Bikeray as a recomendation is to include a tag or note of "Warning. Do not attempt to remove Bezel."

As for the battery: lucky me for being caution when I saw the cap even after I was given the OK to drown the battery. That would have been bad for the PCB.

[scar]

Originally posted by BikeRayUSA-Michael
We shipped out a number of lights that day from our pre-orders and didn't seal yours - for that we apologize.

You not only shipped out to colleen but also a "number of lights that day". So I am curious how you go about resolving this issue with the other pre order customers shipped out that day?



****

[znomit]

We also seal the battery casing - We shipped out a number of lights that day from our pre-orders and didn't seal yours - for that we apologize.

I was going to make some comment about BR sending out a specially prepped light. But I guess they didn't.
Ideally you would purchase anonymously for a test.
Collen are you sending the unit back after you test it or is it a gift?

Now on to the light head...
Is that the Oring I see underneath, exposed to the elements?

[seeker]

Is that the Oring I see underneath, exposed to the elements?

Good catch. Don't worry, I'm sure it'll do fine in that dunk test BR promised us over 2 weeks ago. Right?

[colleen c]

znomit you have an eye of an Eagle. By golly I think you are correct. I took another look and this picture and it is the O ring.

[colleen c]

I was going to make some comment about BR sending out a specially prepped light. But I guess they didn't.
Ideally you would purchase anonymously for a test.
Collen are you sending the unit back after you test it or is it a gift?

Funny you ask this question is such a timely manner. For the time being it looks as if I will be sending it back even more so sooner than later.

Long story short. I did some wallbeamshot yesterday. Then I took one more today for the beam pattern. I then set up the Intergrating Sphere and did the test for instant start lumens and after 5 minutes of run time. I did this test for several other lights. Each one had a cooling fan running constantly. Anyway, after I did the 5 minute test for the Speed II, I changed mode to see what the lumens were for medium and low mode. Guess what? It shutoff on me and the green indicator light was off. Thinking it was battery, I tried a MS light and the Speed II battery was good. I then tried the Speed II with a Geoman pack and it was still not working. So for now it seem like the unit had failed for some reason.

I emailed BikeRay and they will take back this failed light head for evaluation for reason why it failed. They will send me another lighthead for the review. I hate to report this as I was begining to take some liking to the light but honesty is honesty and an unbias review is what was promised and here it is folks. So for the time being, further testing is in intermission. Well at least we know the unit sent was not a specially prepped light.

I just uploaded some wall beamshot photo. Bear in mind that the wall is not pure white but has some beige tint to it. We decided to paint the wall last year and there is not a single white wall in the house. No left over white panel or sheetrock to use as a white wall. Please do not take the beam tint into full consideration but rather just the beam pattern. There is a yard stick with markers at the 12, 24, and 36 inch mark. I will explain in detail what those are the data I gather. Same with the sphere result. For the time being, you can see the picture here:

wall beamshot pictures by Colleenlc - Photobucket

sphere test pictures by Colleenlc - Photobucket

[seeker]

Funny you ask...

So, 145 lux for the MS XML and 133 lux for the S2.

What's that in lumens, Colleen?

[colleen c]

So, 145 lux for the MS XML and 133 lux for the S2.

What's that in lumens, Colleen?

Those number are in the X10 scale. The S2 reads 1330 x 10 = 13,300 lux. My final correction factor for the sphere after 3 coats of paint stands at 22.6 after calibrating it with known tested flashlights. So for the S2 after 5 minutes of runtime, the lumens is 13,000/22.6 = 588 lumens OTF. Reason for 5 minutes is to allow for heat loss and that's where the readings slow down in the loss of likens.

Here are the number in raw and converted lumens at 5 minutes. First number is the raw lux reading and the second is the converted lumens.

Speed II. 13,300. 588
Magicshine XML. 14470. 640
KD C8 2.8 amps focused. 15,820. 700

The initial start had much higher brightness for all three before dropping from heat loss.
speed II. 697
Ms xml. 690
KD C8. 748

Please keep in mind these are only relative readings. My sphere can be off by 5 to 8 percent from a real calibrated sphere. However for reading relative reading of one light in comparison to another it less of a factor.

2nd thing to note. The speed II did failed after the test. I will retake another test to see if these reading are still the same or if the driver was failing during with these results.

[colleen c]

When I did the wallshot at 5 meters, I took a maximum lux reading then calculated that number back to peak throw lux at one meter using inverse square of the distant. The higher this peak throw number will mean a much better beam throw (usually). One thing I learn is that high overall lumens does not always means good throw but it is important for flood. Take for example is my Debree DBS aspheric. It only had about 250 to 300 lumen but the peak Lux at 1 meter is over 75,000 Lux. That light can easily throw 1000 ft and light up the top of a palm tree.

Here are the peak throw lux at one meter.

Speed II 19000 lux
MS XML. 15750 lux
KD C8 2.8 amp driver with reflector focus at Max 24750 lux
Maelstrom X10 25325 lux
Stock KD C8 old 1.5 amps pill 16875 lux

This result shows the Speed II can outhrow the MS 808E XML. When I took the speed II out last night, it did indeed outhrow the MS XML. It was noticeable but not as good as the mod KD with the 2.8 amps or the Maelstrom X10 torch which has a really hot spot. Further testing the lights also reveal some useable corona and spill. I do think it can be use as a bar light if needed to be.

I would have love to have the chance to have taken some outdoor beam shot at the park where all my other lights were previously taken for comparison. This will show better detail than just numbers. But sadly the light failed tonight and hopefully a replacement will arrive for outdoor beamshot. Until then..........

[znomit]

Not really the tight spot we expected from BR pictures
Can you chuck the light meter on there and measure the beam angle? Bonus points if you do some comparison graphs.

Oh, Scar should send you one of his lights, see if you can destroy that

[mb323323]

Is the BR made in China or is just the housing made there and then assembled here at BR.

Just curious.

[scar]

Originally posted by znomit
Oh, Scar should send you one of his lights, see if you can destroy that

I have over 4 years worth of lights in places all over the world out there being tested regularly


***

[colleen c]

Not really the tight spot we expected from BR pictures
Can you chuck the light meter on there and measure the beam angle? Bonus points if you do some comparison graphs.

Oh, Scar should send you one of his lights, see if you can destroy that

I have over 4 years worth of lights in places all over the world out there being tested regularly


***

I swear to Gawd I was giving it TLC as I was getting attach to the baby blue anodizing. Well as the old saying goes...."Never get too attach to anything?"

[BikeRayUSA-Michael]

Is the BR made in China or is just the housing made there and then assembled here at BR.

Just curious.

Semi assembled in China - final assembly done here in Port Orange, Florida.