LED light selection

[slucero]

Hello,
I'm looking to build an LED bike-light (headlight, tail-light, blinkers) and am looking for suggestions for appropriate lights.

I'm planning on using neoPixel ring-lights for the tail-light, and blinkers, but am most uncertain about the headlight (I want to ensure it's sufficiently bright). Any advice on selecting a light/lights that is/are sufficiently bright would be very-much appreciated!

Thanks,
Steven

[adafruit_support_bill]

These are the brightest ones we carry: https://www.adafruit.com/product/518

If you check some of the LED specialist sites, you can find snap-on optics that will give you a nice beam pattern also.

[slucero]

Great - for the headlight, I'm willing to use something other than a neoPixel. The rings will still be sufficiently bright? Or should I look at something else entirely?

[adafruit_support_bill]

Bike headlights serve two purposes: Illuminating the road ahead and making you visible to others. If you are riding in mostly urban streets, good visibility to others should be your primary concern. If you are riding rural roads - or off-road, then you need a powerful beam to light the path ahead.

For visibility, you want a large surface area and wide beam pattern. Neopixel rings are good for that. They have many leds spread over a large area. And the beam pattern is very wide - almost 180 degrees. The down-side is that they are not very good at lighting the road ahead.

For lighting the road, you need to focus more LED power into a beam. I have one I built several years ago using 3 of the 1W LEDs and some snap-on lenses I found on-line.