Blaze: Lasers on Bikes
The Blaze is in on demo and it’s sure fun to play with. It’s a freakin’ laser for your bike, after all, and arrived to market last year via Kickstarter. Now that crowdfunded companies are maturing and to continue growing, they need to get product out for reviews and to the media too. Considering the conditions we ride in Seattle, the laser projection of a bike icon, is a supplemental “safety” add on to your current light set up. I quoted safety as I’m not entirely sure of its effectiveness with drivers but it does draw attention on the path. When the Blaze first arrived, I joked on Twitter…
Got the @blazefeed to demo and cannot wait to laserlight you mothafuckas on the bike path. #lasers pic.twitter.com/0Z0QZb7k2g
— byron@bikehugger (@bikehugger) November 12, 2015
Following Blaze’s lead, other lights project lanes around cyclists, and years ago, I commented on how lights create no effective spatial relationship with cars. Meaning, cars surround an occupant with lights at the corners, where we sit on bikes with the light in the middle. Anecdotally, I’ve been brushed more by cars at night, then in the day, and I think that’s because the driver is focused on the space between the edge of the car and the light, not shoulders or hips. While questioning the effectiveness of a laser pointer for safety in front and in the middle of your lane of travel, where the Blaze absolutely shines is in the construction and feature set
The Blaze Laserlight is assembled from 109 components with the precision you’d expect from a smartphone, not a bike light. It’s made from aircraft aluminum and has diamond cut edges. It’s USB rechargeable, waterproof to the depth of one meter and fits 99% of handlebars.
The charge mechanism, which is magnetic like a Macbook’s charge, is a feature I’d like to see on all lights instead of the micro USB plug. Because of the construction and ease of mounting too, I recommend the Blaze as a gift and for the cyclist that has everything, including a box in the garage full of lights, ever since the first Nightriders.
The light and laser work independently, which means, with or without the laser, you have a 300 lumen LED bike light and that’s just not bright enough alone for the dreariest of rainy season days or nights. To get the maximum run time for daytime running lights, I use multiple lights, and what I’m doing with the Blaze is combining it with the Flux from Spesh. Running the LED and Laser constant, that’s 4 hours of light supplementing the 3 hour run time of the Flux with a 400 lumen Cree LED in battery-save mode.
The novelty of a laser projector on your bike aside (worth a few hours of fun alone), the Blaze is exceptionally well made and I hope Blaze expands their product line to include models as bright as a car headlamp and with a wider beam angle, like the TAZ from Lights and Motion, a go-to-gear favorite of ours.
The Blaze is available direct from a US-based warehouse for $200.