Can we please have another level of brighness which will be less bright? Even in "low" or "night flash" modes, my fellow cyclists complain about 'laser bright light killing their eyes", especially in the dark. Thanks!
Agree. Really needs a low brightness mode as it’s too bright for group rides in the dark. I’m having riders behind telling me they’re riding staggered behind to the left or right of me so as not to get blinded.
I don't understand either. There are far brighter tail lights available. Some produce 150 lumens. The 510 is no where close to that brightness level. There is one tail light that has 400 lumens! I wonder how the 510 is mounted. Is it aimed upwards instead of level?
I was surprised as well. When I bought it I was worried about it not being bright enough as it’s lumens are much lower than many other lights. The specs list it as 20-69 lumen depending upon mode whereas my other rear light I used (Knog cobber - https://www.knog.com.au/bike-lights/cobber/cobber-rear-large.html ) is 60-270 lumens (ignoring the 15 lumen eco flash mode I don’t use). I had no complaints when using the Knog Cobber, only with the garmin 510.
I think the reason is a combination of two things:
1. when a car approaches the garmin seems to flash at it’s brightest
2. The lense on the garmin 510 focuses the light into more of a direct beam than my other lights. End result is that if your in the focus of this beam, the light appears brighter than other lights. (A bit like shining a laser beam into someones eyes versus a light bulb spreading light in a room).
In my opinion, these two things combined cause the problem and not the absolute brightness of the LEDs used.
To fix it, one of the two need to change. At the moment, since I can’t change the way the brightness modes operate, I have had to resort to sticking something in front of the lense to diffuse the light and make it less of a laser beam. (clear sticky tape folded onto itself about 10-20 times and then stuck over the lense). It helps a bit but not ideal and not something I should have to do on a $300 light.
if instead garmin could update the flash modes via a software update, that would be ideal.
I agree to this point with the lense. I checked the lense effect: in 50 cm distance, you get a quite focussed spot with 15 cm in diameter, which is an 15° emission cone. Quite focussed. The bike light sits on the seatpost and therefore quite high (90 cm). Cars/drivers are in a lower position, or riders behind you in the lower bars. A Fresnel stray lense might be a really good solution.
I have successfully used a couple of layers of car window tinting film to reduce the intensity of the light. I no longer get complaints from my cycling companions
