IB14: Niterider Sentinel Blinky Light Creates a Bike Lane w/ Lasers!

Of course a red laser looks bright on a red carpet. The carpet looks red to us because it reflects red light. It wouldn’t look like much on a blue or black carpet.

I’m not sure why a “project your own bike lane” laser would keep me safer at night. Does Niterider have any objective reason to think it does? Or are consumers just expected to erupt into “ooh, shiny!” euphoria?

Maybe this is really helpful, but I’d like a little more reason to think so than “because laser beams.”

Interesting.

On the note about blinking, I’ve encountered riders who claimed they’re sensitive to the blink – epileptic. I don’t know that they actually were, but we changed our rear blinkers to solid.

JasonK, I ordered one of these because I commute in the dark every evening. The thought is that a driver will assume the left hand line is the edge of what they have to pass and they’ll move over just a little bit (vs. the center of the bike where a typical light sits). I ride 10,000 miles a year and tend to feel a little safer within a bike lane. Drivers generally do respect the stripe of a bike lane (at least somewhat) so why not do the same at night with a “virtual lane”? Seems logical and for the price I’m gonna give it a shot.

ObligatedToSay: I’m not epileptic, but rear lights haven’t given me trouble, only headlights. Strobes and LEDs make it really easy to be seen, but also to misuse them to annoy, if not blind people around you.

I got one like that for a gift a few years ago. Works well and is pretty cool but shortens the battery life. The only issue I had was it seems that at night most cars would give a few feet of clearance but when the laser lane was on it shined about a foot from the bike. Then cars would see the lane and give me a foot instead of the few feet they would give without the guide. That may be just the way it felt.

“Blinkers also make it difficult for a driver to judge his distance to you.”
That’s correct. People will notice a blinking light more easily but will have a harder time judging how far away it is. The worst offenders are those high power strobe lights on School busses. You always see them but have problems telling where they are at night.

Unfortunately the article did not mention that the Sentinel Taillight also has a “steady on” laser mode for folks that prefer not to use “blinking” modes. We tested this light here in San Diego with a group of regular commuters, and the response to the laser lane feature was overwhelmingly positive. The lanes are highly visible in the dark, and add an additional level of safety that I’m sure most commuters will appreciate.