Just like with your motoric vehicle, lighting is necessarily important for a bike especially those who will ride at night. Bike lamp is upgraded to be more reliable, smaller but far brighter and Cygolite Expilion 850 Vs 800 are two of the most ideal option if you are in the market for a light lamp yet still provide a good illumination for the ride. For you who are also eyeing these bike lamps, go check what they can offer below and pick the one fits your application the most.
In this article, we are going to give you information about:
- Which Bike Lamp to Purchase
- What are Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800
- What Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 Look Like
- How are the Brightness of Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800
- How many Modes in Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800
- Are Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 Long Lasting
- Cygolite Expilion 850 Vs 800
Bike Lamp
Pedaling at night offer a different experience and if you are into cycling, the condition should not be an obstacle to let us continue the journey. However, besides being extra careful as the visibility is drastically dropped, we also must be prepared with the proper gear and fit to be able to ride all year around and the most important is the bike lamp. This piece of tool is going to illuminate the road, be it on or off-road yet, not just any lamp, we should pick based on our application.
Just like many other bike accessories you will find so many types of bike lamp including those we installed in different portion of the bike; front, back and sides. The front lamp must be using high-output lighting system to offer maximum illumination so we can see the road, where are we going on any condition. Safety lights are dimmer and instead of illuminating they are designed to help motorist notice you in dark situation as well as visibility in daytime.
Moving further, besides the placement we also have various terms related to the unit that you have to know when shopping for one to make sure we can count all possibilities into consideration. LEDs lamp is very popular due to its energy efficiency and durability which makes it a majority of bike lamp we have today as well comes with varying brightness levels. This brightness level is counted in Lumens or unit measurement for the amount of light, just like when you are checking a projector’s brightness.
Lumens is measured at a uniform distance and a lumen describe the light intensity of each lighting unit so company usually put the lumen rating on their products to inform its consumers. Next is beam pattern because if you are shopping for a front light, the best option is those with narrow-focus beam in case the road is common city street with a decent amount of street light to illuminate most of the road and its surface properly yet darker roads will need a wide-focus beam.
Bike lamp is powered by a lithium ion battery in which most of them are removable and replaceable but the best part is they are also rechargeable, making them cost effective if you often ride at night. To make sure this battery last as long as possible, make sure to fully charge them especially before you plan to store them yet don’t go overbroad as well by overcharging. In most cases they are able to be charged more than 500 times.
| Cygolite Expilion 850 | Cygolite Expilion 800 | |
|---|---|---|
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| Shipping Weight | 10.4 ounces | 3.2 ounces |
| Product Dimensions: | 4 x 1.5 x 1.5 inches | 8 x 4 x 4 inches |
| Best Price | click here | click here |
About Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800
If you already recognize and decide which lamp to replace or install, now is the time to see what the market has to offer because there are so many of them out there and while all will be useful as an illumination, quality and performance can be different from one model to another. In general, the pricier they get, the better the performance will be as well and it includes those with higher lumens count when you are shopping for a front lamp.
Among those many brands that offer bike lamp, Cygolite is one of the most popular brands to shop from in the market because they are also a very reliable option to count on especially with lots of amazing products. Their bike lamp have been the favorite of cyclist since quite some time ago and they continuously upgrading their lamp as well to be better with higher performance and cheaper price point. However, most of us love it for how bright and long lasting they are.
The tricky part about shopping for bike lamp is how bright they should be because there is no standard on this part and all depends on your activity or its main application. For riding on daylight only, a lamp at least 100 Lumens can do the job very well but for those who plan to ride on rural area or trail riding while still able to see where they go, Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 are two ideal models to consider.
These bike lamps are not newly released anymore so looking for them can be a challenge yet, they are among the best in this category. As their name suggests, both of them are close brother, very close that many users are confused about which to choose but to put it simply the Expilion 850 is a newer version of the original 800 which was popular earlier. As an upgrade, this model carry brighter lamp as well as overall better performance for your cycling.
Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 Design
When you put Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 side by side, they will resemble each other a lot or identical because they equally coming with the same design and overall shape, dimension, weight as well as form factor. They are featured with one LED lamp and already packed with their own Li-ion battery in which is swappable between these lamps in case you are planning to own both. The lamp itself is about the same size of your palm and will be a tight fit if you put it in pants pocket.
In addition the time to charge their batteries from empty state is about 5 hours until full. Overall you will get the same pieces in the box from the main lamp itself, battery stick, USB wall charger, mini USB charging cable, Loctite tool-free handlebar mount, and helmet mount. The helmet mount is very useful if you plan to use both of these together for example the higher brother 850 for the bike and the 800 for the helmet.
Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 Brightness
The first thing you may want to know when shopping for a new bike lamp is their brightness since it will affect your application or need. In this side, Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 are among the best out there but side by side the newer brother is showing a better result because this one has the best beam among other mid-end lamps in the market with bigger diameter and illuminate literally almost the whole path but compared to those more expensive like Taz 1500, the amount of light is still not as bright.
When use side by side with Expilion 800, 850 shows wider illuminated area and has this horizontal oval pattern that works great when the lamp is mounted directly on your handlebar as well also has less of a spot beam. All of these are thanks to the improvement Cygolite have with its Enhanced Cycling Optics or ECO. Read also: Thule Apex Vs Vertex.
Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 Features
The next part we want to mention is their features because both of them are coming with several operating modes and this will allow you to manage their battery life as well as application more properly. Overall we have 8 operating modes in Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 with Med, High, Boost, Low, SteadyPulse, Day Flash, Walking, and SOS. The last two will give you the longest battery life which is approximately up to 38 hours while Boost is the most energy consuming mode to operate.
In real life, cycling at night will be sufficient even when you are using medium or high setting in which you will get approximately 3 hours with these setting option. Additionally, we also love the steady/flash mode which not only provide good illumination but also flashing to notify other road users when riding at night.
Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 Battery Life
Last but not least is their battery life and this is important because none of these lamps are rated as best in this category for chances you will also need to bring an extra battery in the pocket. They can work well for about an hour and a half almost up to 140 meter range but then begins to gradually declining. We recommend carrying another battery for longer ride which is also done by most of us and Cygolite itself offers a backup that only weighs around 87 grams to not weigh your pocket.
Cygolite Expilion 850 vs 800
Cygolite Expilion 850 and 800 are an amazing lamp to consider but in comparison the former is actually the big brother and noticeably brighter with 850 Lumens instead of 800. It also has better beam diameters and patterns than the original lamp. However, the shape and battery are still the same and in this side none of them are among the best because we definitely need a backup when riding a bit long.
Conclusion
All in all you can choose just any of them because they are equally reliable but, if we are to pick one, we will recommend you to get Cygolite Expilion 850 because it is brighter and has overall better illumination than Expilion 800.