Lumens

Living here in the north land with very short days during the winter months a cyclist is bound to ride in the dark. It's been going on long enough already this year that I'm kind of getting sick of it. Riding at night is fun but I still prefer the daylight. Even worse is gathering up all the batteries, lights and do-dads to attach all the crap to your helmet and bike.

The box was built from scratch out of 18ga paint grip. It contains two, 4 gang steel electrical boxes that were spot welded in place. It's about the size of a steel box that would typically house a sawsall. Ideally a steel porta-band box would be best for a family sized kit.

I chose to paint it orange and navy blue just because the colors looked good on the shelf. I raided my wife's sticker collection to give it some pop. 

  Recently in the midst of getting all this junk together for a ride I forgot to charge the cells the night before and brought them to work in the morning. I get all my lights on ebay from China/Hong Kong but I don't trust charging them when I'm not at home (fire). The output is fantastic and run times very long but after a warning from a similar manufacturer I am weary leaving them anywhere that might start a fire.  Bringing them to work was a mistake.....later that evening when I went to grab the batteries that I'm sure I put on the front seat of my van, is when I realized I left them at work when I detoured to take a piss before heading home. They were sitting safely in the rest room the next morning, but as a result I was forced to ride with an extra light I found in the van. I was very agitated before the ride and crashed a couple times due to lack of light.

It's finished off with some hardware found at any home improvement store....and more stickers  

I mostly use "high quality" Solar Storm, Cree, lights found on Ebay directly from China.

      As a result I decided to build my own set-up, a light charging "station" where I could keep all my lighting stuff together in a non-flammable metal box. I'm not the only one in my household that rides at night so I made it (almost) big enough for all our stuff. The boys don't typically ride at night in the winter, but during the car camping months of spring through fall they are out ripping around the campgrounds into the wee hours of the night. For this purpose I made it portable to plug-in where ever. Also, in the off chance Lynn and I do more 24 hour races the self contained kit will come in handy.