Commuting - Experience with Cateye EL-300?

Hey all.

I just ordered the 5-LED Cateye light and wondered if anyone has had any experience with it yet. It sounds pretty good. It gets old having so many people cut in front of you... Thanks!

I purchased one earlier today and am pleasantly surprised at the light output. It's a little bigger than I had planned, but the fellow at the bike shop showed it to me and I was sold on the features; long battery life, high light output, and reasonable cost. It mounts on my other Cateye mounts too so I can switch it between cycles.

Good luck.

I use mine occasionally, (ie- not for primary long-term use). It is excellent for those who only need a light once in awhile. If you regularly commute in the dark, you need something brighter IMHO. I use rechargeable batteries and have had good results.

Nope, but I have an EL100 which is great. It supposedly has 30 hrs of battery life but I've gotten at least 60 so far and it's still going strong. Cars rarely have a problem seeing me and never do if I wobble the light (short left and right turns or leaning the bike left/right). I plan to get an EL200 to supplement it. The flashing LED's will make me visible and I can use the EL100 to illuminate the road just in front of me.

Thanks for the replies. Hopefully one of these days it will come from Nashbar. It is really backordered I guess. Until then my wife and I share a Niterider Digital Pro between two bikes. Really nice light, but that means one of us has no front lighting until the Cateye arrives!

I'm waiting for one, too!

I asked for it at my LBS after I read about it on this forum, and they said they were just about to send out an order, and they'd put that on it, too. (Their mechanic also wants one!) But their supplier had ordered 100 and sold out of them immediately. They are now on back order. :/

Wish it would hurry, my current light is held together by glue and spit!

I use one in conjunction with a HL-500 (with an upgraded 2W bulb).

In my opinion the EL-300 outperforms the HL-500 and it doesn't 'eat' batteries as much as the 500. It certainly isn't in the same division as the 10W rechargeable lights but it does the job nicely enough for me.

I'm currently using one in conjunction with the old HL-EL100.

The EL-300 is far brighter than the old EL-100, but slightly more focused - you get a fairly good beam, but it's not that wide. I've had people comment on it's brightness, which suggests it's pretty visible, but do play around with the angle of elevation a bit if you want maximum visibility.

Richard

I ordered it 3.5 weeks ago from Nashbar and just got it the other day. (backorder) I'm quite impressed with the intensity of the beam (I made my brother see spots for a while when I shined it at him) but I would say that Cat-eye has left the beam a little too focused to provide good coverage of the road ahead - if they spread the light out a bit more it would be a lot better - however, I used it to make a midnight ride to my post office, and was quite happy with the amount of light it provided - I live in an area with no streetlights and plenty of potholes, but I made the trip without incident.

And of course the usual redneck in old pickup giving me the high beams as he approached, clearly for fear that I was some type of extra terrestrial invader. But at least he saw me coming - I sure as hell saw him.

:lol:

My new Cateye EL-300 has just become my "emergency backup" light. I was pleased with the light, but just installed a Dymotec S6 generator set with a 3 watt halogen headlamp. To put it mildly, there is no comparison in light output, and since there is no perceptable drag from the generator set, I'm sold. The Dymotec unit was purchased from Peter White bicycles for approximately $75.00. With spare bulbs, upgraded mounting bracket, etc., it came out to just over $100. Best money I've spent in a long time. Battery life is no longer an issue. . . Good luck to all.

There's not much more I can add to this. It's still a light more to be seen than to see, but a darned nice one: long-lasting and with lithium batteries it's darned light. For LED lights it's an impressive amount of light but it's still only about as bright as my 2.4w micro-halogen. Although, the halogen eats batteries at a rate of 3 hours, the EL300 with lithium batteries is expected to last 300 hours. It's worth the investment to me on that basis alone.