Superflash Upgrade

The Planet Bike Superflash rear blinkie light is wonderfully bright, plus small, runs a very long time on its pair of AAA batteries and is relatively inexpensive. Thanks to SM for showing it to me. I've adopted it for commuting bikes, but it has a couple weaknesses I'm still learning to live with.

• The button is hard to press. Press on the bottom white button while pushing down on the red part of the top, not the white.


• It's not waterproof enough for me unless the bike has fenders. (No one else I know has had trouble with this.)

I already had one round of waterproofing the thing, putting polyurethane on the switch contacts and vaseline on the rubber gasket, and moving the mount a little to the side to reduce the spray against the power button.
After Friday's commute, the switch seized up enough that I had to open the battery compartment and "hot wire" the switch to turn it off. (The edge of a coin will do it - just touch both silver dots on top of the switch at the same time.) While doing this I noticed the switch itself was beginning to rust - a bad sign in a piece of electronics only a couple months old.
So I decided to convert the switch to a magnetic sensor, called a reed switch. Some of my favorite blinkie lights use this technique, and I needed to replace the switch in any case. Luckily I found that the reed switch of a broken bike computer would (barely) fit in the enclosure, and I was able to wire it in. The picture shows an intact unit on the left, and my modification on the right. After taking the picture, I sealed up all the holes I with some silicone caulk. I'll let you know how it holds up through autumn.

While we're talking about rear blinkie lights, I need to mention the Cateye LD1000. While it is better sealed than the Superflash, it's much dimmer, heavier, bigger, and has a short battery life. It also has a bizarre design which prevents using it in a 'normal' flash mode. The real problem is it got glowing reviews in Cycling Plus magazine and on JensonUSA's website, describing it as 'the only daylight-visible' option. That accolade belongs to the Superflash, in my book.