Lumicycle Elite 26 LED 3Si

Tell us what the light is for, and who it's aimed at. What do the manufacturers say about it? How does that compare to your own feelings about it?

Lumicycle pitch the 3Si as a road/commuter light that can also be used off-road. With a fairly tight beam and the side visibility from the glow ring, it meets that brief well.

Tell us some more about the technical aspects of the light?

Four LED emitters are housed in a rather lovely CNC-machined alloy housing that's generously endowed with cooling fins. A translucent bezel at the front passes some light to the sides to help other people see you, and an "eyebrow" on top prevents any light spill upwards that might dazzle you while riding. At the back there's the power socket, status LED and a rubberised toggle switch. The test system had a 2.6Ah Li-ion battery -- there's a 5.2Ah unit available if you need more run time.

The LED3Si is beautifully made and finished. The lamp housing is CNC-machined aluminium, anodised black. The bezel is secured by four tiny Torx bolts and everything's weather-sealed. The battery lives inside a simple Cordura bag with a Velcro strap to attach it to your frame or stem.

Lumicycle uses a very intuitive control system on its LED lights. Rather than a push button, there's an up/down toggle switch. Hold it up to switch on, and then flicking it down switches to a lower output and flicking it up switches to a higher one. It's slightly complicated by the presence of a flashing mode (long press down from off) and the Smart Boost extra-high-output mode (which turns itself down after three minutes unless you lock it with another long up press) but fundamentally it's an excellent system. The LED uses a mix of colours and flashes to communicate both power level and battery state, if you can remember what means what.

The clamp is the common hinged, cam-lock design, with rubber pads to aid grip. Oversize bars are accommodated by adding an extra link in the hinge, which works well once done but is somewhat more fiddly than swapping rubber pads around.

No problems during the test, although the power connector is a standard jack with no particular extra protection. There's no reason to expect any issues unless you start pulling the plug out in torrential rain, but there are lights out there with more overt seals around the connector.

Claimed run times range from 43 hours on low to 3 on Boost, and the light gets close enough to that to make no odds in the real world. The light comes with a smart charger that cuts off when the battery's fully charged, which takes about three hours from flat.

It's not as bright as the 4Si, but 850 lumens is still a healthy output and the extra battery life is worthwhile.

I've been using this one for a while now and nothing has gone wrong.

At 385g for lamp and battery the 3Si doesn't have class-leading weight, but you get very solid construction and it's hardly portly.

For my money the 3Si is better value than the 4Si -- you save £75 but still get ample light for most purposes, with extra battery life. If you spend a lot of time on very dark roads you might want to opt for the 4, though. At £200 the 3Si is very good value.

Tell us how the light performed overall when used for its designed purpose

Excellent -- there are more powerful lights out there on paper, but the Lumicycle is definitely powerful enough. The beam strikes a good balance between spread and penetration.

Tell us what you particularly liked about the light

The up/down toggle switch is brilliant -- it's easy to find in the dark and it's very intuitive.

Tell us what you particularly disliked about the light

Self-contained lights are always going to be neater than having wires and battery bags dangling off the bike, and changing the clamp between standard and OS bars is a bit of a faff.

Anything further to say about the light in conclusion?

Lumicycle doesn't seem to be as well known as Exposure, but its products are every bit as good (and in some respects better) if you don't mind plug-in battery packs. Excellent.