Lezyne Power Drive XL front light

The Lezyne Power Drive XL front light provides plenty of light for urban and suburban riding and makes a good helmet-mounted secondary light for occasional green lane action. It's neatly machined with plenty of nice touches.

Lights with machined aluminium bodies are everywhere these days and with good reason. Aluminium is sturdy and conducts heat remarkably well, so it's an ideal material for bike light casings, as LEDs work best if they're kept cool.

The Lezyne Power Drive XL is powered by a removable lithium-ion battery so you can swap out a flat battery for a charged one, a feature Lezyne calls Infinite Light. That means you're not enslaved to a wall socket or access to a USB power source, though for serious mile-eating, a dynamo still takes some beating.

So you can take advantage of the Infinite Light idea, Lezyne offers a bundle kit including a storage case, helmet mount, cable and spare cell, for an extra £15.

It takes three hours to charge from its wall-mounted charger, more like four if plugged into a computer.

The switch has a traffic-light power indicator, so running out of power should not be a nasty surprise.

The light body is sealed with rubber plugs and O rings, which seem adept at keeping out the wet, though we're talking torrential downpours, not bog snorkelling. As usual I added a dab of Vaseline to help them seal.

The handlebar bracket is made from composites and has proven reliable. There are shims for 25.4mm and 31.8mm handlebar diameters.

These days, 475 lumens of light output will barely raise an eyebrow at the club house but it's pretty good when you've popped out for late Sunday lunch and your local authority has decided the taking your time over repairing street lights is an easy way to save cash.

The beam brightness and spread is better than that raw lumen number might suggest thanks to decent optics. The 'fish mouth' shape of the lens housing provides peripheral bleed so you're visible from the side.

Full power - what Lezyne calls 'Overdrive' drains the battery with with frightening efficiency, although I did always get a 90-minute runtime. Toggling down to Blast sacrifices seventy-five lumens but gets back 25 minutes.

Charging through better lit suburban stretches, Enduro mode mode gives plenty of light to see by while making everyone else aware of your presence. The flashing mode is visible from 250-400 metres on clear nights and 250-300 metres on murky mornings and gives a runtime of 11hr 22min. The 125-lumen Economy mode is okay for early afternoon scoots around town and with the light mounted on your helmet it's very handy for map reading, puncture fixing and other roadside mechanicals; it gives a 6hr 51 min runtime.

The light comparator

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Verdict

Nicely made commuter lamp with enough oomph for occasional rural fun.