Revolights City v2.0 Review

As for lighting, they give off a nice strong 16 lumens per bulb when fully charged and if you run reflective tires, you are able to get the additional benefit of having a constant light on your tire’s sidewall reflective strip, enhancing the side visibility.

Installation at the hub

The real magic happens once you get moving though. Once speeds hit double digits, all of the individual LEDs start to blur into a TRON-like light. You had best get ready for people noticing and wanting to talk, asking about the lights. The rotation blur effect takes what starts as 8 (4 per side) lights shining at once turning around a wheel and turns them into a seemingly solid bar of light lighting your way and keeping you visible to approaching traffic.

Another shot of the hub installation

This is where some of the best tech/bike geekery happens as well. The Revolights are built with internal gyroscopes that allow the lights to know where ground is and only activates the lights that are appropriate. The only time it breaks from this pattern is when you come to an abrupt stop. When this occurs, they cycle around the ring of lights, landing immediately at their proper activated position.

From above the installation is well hidden

Weight/ride feel

So, you fought through the initial wheel installation, flew through the second wheel’s installation, and now you have them on and it’s time to ride.

At 348 grams per wheel, you will most likely notice them a little. In my experience, it’s no worse than riding a heavier wheel; it sort of feels like I have lost a gear. I found that I endd up one gear lower when going up my usual assortment of hills and that they take just a little extra effort to get up to speed.

Should this stop you from checking these out though? No way; they’re just not that heavy.

From the front it’s all very neat

 
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