Lighting • Lighting • USCA Sidecar Forum • United Sidecar Association %

#1 · July 1, 2014, 7:09 pm

The previous owner installed two rectangular lights on the front cross bar of my sidecar. Is that really necessary for night driving? They are so low to the ground I cant think of it being very useful. The fender of the sidecar has a white marker light. Any suggestions? You can see what I'm talking about in my album.

#2 · July 1, 2014, 7:13 pm

Any light on the sidecar is a marker. It does need to be visible at some distance to be effective. The extra larger lights may be overkill but only if the smaller light is bright enough. My opinion.

Will

#3 · July 1, 2014, 7:44 pm

I just remembered I could not load my photos. Need to make jpg smaller. You can see what I mean on my blog. http://www.finallyhacked.blogspot.com

#4 · July 1, 2014, 8:34 pm

Lighting strikes again!

#5 · July 2, 2014, 7:48 am

jwshort - 7/1/2014 7:13 PM

Any light on the sidecar is a marker. It does need to be visible at some distance to be effective. The extra larger lights may be overkill but only if the smaller light is bright enough. My opinion....

Forward facing lights on a sidecar can be effective in making your rig more visible to oncoming traffic, but often do not offer a lot of functional highway light. LED lights are quite functional for visibility, draw less current and can be smaller. For example, I generally run these two LED lights just to be more visible - at night they may help see the edge of the road better at 20mph.

Lee / Summer Grove, Louisiana: Ural cT, CJ750, Burgman/Texas Ranger, Zuma 50F, MB5, TW200, CRF250L, GTV300

#6 · July 2, 2014, 9:32 am

I like the led idea. I went ahead and removed the halogen lights that were installed. The bike looks a lot cleaner with them removed. I got carried away and removed the rear rack, helmet box and side box too. Much better IMO.

#7 · July 2, 2014, 7:18 pm

I installed 2 LED fog lights on my BMW/Cozy rig and have received a lot of comments from other drivers on how much it adds to my visibility. I think the asymmetric arrangement helps as it makes them sort of wonder what is coming towards them. I installed them mostly for Winter commuting but since they draw so little power I just leave them on all the time. But, as others have said, they offer only a little more light on the road. I also installed one Denali D1 LED driving light and tied it to the high beam. That really does help as lights things up about 50% further than the high beam on the bike. It is installed on the right side of the sidecar tub.