Light Fantastic?

Manufacturers seem to keep giving us headlights that don’t light the road up. Should we just add some aftermarket LED pods then?

- Shubhabrata Marmar

We don’t know where the trend started but adventure tourers have, without exception, additional lights. The surfeit of them suggests that the adv touring rider has failing vision compared to almost any other type of motorcycle, but this is a serious column. So let’s start with your headlight.

The headlight of your machine is usually going to be one or two 55/60W halogen bulbs in a reflector. These are pretty good, last forever, but given how high-beamy Indian traffic can be, slightly useless in many night riding situations. This headlight needs to follow the law. And these laws are designed to prevent oncoming traffic from being blinded. To wit, none of the new laser systems (which produce frighteningly bright light) come without automatic oncoming traffic detection and dipping.

The easy upgrade is the ‘110 per cent extra lumens’ halogen bulbs. They’re not expensive and they promise greater light with half the bulb life, though I’ve never had one fail. Beyond lies the rabbit hole of LED head light bulb replacements etc.