Bike Light Database

This light has a 1/2W main LED, with two 5mm secondary LEDs. It has a solid mode which only activates the center LED, and a flashing mode which rapidly alternates between the secondary LEDs and a double-pulse of the center LED. This light was also very popular in the poll, and I see it around a lot.

This light gets a lot of things right. The flash pattern is attention-grabbing without being painful. The button is nice and clicky, and easy to use with gloves on. The batteries are fairly simple to remove, and last a reasonably long time – although the light dimmed after about 72 hours, it held on for 130 hours before becoming too feeble to see.

One disappointment is that there are only two ways to mount the light: using the built-in pack/belt clip, or using the included seat post mount. I was unable to find any seat stay, rack, or other mounting options for this light anywhere. The design of this light makes me want to mount it horizontally, but as it turns out, the lens focuses the light into a very wide but horizontally short beam when the light is mounted vertically. This gives it good side-viewing angles if mounted vertically, but wastes a lot of the light if mounted horizontally.

The Cherry Bomb isn’t the brightest light based on my measurements, but given the dispersed beam pattern, the light is less focused, making the light more visible at off-angles than some other choices which have higher intensities from straight-on. There is apparently also a 1W version, cleverly named the “Cherry Bomb 1W.” I was unaware of its existence until after I had already ordered all of the lights for this review though, so I was unable to include it.