Project Flock, a rear light that illuminates you
We’re not normally in the business of promoting crowd-funded products, but this is one we’ve been following the progress of for the past couple of years, and so it felt apt.
It’s the Melbourne-designed Project Flock rear light, a product that aims to create better motorist awareness through biomotion. In a nutshell, the light shines three beams. One points rearward as you’d expect a bicycle rear light to. The other two point down and back, aiming to illuminate you, or more specifically, your moving legs.
The theory of illuminating a rider’s legs to achieve the benefits of biomotion is founded on strong research. One academic paper, which measured the difference between traditional cycling lights and lights placed on a rider’s ankles, found the latter to be up to 5.5 times faster at gaining the attention of motorists than the former.
Having tried a pre-production sample myself, I can confirm that the light offers a good brightness that can also be used during the day without the night-time biomotion feature, a respectable profile (70 x 35 x 30 mm), a good weight (47 g), and easy use. There’s a useful battery gauge to tell you how much of the 3-6 hour run-time you have remaining (the light can last approximately 200 hours when used as a regular rear light with a single beam). And charging is done via a USB-C port.
So often, it’s the mounting system that lets down an otherwise great light. Project Flock’s approach is somewhat reminiscent of the hugely popular See.Sense light and uses a specific flexible clip. This clip is held onto the seatpost with either an O-ring or a more specific strap. The clip doubles as the USB-C port cover and also features interchangeable pads to fit all kinds of seatpost shapes.
The Project Flock light will retail for AU$120 (approx US$85). It’s available for backing on Kickstarter with pricing incentives. Unfortunately, delivery is slated for late 2023.
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