Can Somebody Please Explain Dynamo Lighting To Me?

[Low Gear Guy]

Why stick with "normal" instead of getting a dynamo rear?

On my previous set up I fitted a higher power halogen bulb at the front. Probably not much point with LED lighting.

 

[freiston]

Why stick with "normal" instead of getting a dynamo rear?

On my previous set up I fitted a higher power halogen bulb at the front. Probably not much point with LED lighting.

My post was referring to rear battery lights as opposed to rear dynamo lights (the differentiation being between power sources rather than light sources).

 

[andrew_s]

Before LED front lights, it was common to use a 3W front bulb and a battery LED rear light rather than a 2.4W front bulb and a dynamo rear, to get extra seeing light.
Front LED lights can't be fiddled with, so there's no point doing the same from a lighting point of view, but some people don't like the front to rear dynamo wire, which is viewed as being untidy.

 

[shdwolff]

Hub dynamos are the best, they are available to suit any budget. Bottle ones tend to slip in the wet and obviously wear your tyre wall to a degree.
I'd just get a front light and continue using battery rears. You'd need one with a standlight, this stays for a few minutes on when you are stationary. You don't need a voltage stabilizer and they are all 6 volt afaik.
Once you've tried hub dynamos you won't go back to batteries.

You could just add an inline capacitor which will keep the light on for several minutes as the capacitor discharges. Once you start moving again the capacitor will charge back up and be ready for you when you stop next time and a capacitor will only cost maybe 3 dollars as opposed to buying a specialty light which could get very spendy.