UPDATE:
I received the AXA Luxx 70 Plus with stand light (and without sensor) and have used it for a few weeks. The instructions that came with it are in German, no English version, but it was pretty easy to figure out.
I use the light with my SP Dynamo PV-8 3 watt dynohub. I use a battery powered taillight so the AXA light or USB port is the only device that draws power from the hub.
You can use the AXA for light or for USB power, not both. The light has a two position switch for one or the other.
The USB port works well to charge batteries. I probably will use it to directly charge my Android based phones and tablets in the future, but so far have only used it to charge AA batteries. My battery charging needs are for GPS, camera, phone, tablet, taillight, camping light, and possibly a radio. These needs are met with Li Ion and NiMH AA or AAA rechargeable batteries. I use the following for battery charging, all of these devices use the USB port for power:
- Pixo C-USB. This is a 1 or 2 AA, 2 AAA or 1 Li Ion smart battery charger.
- Eneloop smart AA charger model KBC-E1AS, charges 1 or 2 AA batteries, not rated for AAA batteries.
- Generic cheap 1 or 2 AA or AAA dumb charger with low current rating. (I owned these before I bought the Eneloop smart charger.)
Also have a USB splitter cable, USB extension cables that allow me to put the stuff I am charging in my handlebar bag and a LCD ammeter so that I can see how much current is coming out of the USB port. The USB port supplied over 300 ma at 6.5 mph (~10 km/hour) and up to 500 ma at 10 mph (~18 km/hour). AXA says the USB port works at 14 km/hour, but I did not try to see what the current was at that exact speed. Occasionally it went over 500 ma current flow when I was using two of the Eneloop chargers on the splitter cable to charge four AA batteries at once, the highest current flow I saw was 620 ma. The Eneloop chargers current draw is quite erratic and constantly changing, thus the current flow out of the AXA was not very consistent. That is a characteristic of the Eneloop chargers, they behave this way when plugged into an outlet too, so the erratic current flow was not due to the AXA Luxx.
Neither the Eneloop or Pixo chargers protest when I stop and restart rolling again, they keep charging the batteries just fine when I start moving again. Thus the lack of a cache battery on the AXA does not hamper me. But, I would not be surprised if stop and go charging interferes with the chargers knowing when a battery is fully charged, so if I am facing a lot of stop and go traffic I probably will disconnect the chargers.
This time of year it stays light out pretty late. I took the bike out in the evening a few times after dark just to test the light, but overall I have not used the light very much in the dark yet. I however did use the light in an unlit tunnel yesterday that is about a quarter mile long, it provided adequate light with a narrow beam in the tunnel where there were no other light sources. The light provided enough light to the sides that I could stay in the middle of the tunnel, which I had difficulty doing with previous lights. On the internet, some complained that the beam was not as wide as the B&M Luxos U, but I liked the narrower AXA beam shape.
The light beam varies with speed. I have no clue how it senses speed (AC frequency?, voltage?, other?). At slower bike speed it uses a high power LED for distance and a pair of lower power LEDs to light up the ground closer to the user. At higher speed the close distance LEDs turn off, only the brighter main LED remains lit, this high power LED has a bright narrow beam. AXA calls this intelligent beam technology. I like that lighting system although I have seen some comments on the internet that some users do not like this speed dependent lighting. There are hot spots in the main beam, I can live with that but I would have preferred that the engineers that designed the reflector spent a little more time designing it to avoid the hot spots. The cutoff between the ground and up higher where it can shine in the eyes of oncoming traffic has a sharp cut off, with careful aiming of the light you can get most of the light where you want it without wasting much light above the horizon.
The AXA wiring is not as nice as I would have liked. There is a short wire for tail light hanging out of it. Since I use a battery powered taillight, I do not use this short wire, but some day I might change my mind so I did not want to cut the wire off. Thus, I used some electrical tape to cover the conductive spade connectors and coiled it up to get it out of the way, but it looks a bit untidy. I would have preferred that AXA used a B&M Luxos method of having two spade connectors on the light unit to plug in tail light wiring instead of a wire hanging out of it. The power supply wire was quite long, probably about the right length for most people to reach the hub. I have wire connectors at my fork crown so I cut the supply wire shorter to plug into space connectors at the fork crown. Like my comment on taillight wiring, I would have preferred that AXA used spade connectors on the back of the light for the power supply instead of a dedicated wire soldered into the unit.
The USB port is in the mounting bracket. If you remove both bolts on the mounting bracket, the two pieces of plastic that form the bracket separate and there is a USB connector as part of a printed circuit board with the wires attached in between those plastic bracket parts. There is no apparent waterproofing other than the soft plastic plug that covers the USB port when it is not in use, thus the two plastic parts that form the mount have no water seal between them to keep the water out of the circuit board. I put electrical tape over this seam, hopefully this lack of waterproofing never is problematic. I have not seen any negative comments on the internet by others about this lack of waterproofing. Someone on this forum had commented that they put a plastic bag over the entire light unit when they use the USB for charging in the rain, that is probably a very good idea and I have put a couple small zip lock baggies into my handlebar bag in the event I want to use the USB port in the rain for charging.
The mount appears to work just fine. Some on the internet commented that when they hit a bump that the light aim changed, this has not been a problem for me and I found it easy to tighten up the mount to hold it in place. I have hit several bumps with my Nomad without the light shifting, so I have tested the mounting bracket rather well.
The mount attaches to the fork crown the same way that all other lights do, with a threaded bolt into the fork crown. Unfortunately on my fork the threaded hole is not aimed directly ahead, but slightly to the left. This is a problem with my Thorn Nomad Mk II fork, not the AXA light. Thus, my light beam was aimed to the left, not directly ahead and there was no way to adjust it with the AXA mount because the AXA mount was plastic, not a bendable metal. I had to shim this to get the light to aim correctly. This was a bit of hassle that I did not expect, I wish that quality control on the fork had been a bit better.
The light came with a couple extra pieces of wire and some additional mounting brackets for other forks. I think there is enough extra wire for a taillight if I wanted to use one.
The stand light uses the high power distance LED at lower power, not the closer distance LEDs. I suspect that using the main beam this way is safer as oncoming traffic can see you better when you are stopped. But if you wanted the stand light to help you put a bike away in a dark shed, it might not be aimed the way you want it.
Overall, I am quite happy with the AXA Luxx 70 Plus. It is small, lightweight and compact and I expect it to serve my needs quite nicely. It also have a very good price compared to other options. There are many differences between it and the competitor B&M Luxos U. If you are looking for a dynohub powered headlamp with USB charger supply port built in, you will have to spend some quality time deciding between the two because the two are quite different. So far I am happy with my choice, but I am sure some would prefer the B&M. As noted above, I would have preferred that AXA used the same method of wiring with spade connectors as B&M. Also time will tell if the waterproofing at the USB port circuit board is adequate. I chose the version without the automatic sensor to turn on the light in the dark, thus my comments do not reflect the sensor version.
In the photo nothing is plugged into the USB port, it is under the light gray cover on the mount that has the USB symbol on it. The two position switch is on the back and not shown in the photo.
