Trek CarBack Bike Radar Taillight Review - feat. 90 Lumen Taillight + Four Level Battery Gauge

Just a few years ago, Garmin had the bike radar market to themselves with their ubiquitous Varia models. That’s rapidly changed as Magene, Bryton, Magicshine and even iGPSPORT have entered the market with their own radars. The new Trek CarBack is one of the latest bike rear radars to hit the market and offers a few unique features. Trek has set the retail price on the radar to be $199.99 and incorporated a 90 lumen focused LED that is reminiscent of the popular Trek Flare RT. What is unique about the CarBack is the four-bar LED battery gauge that lets you monitor the battery status and a claimed 240m range that can detect 7 vehicles simultaneously. The CarBack also uses Trek’s clip-on quick mount as well as a modern USB-C charging port.

Trek has utilized their standard slide-on clip design for mounting the CarBack to the bike. It’s the same mount design that the Flare RT and other Trek and Bontrager devices use. Trek includes a quick connect rubber strap with the radar to mount it on a seat post. It’s a simple design that locks into place and as a release tab to remove it. The mount has a built in angle offset to keep the radar parallel to the ground and a rotatable design which gives you more flexibility on mounting options. Because this light uses Trek’s existing mount, you can also use the CarBack radar with the Blendr saddle rail mount for an even sleeker installation. On our standard 27.3mm round seatpost, the included mount felt flimsy and required stretching to nearly the last hook on the rubber strap to get a secure fit. Given the price of the radar we would have liked to see a more robust mount design like the ratcheting designs KOM has introduced.

While Trek might be a bit late to the bike radar market, they’ve nailed the branding with the “CarBack” product name. It’s exactly what you’d yell out to other cyclists on the road when you know there is a car coming behind you and is the perfect name for a bike radar. Trek has also given the taillight a unique shape with a square-ish profile instead of the elongated rectangle design that is used by other brands. It’s quite a bit wider than other radars with its 70 x 50 x 25 mm dimensions and flat black radar surface. Beveled edges breakup the otherwise glossy black surface of the light which is a dust magnet and shows scratches after its first use. Branding is limited to Trek printed on the side and CarBack on the upper surface which gives the radar a clean look.

... Read the full review @ https://thesweetcyclists.com/trek-car...
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00:00 Intro
00:10 Unboxing + Specs
02:30 Fit + Finish
06:42 Light Output
08:05 Radar
10:01 Trek Accessories App
10:49 Comparison (Bryton Guardia R300 / Magicshine / Magene Seemee 508)
12:26 The Final Score
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