Riding at night
 

I was looking at reflective tape and such to improve my visibility at night, and among the results I got were pens and spray paint that supposedly act in the same way. That got me wondering if I could apply something to my vest (like fabric paint) that would act as a reflector while being practically invisible during the day (I have the Harley eagle denim vest, so my plan was to apply a white reflective paint to the eagle). Has anyone tried anything like this?

Not sure why you'd want to do this when there's plenty of riding jackets with reflective piping that you cant see during the day

You can buy LED riding vests and jackets, but why bother? Ride like they don't see you, because they don't.

+1 don’t reck a good vest.

Your money would be better spent and you would be much more visible by upgrading all your lighting to LEDs (if you haven't already).

The problem with reflective tapes/markers is oncoming traffic will not see any of it at night because of your headlight, and their effectiveness for drivers behind you will depend on their headlight angle and even the angle of your vest. It's retroreflective, which means light from the car's headlight hit you and bounces back to the driver's eye, and unless conditions are perfect, you likely will not be seen.

Same applies to street signs and road markings. Have you noticed that stop signs are really bright when you approach them at night, almost as if they are illuminated? That is your vehicle's headlight bouncing back to you. If that stop sign is rotated left or right by just 10 degrees, the light goes a different direction and you do not see the sign at all. Road markings are almost always paint. You cannot see the paint at night. What do see are millions of tiny glass beads embedded in the paint that reflect light back.

You don't say what bike you ride but, I still say improve light to the front and light to the rear is the best defense.

They make reflective paint but it'll soak into your denim vest and require many coats.
Many coats will become thick and crack resulting in not reflecting and looking like crap. JMO
Sew on your own reflective piping.

Plus one on upgrading your lighting. It's better for you in two ways...you can see better and you can be seen better by the brainless texting idiots...at least if they get blinded they might notice you lol.

I quit riding at night all together. It's too dangerous here, not because of cars, it's the damn deer. I swear they will wait until you're right beside them then jump right in front of you.