Or would it be beneficial to get a end mill bit? Like a 6 flute end mill maybe? Then it would cut clean... might be a centering issue then I don't know.

Thanks for sharing. You'll be sure to sell a lot more optics now! :bigsmile:

Thanks for sharing! Have you tried sanding and buffing the remaining burrs for a cleaner end result?

Have you compared light loss between dedomed emitters and dined emitters using this method?

I guess I am not a good member here, just ordered an 11/64" 3 flute ball nose end mill bit.  

Dog ask me, cow should I know?

Edit: Ain't it purdy?

Regardless of the method, its nice that these can be opened up without changing the beam pattern. Thanks for posting.

But I'll use it for some of my other projects so it won't be for nothing either way.

Cool. Thanks for the tip.

Thanks, that’s what I’ve been looking for. Any idea if the rough finish hurts the % of light much?

RMM wrote:

The bit’s face needs to be slightly tapered—too little and you will have a hard time keeping it centered; too little and you will bottom out before open up the base enough.

I’m think it should be “too little and it will be hard to center” and “too much and you will bottom out” ?

cool idea!

ai laik!

Very cool. Nice to know it can be done without messing up the beam profile.

DBCstm wrote:

Or would it be beneficial to get a end mill bit? Like a 6 flute end mill maybe? Then it would cut clean… might be a centering issue then I don’t know.

Thanks for sharing. You’ll be sure to sell a lot more optics now! :bigsmile:

Acrylic edges can be flame polished, I don’t know if that can be done here.

is this really an advantage over a dedomed xp-l?

bdiddle wrote:

is this really an advantage over a dedomed xp-l?

Keeping the domes on is most beneficial in maintaining tint. De-doming costs some lumens but most importantly it degrades the tint, sometimes in a way that is too much to take...the pea green hue.

Say you absolutely LOVE the 3D tint (I absolutely LOVE the 3D tint!), you really can't de-dome an emitter and wind up with that color of light. De-dome the 3D and it changes pretty drastically to orangish warm. The warmer tint emitters aren't as prone to show the pea green color, but they do shift away from the preferred tint. It's been pretty common with the XM-L2's to de-dome 1A tint emitters to keep the color as nice as possible. But are there 1A XP-L's? 2A, 2C, 3D...I haven't seen a 1A yet. The 2A's aren't horrible when de-domed, if you don't mind a slight off yellowish-green hue. (very slight usually, but still)

Thanks Richard! Like Dale, I LOVE the 3D tint, and now I can have it in a 20mm triple! Could you show a comparison beamshot between the modded dome-on triple and a de-domed one? And do you know the approximate OTF lumen difference?

Whichever way (this way or my way with a knife blade) the key factor to watch out for it to not bottom out the tool in the optic cup- if the in inverted dome get’s scratched it’ll screw up your beam badly.

My recommendation is to buy extra optic’s to practice with.

Hey RMM… you should offer opening up the optics to fit domed XPL as an extra add-on service with all your Carclo triple optics

Even if the XP-L stays within 10% of it's output when de-doming, with a triple light that's a 30% loss in output! With a hot rodded triple, that can be a very significant lumens loss. 

Say we're seeing 1400 lumens per emitter for 4200 OTF lumens with the domes on. Take the domes off and lose a mere 10% and we have a 520 lumen loss! Yeah, I'm all for keeping the domes where they belong, on the emitter instead of on top of my computer. (I have a little collection of hot de-domes. )

Edit: Obviously, even more impact on a Quad.

DBCstm wrote:

I’m all for keeping the domes where they belong, on the emitter instead of on top of my computer. (I have a little collection of hot de-domes.

Couldn't resist trying, so I modified a Torx bit and gave it a shot...

I used a cordless Makita hand drill with variable speed and did most of it at very low revolution. Then I set it to high speed mode and ran it fast to sort of polish the cut. Works so so. There was a bit of slag along the cut edge that I scraped off with the razor sharp tip of my Sage 2. Now I'm gonna have to build a light!

Just ordered a shorty S2, I swear those weren't on the site last order I placed just day before yesterday! Now I'll have to wait for that to come in so I can complete this quad.

Here is one that might work…might need to remove the outer ledge in order to expose the cutting blades

http://www.harborfreight.com/reamer-deburring-tool-65338.html

Good idea. I just use an exacto knife and taper out the openings with that. Same way as I trim off the metal in the ID of a pipe after cutting it.

DBCstm wrote:

Even if the XP-L stays within 10% of it’s output when de-doming, with a triple light that’s a 30% loss in output! With a hot rodded triple, that can be a very significant lumens loss. 

Say we’re seeing 1400 lumens per emitter for 4200 OTF lumens with the domes on. Take the domes off and lose a mere 10% and we have a 520 lumen loss! Yeah, I’m all for keeping the domes where they belong, on the emitter instead of on top of my computer. (I have a little collection of hot de-domes. )

Edit: Obviously, even more impact on a Quad.

The output loss is still noteworthy of course!

@RMM – thanks for posting this.