Did anyone try to use an LED with inappropriate reflector? I wonder what happens if I install an xp-g into a reflector designed for xr-e or xm-l. I would like to have a beam with very wide hotspot to use on a bike. Maybe some combination of an LED and a reflector will work&
Why not to use TIR optics? Quite a lot of people like them more for bike lights, than classic reflectors.
I would think the only differences would be hole size and expected height of the emitter. If you can compensate for those any reflector should work.
Someone correct me if I’m wrong.
I use tir optics on my bike lights. Medium beam on bars and smooth spot on helmet. Ledil Cute-3&4 is great or gt4-xps if you have less depth. Eva-Ss works well with XML, xre, or mce but not p-7. Those are all 35 mm lenses(mr11). Carclo and Khatod also are a good choice for other sizes. Check the pdf’s to make sure the LEDs match the optics on multi emmiter boards. Happy to answer any specific questions I can.
You can use any led with any reflector but they’re optimized for certain led packages. To change the beam pattern, you can try shimming the reflector up from the star or alternatively, pushing the led up into the reflector(as with a mag cam). I personally prefer op or tir to smo as I find artifacts distracting on single track. From what I’ve seen, the xre focuses to a tighter spot than other LEDs when using tir optics and make the best helmet(look ahead, around the bend)lights. I run hi-mid-low on both bars and helmet and for me 1200-1500 lumens for each is plenty. What body are you using for your light.
XP-G and XM-L lenses/reflectors are largely interchangeable, with the difference that you get a larger hotspot with the XM-L. Going from XP-E (that’s the one with the ring, right?) to XP-G/ XM-L is a bit different as the actual emitter sits higher on the star, so you’d have to make sure the base of the XP-E lens/ reflector is at the same height relative to the die. The LC1 TIR is a good example of this - made for XP-E (I think, or XR-E), looks like poo on an XM-L using the holder but is the best all round optic I’ve found when mounted bare on the star.
For 20mm, the Regina is the best/ only reflector for XP-G/ XM-L. LC1, LXP-RS and Laura-RS are all good 20mm TIR optics.
For 35mm check out the Iris (TIR), plus there are a bunch of good reflectors.