First thank you all, and sorry for late reply, but i have less and less time lately.
have made some schematics for some new more compact ideas, will upload in first post as soon as i can. maybe someone with some spare time and some nice equipment could have some fun some day.
@djozz “What if you do not use a zoom flashlight, but just the bare emitter, e.g. just remove the head of the UF-T20? I’d say it would increase the throw even further (but the beam would be way narrower). Do you have beam-shots of the set-up actually illuminating something, to get a better idea of the throw?”
of course I have tried that, but the result was not that good. first as you say the beam would be way narrower, the spot very very small. but there is another problem, the beam quality downgrade too, the projected image go full artifacts too. the cheap mirrors shows their true face in this setup i think. using lens as pre collimator rise the overall performance (more light is captured ) but also the quality of beam.
@islisis_“i’m wondering how you figured out the focal length requirements for this also before buying the mirror. i think it was a good idea coming up with this precollimator set up. it allows a decent amount of light to hit the mirror, over the required distance to focus the light. i’m not sure it would work so well any other way, bare emitter=low coverage angle (without a short focus mirror), reflector/optic=mixed light angles? also curious what the beam spot looks like”
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I try to touch this subject a little in the review on my first post, but understand that without proper examples is not that clear. Will try to make schematics hoping it will explain something.
Lets assume that in the A we have an ideal setup.
Now going to B we have an mirror with a larger f. using the same lens but playing with x and y we still can find a right setup that give us an clear projection. In this case x become bigger and y smaller. We just lose mirror area as an unused space so overall performance can suffer a bit, but the system will work somehow, just working with x and y. in the worst case scenario going to extremes we will need to add some additional lenses. Case C. in extremes we go in normal reflector setup without the need for lenses.
In the end will add some photos and also will try to finish first post with additional photos.
“ ervin, have you thought about reducing the size of the setup by using two concave mirrors?”
not 2 concave mirrors but have thought of other ways:
maybe one day will go after those projects but i am shorts on tools
again thank you all for your kind words, really appreciate.
Photos(will try to edit later with proper explanation and if u click they go full size ):
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beam finally hit 1M cd