I’ve got these boxed up, ready to go out, but my USPS online account only allows for 2-Day Priority mail at $6.02. So I’m taking them to the Post Office in the morning to see how much cheaper they can do it from there.
If y’all want to split the difference on that shipping, I’ll cover half and you can pay $3.00 and get a tracking number, see em by Wednesday. What’dya say?
Sounds good to me. I think you will be pushing to get mine to me in two days though but go for it anyway. Thanks.
hahaha, I wonder if they do an Overnight Express to Australia? Should be pretty cheap, right? I mean, it’s not like you’re in the Outback or anything….
You haven’t seen that box with Cutter written all over it yet? That box will have some serious mileage on it!
payment sent for mine :)
Oops! I need to go PP! :shy:
Edit: Ahhh! I feel better now! :bigsmile:
Payment Sent (Unique Transaction ID # 8TE64456GC333513U)
Mine shipped, thanks Dale
No box yet my friend. The quickest post is usually 5 or 6 working days.
Dale, I see above that you said the reflector is easily cut with good scissors. But, what about the opening at the back for the mcpcb? I want to open it up just a little, but I’m afraid that I might warp the reflector messing around with it, since it is just sheet aluminum. Is there a sure-fire way to widen the opening at the back without ruining something? :~
The opening at the back is made for a star mcpcb, like a SinkPAD. It fits perfectly, with a 20mm star. A round mcpcb like the Noctigon doesn’t fit.
The aluminum sheet is actually thinner than I’d like, making it difficult to open that entry without a higher risk of messing up. You can use a round file and cut it that way, probably the safest. Or a dowel, something like a round pencil, with sandpaper taped tightly around it. That would also work. You could tape sandpaper tightly wrapped around a drill bit and spin it with the drill, slower would be better.
i for got to ppost but i got my package fast 2 days :) thanks dale
Thanks. That’s what I thought, but I was hoping there may be a chance that you’d opened one up and knew how best to do that. I’m still waiting on my MT-G2’s that I bought from IOS a couple weeks ago. Two of them are on 16mm boards, so they should fit. But, I was trying to test the reflector with LED’s I already have on 20mm stars, and it wasn’t fitting very well. But it almost fits. That’s why I asked about opening it up a little. Maybe a small file will work. I don’t have a round one, but I have a small triangle file that will probably do the trick.
I’d say use a rotary grinder (Dremel, etc.), but be sure to mask the inside of the reflector from the swarf. Something cup shaped like a bottle cap with a little hot glue or putty to keep it in place would work well to mask the inside of the reflector during the process but without touching the inside surfaces.
I used a dremel, (rotary tool), with a #115 bit and opened mine up with that. Speed, (1-5), was on 2-1/2 I believe. It was easy to do and I just blew out the filings with compressed air. Held the reflector in one hand and used the dremel with the other. It doesn’t take much to open it up.
Would it be safer to mod the star itself rather than the reflector?
If the reason to increase hole clearance is to raise the height of the emitter in the reflector, that doesn't seem necessary. The emitted light won't hit the bottom for the reflector even with the reflector resting on the star. It should be slightly higher than the star so that more of the reflective surface is used.
The hole almost fits over the star. It’s just a little too small of a hole to fit around the star. A little bit of reaming out with a file or some sandpaper will probably work fine. Or, I could use a smaller star so it fits. I suppose, since it is made to sit around the base of the star, the parabola is probably optimized for that arrangement, too, so if I did set it atop a star, it would be out of focus by that much.
^ I don't know what is was designed for but when I was playing with mine it focused best above the star. Check out the portion of reflector not being hit by the emitter's output in the below pic (very awesome pic, by the way) from Post 12. The emitters we use don't emitt 180 degrees and most reflectors are designed for that.
EDIT: My reflector is in storage at the moment, but my recollection was that the curve of the wall appeared to be parabolic all the way to the drop off to the bottom flat area.
Okay, that’s good to know! Thanks! I was just reading the specs from the maker’s website. I’ve played around with mine in open air, but haven’t got to really test it yet with things locked down in place. 
Could it be the difference in emitters? This reflector was designed for Luminus SST-90, not the Cree emitters we play with around here. I do have a SST-90 I might test it with, when I get a chance. Then, when I get my MT-G2’s I will see where the best focus is achieved with that as well. I don’t have any XHP-70’s to test with, so thankfully Dale has already posted pics for us here! :bigsmile:
^ Sounds like a good plan and I have to point out that I didn't try to open up my reflector's hole to even try the setting in the above pic. I just got as low as resting on the mcpcb. In the above pic, not much of the reflector is "wasted", but then again I think I had my reflect maybe above the top of the mcpcb by about the thickness of a noctigon.
I am curious now and will need try that out. Your point that the reflector maybe designed that way makes sense. It could be the beam may have fallen into place if I would have continued going deeper into the reflector. Interested in hearing what you find out.
You can’t go by that pic, as it’s a macro from close range and doesn’t show the focal point. If I pull back from the light the reflector fills with the phosphor color at the appropriate distance.
Remember how a donut hole appears if the light is too close to a wall, but the hot spot is focused at a certain distance? That’s what you’re seeing in that pic. The light has to be collimated towards a distance in space to get the beam out there where we want it. Gathering light from a small point in a large reflector means it takes some space to get the beam to come together in focus. 
With a thrower, this can be seen as a dark “^” in the beam, with the point out there where it all meets.
I was going to put one of these in my Courui with an MT-G2, but the Courui’s reflector focuses that emitter into a tighter beam so I left it alone. (held the Lum 5-90 on an MT-G2 for testing)
The diamond profile mixes the light from the emitter, perfect for the XHP70. It blends away the small artifacts in the MT-G2 as well, but with a larger softer hot spot than what the smooth reflector does in the Courui.