XP-L High Intensity vs XP-L vs XP-L DeDomed

I’m upgrading my Cypreus this week from de-domed XP-L to XP-L HI, to fix its tint. Also upgrading the driver from FET to FET+1 to get better low modes. Maybe in a year or two I can upgrade it again to get a higher output bin. :slight_smile:

I wonder how much the output will drop, going from a de-domed V6 to a factory-de-domed U5. And I wonder how its lumen output compares to a high-bin domed XP-G2. Think you might be able to test that in the original host?

The old emitters are XP-L V6 2C dedomed, new ones are XP-L HI U5 5000K … and what I’d ideally like is XP-L V6 (or higher) 3D with domes and with large enough optics.

Also, I want your integrating sphere. My current solution is an “integrating milk carton”, which is a bit less than ideal. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

Are these pictures on the side of your milk carton?

No, I’ve got an older model. The missing-person pictures on mine look like this:

Thanks pflexpro/everybody for the tests and for the information!

TK: “My current solution is an “integrating milk carton”

.

Really? - If I’m not mistaken, isn’t that how selfbuilt got started?

Truth be known, He’s probably still using it, as he says that this or that light was too large for measurement, so lumens are estimated:-)

Hey! - More power to ya!
-Chuck

Well, at least it’s better than an “integrating bathroom!”



The integrating milk carton method works well, as long as the luxmeter sensor does not receive light directly from the lightsource, integration should at least be better than the bended pipe things. It helps integration if the shiny inside is sanded to flat with very fine sandpaper. Do you have a range problem? Or is there a grey filter before the light sensor?

Reference: https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/6918 for the bent pipe things Smile. I agree, science does not back up our pipes. I find if I slightly tip a light so the business end points towards the inside of the pipe, it increases readings quite a bit, whcih leads me to believe flooders may be over estimated. Might explain some of our (the bent pipe club members) unexplainable high readings on flooders. manxbuggy1/rdrfronty abd TurboBB did extensive tests of high quality lights with the pipe light box, and can show consistency, but I'm pretty sure vast majority were reflector based, not flooders, maybe all were reflector based. There weren't many off the shelf high end TIR optics or aspherics around at the time.

By design, integrating spheres and even milk cartons should have better integration than pipes, but what really just is needed in practice is 'good enough' integration, if the pipe does not significantly favor throwers over flooders, all is ok.

TurboBB never did a direct test on integration though. Tom, for my curiosity, would you mind sometime taking a zoomie zoomed to spot and shine it as far into your pipe as possible, and then again tilt it a bit and shine it to the side of the pipe close to the light entrance hole, and one more time halfway, and see what is the difference? My integrating spheres tested this way show a few percent variation shining a zoomie in different directions, so they do not integrate perfectly either, I wonder how the pipe responds to this.

Well, @work now (working??), but I know the results will be bad doing that. From just a slight tilt of a C8 or HD2010 type of light, the differences are dramatic. I'll try it this eve - if I remember Smile.

Thanks!

(working???? You're not spending your life on anything but BLF, are you?)

I'm knocking my head against the wall in a forever loop, trying to get this stupid C# .NET app to get a JSON stream working to talk to our PIC based, USB/virtual COM port plug-in Dose Calibrator (nuc med device) simulator. Goin on a day+, with lots of interruptions. Frustrating as hell right now, so I'm distracted very easily... Smile

Cool Tom, my wife is back in school to get her LVN and is complaining that that they aren’t spending ANY time on dosage calculations. She’s gonna throw fits at the end of the semester, as, of course, that’s life and death stuff that they breezed over like it was nothing.

She would love your app, for sure! (gonna be spending some hours this afternoon with fellow classmates, off the clock, working on dosage calculations)

Since she’s burning the candle from both ends, I think maybe it’s a good time to upgrade her P1D that she previously wouldn’t let me touch. It’s only doing 567 lumens for crying out loud!

Ahhh - that's probably dosage calc on real meds, our equipment is used only for radiation/nuclear meds - decay calculations is a big part of it though, but we are one of only a handful of manufacturers in the world making a gas chamber to measure radiation dosages, either in needles or vials - one unit for a doctor's office all the way to the nuclear pharmacies. Actually from yesterday, I was work'n with a mech engineer on a LED flashlight he wanted to use on a isokinetic machine (rehab) for the clinicians to properly align the machine's attachment with the limb joint (shoulder, knee, etc.). Funny, he actually bought 3 cheap zoomies, one being a SK68, so today, I brought in a "small" collection of zoomies to show him. Apparently people freak (regulators too) when the word "laser" is mentioned, even low powered. A laser is a better solution, but a focused beam from a LED he is saying would be good enough. I got a collection of slim AA zoomies and found the best to be a gold one - don't think it's a XP-E, looks like a smaller dye and has a nice small hot spot. The SupFire F3 with an XP-E and another with a de-domed XP-E2 performed as good or little better, but it's bigger size might count it out. Weird in that he wants something real cheap, off the shelf rather than custom - forecast is only bout 20 pieces/year. Was think'n of the XP-L HI, but think an XP-E or XPR is tighter - brightness not much of a factor.

Yep, meds in OR and such, and on the floor.

Cool story about the pinpoint light source, XP-E2 probably perfect for that in a small aspheric. Up close and personal it’ll be an intense beam hot spot right? lol Mech Eng cheaping out, tsk tsk tsk.

I'd say that my results so far are similar to yours Randy. The XP-L HIs have really nice tint--cleaner than almost any other dedome I've seen. The total lumens output seems to be in between a high binned XP-G2 and a domed XP-L (with the throw being similar to a domed XP-G2).

I built a few triples at 5.8A-6A over the past few weeks and tested an XP-G2 S4 2B against the XP-L U5 5000K. I got about 200-300 lumens more out of the XP-L HIs, but that's through Carclo optics, which always eat some lumens regardless of the setup.

I don't know how the V5/V6 dedomed XP-Ls would have measured in that setup, since the ones I've built before and tested were with an FET driver pulling 10A+, so it's not really comparable.

At the end of the day, I will have to say that the tint is fantastic on all of the HIs I've tested so far. A very nice option for sure, especially for the triples. Now all we need is a factory dedomed XM-L2 and XP-G2. That would be heaven! (I would want the XM-L2 so that I didn't have to deal with trying to center an XP die in lights that are set up already for XM dies).

Also, it could have just been me because I didn't measure it, so take this anecdote for what it's worth, but it seems like at the same drive currents the triple XP-L HIs are actually running slightly cooler than the XP-G2s. I have built a ton of the triple S3s so I'm pretty used to how they feel, and it feels like the XP-L is producing a little less heat at the same drive current (more efficient).

I little birdy told me that some real XP-L HI V3s are coming soon, so we'll see how those compare.

--------

Regarding the light pipes, integrating spheres, milk cartons, etc.... I have one of the pipes and it has been fairly consistent for me, and the readings I've got from it have lined up very closely with those from others (even with some of the same lights that I've sent to others with different kinds of setups). It isn't a perfect solution, but it is close enough to give a pretty good idea. You do have to be consistent with how you measure the lights. I have different foam cutouts so that the lights stay centered and flat regardless of what light is used, because the readings do change if you tilt the light. It is an obvious flaw, but one that isn't fatal as long as you are consistent. Consistency counts.

I wouldn't use the numbers from this for ANSI style publication, which is why I rarely publish exact lumens numbers (and when I do, I usually underrate them a bit), but it does give me a good indication of how the lights perform and what the modifications have done.

As imperfect as it is, it is infinitely better than my two built-in light meters--which are easily fooled!

I’ve only got one XP-L HI light, but the tint is very nice. It’s spec’d at 5000K and it looks to me like it hits 5000K right on the dot. It’s a whiter tint than a 3C, and looks to me a lot like a Nichia 219B except very slightly cooler. However, it’s in a copper host so I suppose some of its tint is probably coming from reflections off the copper.

Having a triple only makes the tint better, since each LED will have slight variations. They add together and even out, producing a beam which is closer to the center of the tint bin than any individual emitter.

I still want an integrating sphere. The milk box is okay, but it’s definitely prone to sensitivity regarding beam angle and shape. I might try the papier-mâché-around-a-big-ball method unless I find something easier which is still fairly cheap.

There’s another method I’ve wondered about though… how well would it work to use a tube with a light meter at one end and a light source at the other end, pointed directly at the meter, and the entire inside of the tube is a high-quality mirror?

At that point you’re basically measuring throw, with reflections from the spill to mess things up. Now hitting a frosted piece of glass in the middle to prevent directly hitting the meter with the beam and you may approach milk jug levels of accuracy. :wink:

I'm really look'n fwd to those V3 HI's.... I pre-ordered 5, should have done 10 like Dale. I always thought those XP-G2's ran hot, and the weird problems when de-doming of what seems to be effectively raising the Vf. I'm think'n Richard, you may get the V3's before us, just hope you have enough coming in to keep in stock for a while Wink. You got a good point bout de-domed XM-L2's, would be nice. Just hope CREE isn't abandoning the XM-L2 line in favor of XP-L's - seems like they are at least giving XP-L's some priority.

+1 bout the light pipes. I got the same blocking foam setups and the centering is pretty important. My conversion factor is 0.34, worked out with manxbuggy1. Still, these light boxes seem to have a phenomenal range for light sizes and low to high outputs, for what the light box is. Agree the IS of course would be great to have...