Luxeon Rebel LEDs - Underrated performers

Yeah, the “copper penny” approach (scraping the top to expose the pads and soldering wires) would interfere with a focusing light’s reflector ring sitting right next to the LED
All the boards I have are dedicated Rebel boards, with the pads off to the side. Those leave enough room for a reflector, though I’ve only built a couple.

I mostly make zoomies, and as I mentioned the square boards drop perfectly into the round shelf/hole used for a “16mm” emitter — and that puts the emitter dead center.
There’s a tiny bit of movement possible, less than a millimeter at each corner — you know the trigonometry, a 10mm square has a diagonal measurement a bit over 14.14mm.

That makes those ideal for dropping into the #3 zoomie, SK68, and Cofly’s little 1xAA zoomie (I have seen very few with solid pills, otherwise those need a copper disk from Etsy dropped in, to fill the hole like a solid pill.

But as I said, I’ve got the itch to try the Luxeon Rebels in the little 1xAAA lights now. Well, three opportunities are in the mail from Australia. I hope they can get more eventually.

There is always a solution. Some just take more thinking and fiddling.

I still use 7135s, for 10440 lights, for colored lights and for Nichia 219C lights. I have only used FET drivers with white Cree LEDs. It is, after all, better if you can get the current you want, independent of the battery charge state and condition.

Yes. My problem was the limitations of them since stacking chips was always a failure for me, which is why I was so happy with my latest red rebel triple. I went at it again and managed to get four extra chips stacked and a solid 4.5A. After all my failures, I was elated. Now that I have the option of a 4.5A regulated driver, I’m going to be visiting my ignored stash of Qlites more often.

Sorry for bumping the topic, I was wrong several places I’ve corrected.
He’s got more boards, and will have more mounted emitters on boards available soon.

I’m thinking of trying some Luxeon Z. Maybe RGBW.

Does it come with an itty bitty soldering iron and “waldo” micromanipulators also usable for surgery on single cells?

I found some more small rebel mcpcbs.

Well, I looked it up. Seems the Cree XQ-E beats it. No surprise there. But, the Micro-Z1 comes mounted on a 5mm x 5mm MCPCB? Wow! Now THAT is cool! :sunglasses:

Actually djozz did a thread on the “Luxeon Z” emitters.
I just ordered 12 of them with boards that form clusters of four.

What is the difference between a Luxeon rebel, and a Luxeon R? I have a bunch of triple luxeons that I purchased some time ago, ohaya bought some too, and I always assumed they were rebels. Looking back to where I purchased them, I now see they are Luxeon R.
What’s the main difference? A mounted triple board of Rs go for around $6, and a mounted board of rebels around $20. What advantage do the rebels have over the Rs?

> what advantage

You’re in Canada with the LuxeonStar people (ok, I admit it’s a big country)
You might ask them directly, I’ve found them pretty responsive when I had specific questions about buying from them.

All I see at the Luxeon page is the many different listings under high-power LEDs; comparing, the “R” are tested sorted no-bin (consistent white) for high brightness outdoor use — but the “Luxeon” is an ecosystem/base design with a lot of chips on its shoulders.

Like I said, I always thought they were rebels I got a great price on. I just put an order into Luxeon Star last night. If I had realized then that the ones I had were Rs, I would have ordered a rebel triple just so I could compare them.
Yes, Luxeon Star is not far from me. Next day delivery. I decided that every third light I build is going to be a Luxeon until I get a true feel for them. Luxeon Star seems to be the only place I’ve seen that mounts their rebels on DTP sink pads.

Well, I’m trying to wire triple Rebels (on Sinkpad2 boards, bought that way from Luxeonstar) as parallel.
It’s right at the edge of my competence to get all the wiring stuffed in and connected cleanly, basically.

Does Noctigon make a triple board that will take the Rebel emitters?
I’m wishing for something as easy as the KD triple parallel Nichia http://www.kaidomain.com/Product/Details.S022933

I don’t know if the physical spacing of the contacts on a Noctigon triple board is compatible with the shape of the Rebel emitters.

I know Noctigon triple boards are much easier to set up for parallel, using jumpers on the front.

Basically, old shaky hands make my soldering sloppy.

I’m thinking I have to start doing hotplate or toaster oven soldering, where at least the shaky problem just affects placement with tweezers, not heating.

You can use the noctigon board with XP-E2 red emitters. No problems for you, just put jumpers on the parallel pads and add a driver.

Yeah, I’m interested in combining three different Rebels — red, red-orange, and PC amber — that’s what’s got me stuck.
Cajampa was working toward the same thing but hasn’t been here for a while.

Ah, promising:

XP-E2 have a red, red-orange and amber also.

Yep. I’ll try them. DigiKey has them all, affordably enough

Where can I buy empty Noctigon triple boards for these XP-E2s?
Or is there someone selling them populated with your choice of three different emitters (as luxeonstar does for rebels)
_

Oh my aching brain, eleven different red emitters, nine different red-orange, ten different amber
http://www.digikey.com/product-search/en/optoelectronics/led-lighting-color/525607?FV=ffe875a1%2C1c0002%2Cfff40008%2Cfff80527&mnonly=0&newproducts=0&ColumnSort=37&page=1&stock=1&pbfree=1&rohs=0&quantity=&ptm=0&fid=0&pageSize=500

Do I want the “exposed pad” version?
Google and DigiKey failed me there.*
I’m guessing that refers the thermal pad on the bottom and I do want that exposed.

All the same 2.2v forward voltage.

The difference is the brightness in lumens.

I guess I want the brightest red, intermediate red-orange, and less bright amber so they end up appearing about the same to the eye …

Learning curve.

_

  • “Google has failed” — except for trying to convince me everything could be way more complicated: https://bitknitting.wordpress.com/
    “… I run Python within the Eclipse environment, I enter arguments to MakeDigikeyBOM ….”

You can get the noctigon boards from Richard at Mountain Electronics. He would mount the emitters, but he doesn’t carry red-orange.

I didn’t think there were so many variables for each color emitter.
Djozz would probably be the best person to match up which ones are best for you.