I'm building a thing with a 64mm lens from a Cadillac headlight, a big slab of copper, and a 18x 7135 driver (10x on the original board acting as slave, with a luxdrv 105C wired up as master). Which LED to use, XML2 or XPG2? Whatever I use will be de-domed, of course.
Another question about aspherics in general, does the focus change with different LEDs? I did a temporary test setup as best I could with a de-domed XML2 and came up with around 1.65" between the top of the star and underside of the lens, will that number change if I use a XPG2 instead?
My TG2 = XP-G2 dedomed on copper 3040mA 66mm aspheric got 324kcd
(It’s difficult to set best spot/focus)
If you use XM-L2 you will drive harder maybe 5A+ for 300kcd range but you will get bigger spot.
“does the focus change with different LEDs?”
Between XP-G2 and XM-L2 , Yes with dome but No with dedomed
Currently building 60mm aspheric with xpg2 dedomed on sinkpad, 4.95 amps to the led through KD driver. Was originally hoping for over 500k, but looking like it will max out at 300ish now
Yes, the gap between the step the lens sits on in the head, and the bottom face of the bezel, is about .100" bigger than the thickness of the outer lip on the lens. So it can sit anywhere in that range from all the way forward or rearward depending on spacers/o-rings.
I would use an XM-L2 not the XP-G2 You should already have a very small beam as it is. Here are some pics with XM-L2's The first one is a 54mm lens in a ZY-T08 the second is 76mm in an X7. This is about 150 yards. The small sun is 220kcd the X7 is 600kcd but it's so small that unless you are over a hundred yards away at least it's about useless. I could probably get more than 600kcd with it but I don't think it would make it a better light really. It would reach farther but what is the point? By then your eyes wouldn't be making out any real detail anyway and it wouldn't be a big enough beam to be useful until way out there. One more thing I noticed is that the XP-G2 de-domed is really much more neutral and for a thrower this isn't such a great advantage. I'll toss in a third picture of a T-20 110kcd De-domed XP-G2 about the size of a C8.
This is the, um... well, the thing that goes where a 'pill' would be.
I milled off the top 1/8" of the hollow pill & replaced it with 1/8" 6061 plate. I still need to make the screw holes for the star, these will pass through the copper and thread into the aluminum because no way in hell am I enough of a masochist to try making M2 (or maybe M2.5, not picked any screws out yet) threads in a .200" thick piece of copper. I can also rationalize that bit of cowardice by claiming that doing it that way will improve the clamping load between the AL & CU.
The damn thing, just the pill, weighs something like half a pound. Good thing it's going in a big bulky light with a huge chunk of glass in the front, eh?
All the various layers of the pill are yet to be sanded/polished of course, and everything but the inner surface of the refluxer-thing and the die itself will be flat black. It will need another set of holes drilled & tapped still, for bolting down the cover plate thing.
And I just realized, the on-center & off-center pics were both done with the camera in manual mode using the same settings, so the difference in brightness at the die you see there is real. With the refluxer off-center you can clearly see the corners of the die, on-center it's overexposed to the point you can't anymore.
It's ready to be assembled, believe it or not what I'm waiting on (procrastinating) is some flat black paint that won't melt the plastic. All I have is VHT engine paint which nearly destroyed the flat plate the reflector mounts on. As far as I know there hasn't been a model/hobby store in town for years, and I avoid Walmart whenever possible...
I have a lux meter on order, assuming it ever gets shipped. Imagine how upset they'd be if they shipped an order, and you waited a week before you got around to sending them the money.
Nah, the backside (now top) of the Mag reflector has to be black too (and maybe the ID of the head, dunno yet). I just have to eventually get a little bottle of flat black acrylic model paint.
I also wound up with a Junkfire 1226 and havent quite figured out what to do with it. I like what you’ve done in slaving off the 7135’s from the stock driver. Great idea! Have you checked actual emitter amps with 4 x 18650’s?
Your Cu emitter contact plate gizmo is killer! :bigsmile:
