I added gift wrapping tape to the lens on this headlamp. It worked well enough that I’m wondering if there is a clear replacement lens that I could use with dc-fix to make this an even more floods light. I really like it just wish it didn’t have as much throw. I was thinking of a clear lens instead of the TIR lens. If anyone has any advice on this I would appreciate it.
Might have to get the measurements of the lens and look on aliexpress for a lens with a wider pattern. TIR lens come in different degrees of beam pattern. I don’t know anything about that light to look up replacement parts and give you a link, sorry.
Might be a better option than aliexpress also. Been a long time since I was modding lights. Working on building a cabin now and aint had time.
A clear lens turns it into a mule, which would waste a lot of light output. Better use a heavy frost tape on the surface of the TIR instead.
I have the light. I swapped-in a 519a 3500k (domed) and use a layer of DC fix to clean up the beam. It looks great, but yes, not very floody even with the DC fix.
I have some 18mm clear lenses and they are just a little too big to fit (they are measuring 18.05mm). Regardless, with how the light goes together, I think you would need something that exactly matches the height of the stock optic - so about 4.8mm. Otherwise the bezel won’t sit flush against the body and the lens won’t sit right between the inner bezel and body.
Those flat TIRs aren’t too common and I’m not totally sure how they’d behave by using a drastically different LED. Normally I’d say to get more flood you could use a bigger emitter, i.e. a 5050 like XML 2 or SST 40 (keep it domed). I believe you could use a 16mm MCPCB and modify it. You’d have to trim the edges to make it fit in the body and also drill screw holes since they are needed to hold the MCPCB down. This route could be quite a bit of work.
I’d suggest ordering a variety of diffuser sheets from @Boaz and trying them out. He sells some that make the beam quite floody. I could probably find the ones I have and share a couple comparison pics but no promises on when I’d get around to it.
Thank you all!
I thought it might be a long shot because of the lip around the lens. However I wasn’t considering the distance from the emitter being a factor. Which now that it’s mentioned, I realize would be very important.
The tape helps it a lot and it’s not too, too bad anyway. I’ll give a couple different models of dc-fix a try and see if it works any better.
I like the light for its size and weight and it’s pretty inexpensive. One thing I like is the length of it. Being short it keeps the light closer to the center of the forehead. But if I need a super floody light there are other options.
I like it a lot, too. One caveat is that it seems to have high parasitic drain. So if you don’t plan to use it again soon it would be a good practice to loosen the tailcap until the button no longer functions.
I saw that information somewhere a while back so I have been doing that. It’s not perfect (no such thing) but it’s a great little light for cheap if you catch it on sale.