Yeah, and it doesn’t make sense why. The binning should gravitate up, and if there is demand, there should be supply. I still hope it will happen, because I love the XPL-HI.
We always have to remember though that Cree doesn’t make emitters for flashlights. Our market is a very very small percentage of what utilizes their product. Industry uses reels and reels of emitters in street lights, overhead lighting in store fronts, displays, 10’s of thousands of emitters, and more. While we use a tiny few. Same for Nichia. Reach out, try to get a supplier from Nichia for your 10 or 12 emitters. They have recently expanded in the US to a wholesaler that has a minimum order quantity of 5 reels, that’s 17,500 emitters! MINIMUM! Maybe that explains why we can’t get the tint and power bins we want for our flashlights.
For sure true, and I’m guessing the HI emitters are less valuable in non-flashlight applications. I still thought supply and higher binning would trickle up a bit though. It seems to have with the domed emitters.