The green color cast of the de-domed SST-90 adds to the greens of foliage. Notice the grey concrete and white/off white buildings…they’re wrong. The MT-G2 is closer to accurate color schemes.
Unfortunately, there is a bit of trickery by the camera. I don’t have a good camera for this type of photography and even if I did I would have to learn how to use it :weary:
The purpose was more about comparing output than colour. The ceiling shots are pretty close to what my eyes see, just slightly less green on the sst and slightly more yellow on the mtg2. The outdoor shots are not quite what I see, particularly the mtg2. I’m not sure but I have a feeling the sst is slowly going green as I didn’t notice it as much before, of course, I may be just thinking that because I’m comparing to the mtg2 now???
The other thing I pointed out which I think has some relevance here is the size and form factor. The sst lends it self to smaller setups due to the smaller die, meaning smaller reflector for similar beam to mtg2 (I realize the 2 beams shown are different but you get my drift), and single cell operation, meaning shorter/smaller hosts for similar lumens making it somewhat of a ‘wow light’.
The mtg2 will be more efficient and has more watthours in 2 batteries and also more heatsinking through shear size of the host BUT I get the feeling there’s a few BLF members here who dig ‘wow lights’ J)
I chose to drive the crap out of an sst-90 because I thought the lumens per die size would be chasing the xml and xpg on their given ratio’s. Plus it has excellent thermal path and puts out big lumens overall. Efficiency was less of an issue for me. Wow lights cannot have efficiency in the equation IMO. Similarly with colour, whilst I like 4500k my sst-90 build is not intended for a whole lot of practical use.
Thanks for the follow up info Pinkpanda. Your logic makes sense to me. Seems like the SST could be used in a practical light too, given it's lower power requirements. Carring big light with extra cells is not always an option
Really like your lights. Do you have mod threads on them?
No build threads as such.
I recently built a n-bin sst90 on copper. it runs direct drive from for 1/2 D nimh cells. I tried to used an XML2 at first but the freshly charged cells we just to much for it. The higher voltage/amps of the sst90 was a perfect choice. The n-bin puts out a great color and although I never measured anything it puts out a very similar amount of light to a MRK @ 1.25A. Build thread here.
The sst-90 may be getting a little old and out dated but it’s sort of in between the xml2 set to kill and the MGT2 that needs 2 cells.
Disappointing news: Q bin doesn't exist.
I’m supprised that Luminus has not built a more efficient replacemnt for the SST90 yet to stay in the efficency game with Cree.
They may not be able to. And their niche in the market may have been taken over by cheaper chips from other manufacturers making expensive research not paying off.
(just guessing away)
If you look at big buyers around my place they buy tens of thousands of small Osram or Phillips Lumileds, brand name still matters. Some people that were actually fitting big stores with LED lighting had no idea who CREE is (as strange as it sounds), I guess Luminous is out of discussion for most of business that want to impress a store owner with well known brands. Same can happen with street lighting when companies bid to the city administration. I guess Luminous may not have the cashflow of those big corporations.
To add to the luminous discussion, I think the low vf, high amp led were hard to sell since it was a little pricey for a single led AND also needed a comparatively pricey driver to get the maximum potential out of it. Even for flashlights, when the sst technology came out there was little technology to support the big amp draw. It seemed luminous leaned towards fixed lighting and projection lighting to cater for the unusual limitations of the led (including heatsinking). Luminus had good tech at the time it was released and understood good heatsinking was priority (being so high amp/high power) that’s why they came out with the copper mounted cbt/cst (don’t know if it still had the dielectric layer though).
They HAD a good led. It just didn’t seem to fit neatly in any market. To keep researching and developing for more efficiency would be misguided IMO.
These things are so bad I’m just gonna have to toss em in the trash can when they get here… 
Sarcasm, right? Or toss them in my direction. 
I imagine they’ll do ok, might not be the “best” but certainly won’t be the worst either.
I’m gonna have to re-read this thread when they get here to figure out what I intended to do with em.
I REALLY like the look of the SBT-70, with it’s round die face and glass covered flat surface. Might end up with one of those as a mule somewhere, really would like to use it in a very small light I have in the que. Just don’t know if the small cell it will take can supply enough power to it to make it all worthwhile, as they’re expensive!
Dale, I look forward to your results with this emitter. I know you've got the cells, the copper, the drivers, the lightbox, and most importantly--the guts to push this emitter to the limit and then post the results here! 
+1
Hmmmm, I’ll have to report this to my parents. What they’ve been calling lack of sense, you refer to as guts. One sounds better than the other…
Pioneer.
Trailblazer
Buying American (doesnt matter if its not true)
you need to weave these phrases into your narrative.
EF, it’s getting difficult to FIND things made in USA! Cree emitters are though…
Is there a way to determine bin by looking at the emitter? On the ‘Comex’ copper star of the SST-90 I pulled from my generic/unbranded X6, there is 47.12 printed above “SST-90”. I didn’t realize that the SST-90 had a similar Vf to the XM-L/2. Seems to me that the SST-90 uses only 14% more wattage than the MT-G2 at their ‘safe’ upper limit. Reinstalling the SST in the X6 would also most likely better focus the light as the MT-G2 sits a mm or two too low in the reflector.