if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
ive youve ever looked at the vision-x led light bars, there are some new leds coming in julyish.
http://www.luminus.com/content1519
these will make for some sweet home made lights. id be scared to buy them premade though since the vision-x things are fetching $1500ish.
i cant find it but i think i read these require 12VDC input. that would be perfect for us as we'd only need to regulate the current. so start making friends with CNC machinists and start saving block aluminum and/or large heatsinks. some nice metal reflectors would be handy too.
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
wow those specs are pretty crazy. I'd like to know how much that'll cost. Not that I'd ever be able to afford em!
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
nice! those look good. im in iraq right now(contractor) ill have to check out the mraps. they came out in 07 it sounds like so the leds may not be the brightest.
the cost shouldn't be too bad for the raw parts to make a light out of the cbm-360 led but premade will be a grand or more. id figure those leds will start at $150 a piece then move to $40-$50 as they become available. it should only take 1-2 to make a good light. 3 or more if you wanna show off lol
here is what a guy made with the current high output led's (900 lumins each):
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/...d.php?t=213704
thats pretty damn good for the $240 in materials with his first try on reflectors and led drivers.
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
update to this thread. The CBM-360 LED has not yet been adopted to offroad lights like I thought it would be. A new LED called the Cree XML has been widly accepted for lots of uses though so the price is very cheap. It looks like they are used in the newest Visionx products. In the mean time a few home brew projects have been made with the XML's
http://www.bigjimny.com/index.php?op...4433&Itemid=75
http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f9/le...umens-1246091/
the light output on one XML is 900-1100 driven at ~3 amps. A three pack of these would need ~12.6v DC and ~38 watts to produce ~3000 lumins. Thats ~40 USD (not including the housing/heatsink). The issues now is no real good reflectors are made for them so distance is not up to par with what HIDS can achieve. Not to mention HIDS can be had cheap these days.
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
Anyone looking to try a project? I think I may try building a 6 LED light bar. Still there are no optics for HID style through so I dont think a prerunner would be very impressed with anything LED yet.
this forum has all the info needed:
http://forums.mtbr.com/lights-diy-do-yourself/
and this is the style that make the housing cheap enough to consider:
http://bikeled.org/
A modified version of the above housing integrating these heatsinks as the backplain?
http://www.heatsinkusa.com/10-080/
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
I am looking for a few good flood lights. that should eliminate the need for optics I would think.
I haven't looked at the specs and I'm on my phone. ill check it out more tonight.
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
heres some info that I have gathered
best driver for three XML's on a vehicles ranging 12V power $5 USD shipped-
http://club.dealextreme.com/forums/F...hreadid.890954
modify the driver to only high mode like this:
http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/show...191f6cf8c997af
optics that fit in the 1" square tube are these ~$2.50 USD each:
http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/1375399.pdf
and housing incorporating large heat sinks and this basic design $20-$30 USD:
http://bikeled.org/ConstructionSteps.html
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
Lot's of good info Troy. I've build quite a few LED lights and I think it's cool the high-high power stuff is available and priced well. Not only does it make it available to the little guy but it will also bring LED's mainstream.
Running those LED's at 3 amps is gonna make them HOT. I've had to re-work a project before because of heat. I had a CREE XR-e get to 120* in 30 seconds running at 1 amp.
Re: if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit
The heat is a huge concern. Even the $1200 LED bars must thermal limit when your not moving since the thermal path of a "visionx prime" to the sink is not very impressive. I do however figure any reasonable heat sink solution I can come up with will require the vehicle moving at least at a crawl pace. Parking for a long time wont be possible, but my 80/100 bulbs already limit me from parking with the lights on.
The mtn bike guys are running minimal fins but also driving them much lower. I am hoping considerably more cooling fins and the higher average speeds of a truck will be enough...
