if your looking at lights you might want to wait a bit

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Originally Posted by troyboy162

I agree. I'll have to break my books out to figure out the minimum value to be reasonabley assured. I'm sure the driver can handle some flucuations but probably not what a auto can spit at it. I am close to ordering the parts for the project. I think it has a pretty good chance of being very good, but the low point is still the optics avalible. Nothing can really mimic the throw of a good hid spot light with LED yet.

XML LED's on stars are going as low as 6 bucks these days. Drivers range $10-$30 for a 3x3 or 8x8 set up. Optics are $.50-$2.50 per LED. Heat sinks are still the wild card and the hinge point of the project.

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One source for cheap/free heatsinks is old computers. We just recycled about 30 machines at work and I scavenged a bunch of parts before we sent them out. How many LEDs are you going to to run per light? Do you have an estimate of how much heat sinking capacity you'll need?

- Matt

I have a box full of my old ones and they may be used for a experiment. Computer heat sinks would be ideal for 1 or 2 led pods. Ideally Id want at least 6 leds to make it worth my while, but a sacrificial experiment with 3 or less LED's using heat sinks I already have sounds fun and cheap too. It takes 3 XML's to be perceptibly brighter then the average headlight.

Each LED is consuming 10-12 watts so a pack of 3 roughly equals a pentium 4 CPU. Placement anywhere near the grill means airflow even while stopped. I havnt worked the numbers because no calculation can figure in air flow. Even rock crawling we have quite a bit of air movement on the average. Also a XML can work up to 150 C , but it just gives off 20% less light

I'm looking at either pods of 3 or 4 (which ever works out better for the driver) on my roof rack. idea is to have about 6 or 8 pods up there. i am planning for 0 airflow, so they are probably going to need some fat heatsinks. The good news is my roof rack is aluminum, so I may bond them to the rack with some arctic silver paste (not adhesive) and screw them directly to the rack to aid in heat dissipation.

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1052847

The Chinese have landed. The issues with the lights is they are using glass covers and the LEDs are not the best, but the price makes these unbeatable. Trailworthyfab is selling them. The company is hunma and another is Aurora. The Aurora ones are a little more expensive and are having customs problems do to ridgids copyright claim. Edit: the auroras are nearly impossibly to find for good reason. They are Identical to ridgid and slightly brighter at a Chinese price. Ridgids copyright claim is completely legit.

http://youtu.be/IXw-8Ad1sm0

I keep plastering this post with info and no lights in hand lol. Found this today and if he can meet his price points they may be nice for the money.
http://budgetlightforum.com/node/11104

the details...
1.875?x7.875?x3? weights a little over 3.5lbs
different beam profiles
5100 lumens
"I am shooting for $300 for one $575 For two and $825 for three"

kinda gives you an idea of where these lights should be priced and what kind of performance you should expect from them with modern componets.

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Originally Posted by troyboy162

I keep plastering this post with info and no lights in hand lol.

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The mark-up on LED stuff is still very high. For example, I am building LED fixtures for the family boat. I am running two warm white Cree LEDs in each interior light and three Cree LEDs for exterior lighting. Even at low-volume full retail price, the LEDs cost me around $5 each. I pay around $14 each for the driver, so one completed assembly costs around $24 in parts and a new incandescent housing (the actual boat dome light itself) are $19.99 each. So $45 total per light, including the aluminum stock I use for heatsink, at full retail prices. However, the store-bought LED versions of these lights are between $200-$300 each. Why?
As much as I love LED stuff, I just can't bring myself to pay $300 for an automotive light.

I know its nuts. That last link I posted smokes anything you can buy in terms of performance because he's using high end parts. He's got small run printed circuit boards and machined heatsinks...two items that should skyrocket his price. Lumins per lumins he's half the price of ridgid in a package half the size with user replaceable beam pattterns. I'm gonna watch his post and possible try a group by with him since he's already stated discounted with volume. Just to put it out there the Chinese ridgid clone (can't be reliabley imported) was 1/3 the price and brighter. Does assembled in America mean 3 times the price?

I think I have given up on the home build ideas I had due to the chinease lights being so reasonably priced. On the high end side the above light bar is much nicer then I could build and time considered, its not a horrible price

I am still looking for an affordable LED flood light I can put up on my roof rack. At this point, I'm just waiting for the prices to drop a bit on materials while I save up some cash. I really wish i had access to a mill to make some sweet aluminum housings/heatsinks.

Sean there are alot of Chinese ones out there that should be good for the money. The two main players are:
http://www.hanma-auto.com/products/d...work-light-16w

and these guys who are ridgid clones that are not really able to import into the usa

http://www.szaurora.com/1.aspx?id=130

im not opposed to making my own, but some purchased solutions would be handy. these would basically be area flood lights for camping, night wheeling, loading/unloading, etc.

troy, do you have a link to buy those? or is it just find on ebay and cross fingers?