New Offroad Light Cannon with Luminus SST-90

[dirtsport7]

I just came across this, I've seen them in person, and they are incredible. I just ordered a set for my Jeep.

The coolest thing is they have different covers that allow you to change the beam from a spot (native form) to a "Euro"(driving) or "Flood". and also different color snap on covers, yellow (fog), red (dust) and blue (snow)

 

[-Virgil-]

Colored plastic lenses do not "convert" a lamp into a fog lamp, snow lamp, dust lamp, etc. And even if they did, blue is never the right color for driving through any kind of obscuration, especially not snow -- this is the same bogus, unscientific claim made by other sellers of lights that are long on hype and short on substance.

Also, this forum has rules about who may advertise (sponsors), who may shill (nobody), and who may post oversize photos (nobody). Please read and follow them, thank you.

 

[dirtsport7]

Sorry about the oversized photos, didn't realize they were too big. I'm not a shilling or advertising. These lights are the first offroad light to use Luminus, I thought people here would appreciate that.
Can you at least put the Press release links back up? The rules say links to outside websites are ok, it was to press release info, not sales sites.

 

[-Virgil-]

It is indeed interesting to see a vehicle auxiliary lamp that uses a new light source -- thanks for the info. And thank you for complying with this board's rules; everyone appreciates that. This isn't really the right site for providing free publicity and sales promotions for non-sponsor companies by publishing their press releases; anyone who wants to read the company's promoblurbs will find them with a quick and easy web search.

 

[NFT5]

Scheinwerfermann, I appreciate we have to work within the rules but I've just spent 10 minutes searching for these, without any luck. Like most on here I'm interested and curious about lights, especially new technology. I see forums, like this one as a means of sharing information of common interest. I'd like to think that we're mostly grown up enough to be able to tell the difference between overt advertising or even shilling against just sharing. Could we at least have the name of the company so we don't all waste our time searching page after page without having much idea of what we're looking for other than it is reasonably sure to use an SST-90? Would this be any different than posting up that Hella/Philips/Lightforce/Osram have a new product?

 

[-Virgil-]

Quick Google search turned up the maker's promo page.

 

[Alaric Darconville]

The coolest thing is they have different covers that allow you to change the beam from a spot (native form) to a "Euro"(driving) or "Flood".

And does none of those very well. Or at ALL, really. And what is a "Euro" beam? Is it the kind of spotlight one might shine on Kraftwerk or the Pet Shop Boys?

and also different color snap on covers, yellow (fog), red (dust) and blue (snow)

I wouldn't recommend a red or blue cover for anything but getting stopped by the local constabulary if you forget to take them off before returning to the road. Blue is NOT useful in snow or any other condition. I'm surprised there are as many survivors of off-road expeditions considering the horrific equipment people will put on their vehicles and then depend on as a safety feature.

 

[Alaric Darconville]

Quick Google search turned up the maker's promo page

Love the pic of the truck with four of them on the front. If these lights are that darned awesome, why would you need four?

Oh, and why didn't anyone tell me about the Glow-in-the-Dark cover? SOLD!

 

[adv]

Love the pic of the truck with four of them on the front. If these lights are that darned awesome, why would you need four?

They are narrow beam spots. Could be aimed to the sides to increase the area coverage.

 

[Rick D]

And what is a "Euro" beam? Is it the kind of spotlight one might shine on Kraftwerk...?

For Autobahn use only. (Let's hope the mods are up on their 1970s electro band humor.)

 

[Rick D]

dirtsport7 <> I took the time last night to Google your find. It indeed looks interesting, but nothing that makes me want to grab my wallet.

The manufacturer isn't highly regarded in these circles. Chinese manufactured, albeit perhaps at a higher level than some of the dross we see. Pumped up marketing claims. IF they bother to provide an isolux chart, it goes out to 0.5 lumens. See what they did there? Add in colored lenses, glow-in-the-dark covers, and a chicken bone and you have soup. I would especially worry about reliability wrt environmental factors such as shock. My friend who races a SCORE Class 1 car doesn't use them, preferring Hella and another unmentionable name that has a poor reputation on this board.

I would be interested to see if the issue of excessive foreground illumination has been mitigated with the larger size of the SST-90. Although a beamwidth of 10 degrees is advertised, any square aperture such as an LED emitter will provide sidelobes in the form of a sinc function. To my knowledge, reflectors (such as used for a source located at the focal point of a parabola) don't work so well for for an LED emitter located at the rear of the reflector. I'm guessing (emphasis mine!) that a well designed reflector could suppress the higher order sidelobes and reinforce the first or second order lobe into the main beam. But more than likely, all of that sidelobe illumination just bounces around inside the reflector and becomes one large area of foreground illumination, which negates your ability to see distant terrain.

Scheinwerferman, could you please weigh in on the relationship between LED emitters and reflectors? I know there is a relationship between emitter size and spacing/amplitude of the sinc function. And be gentle... My last optics lab was in 1985.

Cheers,

Rick

 

[dirtsport7]

Not sure why this manufacturer is not highly regarded here, they make a pretty broad range of very usable lights for Offroad Use and Heavy Equipment and even some structural LED lighting.
They are Designed and Engineered in the U.S., manufactured in So. Korea, NOT China.

The Euro is a light pattern that Hella has used for for years, it is a "Driving Beam" for for Offroad Lights. Typically offroad racers use a combination of Spot and Euro to get distance and wide spread of light for driving at high speeds at night.

 

[Rick D]

I stand corrected. Going to the manufacturer's website, the lettering on the technical drawings for various lamps is indeed Korean. Not something immediately obvious to me.

Do you know what is obvious? Going through your previous posts you recommend this manufacturer for everything and include helpful links. So far this brand of lamp is the ideal solution for off road racing, auxillary lighting for casual 4 wheeling, motorcycles, and golf carts. Golf carts.

 

[-Virgil-]

I notice the same thing as Rick D. dirtsport7, are you affiliated with the manufacturer of these lights?

As for "Euro beam", it is a meaningless term. It means whatever whoever says it wants it to mean at the time they say it.

 

[SemiMan]

Some of their products may be engineered in the U.S., but obviously not all of them are. Some are private labeled.

Semiman

 

[XeRay]

Some of their products may be engineered in the U.S., but obviously not all of them are. Some are private labeled.

Semiman

I have looked at the goods made by this company (XXXXX) many times at the SEMA show, ALL of it is mediocre quality at best. Made in S. Korea or not, the quality speaks for itself. Not terrible, but not good either.
Most, if not all of their HID housings are plastic, the ballasts are inside and not heat-sinked at all. This can be okay for 35 watt HID, but 50 to 70 watt (they also claim to sell), forget it. The ballasts even if 90% efficient (NOT), would cook themselves to death if left on for any extended amounts of time. The housing becomes an "oven".

 

[-Virgil-]

Also, if a company's willing to tell me big, stinky whoppers about one thing ("It's really twenty lights in one with this set of plastic snap-on covers! Red for dust! Blue for snow! Amber for fog! Purple for horseshoes! Green for shamrocks! Pink for raspberries! Orange for tigers! ****oo for cocoa puffs!"), I just can't trust them to be telling me the truth about anything else (performance, durability, water sealing, country of construction, etc.)

Lamps engineered and built by serious, adult companies don't need any of this bogus fib-telling. They stand or fall on their own merits.

 

[Alaric Darconville]

Red for dust! Blue for snow! Amber for fog! Purple for horseshoes! Green for shamrocks! Pink for raspberries! Orange for tigers! ****oo for cocoa puffs!"), I just can't trust them to be telling me the truth about anything else (performance, durability, water sealing, country of construction, etc.)

You keep this up and I'm going to have to buy coffee-proof keyboards.

 

[TEEJ]

Also, if a company's willing to tell me big, stinky whoppers about one thing ("It's really twenty lights in one with this set of plastic snap-on covers! Red for dust! Blue for snow! Amber for fog! Purple for horseshoes! Green for shamrocks! Pink for raspberries! Orange for tigers! ****oo for cocoa puffs!"), I just can't trust them to be telling me the truth about anything else (performance, durability, water sealing, country of construction, etc.)

Lamps engineered and built by serious, adult companies don't need any of this bogus fib-telling. They stand or fall on their own merits.

:lolsign:

Seriously though, when I need to navigate through dark cocoa puff infested terrain, I DEMAND ****oo snap on covers on all lighting.

 

[HB021]

A lot of bad talk about this company who actually is great. I've been working with many great brands such as Hella, Lightforce, NBB, Rigid Industries and Vision X.

And this is absolutely quality stuff and is not mediocre! The quality is far better than Hella, Lightforce and NBB, and I would rank them even with Rigid Industries in quality terms which I'm also a huge fan of.

Regarding the euro beam as we call it here in Europe is what you call driving beam in the states. It's a type of beam pattern that adds width to your lightning but tries to retain some throw by only spreading the light horizontal.

I have the Light Cannon here in my hand and this is what the euro beam looks like:

This is unfiltered (it's exactly the same output as Olight SR95, 90mm reflector and SST-90):

Regarding the snap-on filters which I believe Lightforce invented, is great feature. Instead of having to buy a new light if you wasn't satisfied with the beam pattern you can just change it.

I do however agree with you that colored filters are absolute crap, and this is where you guys hung up. I do testing of all my lights and I find blue to be annoying in snow and yellow also irritating. However it's somewhat true that the absolute white (~5500K) reflects most back into your eyes on snow but I still find using this color temperature most useful.

Here's some pictures in snow:
Vision X Horizon Prime 24" 90w (Cree XP-G) 10 degree

Vision X EVO Prime (Cree XM-L) 20" 120w 20 degree:

20" 60w (Cree XB-D) LED bar (no name) ~7000K:

Also a video of my car in snowy weather (3x 90w Vision X Transporter + 240w Cree XB-D no name LED bar):
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TVtOLrqT2E[/youtube]