Rigid Industries Dually vs. D2 LED lights

[BenChiew]

I have a pair of D2 Amber in flood and another pair in driving amber on my grizzly. Just last weekend I was out in the jungle riding thru torrential rain and running away from the rising flood waters of the river. It was around dusk and the visibility was down to no more than 20-30 meters. The amber allows me to see clearly where my other friends were using white and they had a hard time seeing the trail.

The waterproofing on the D2 were good as it was completely submerged for a good period during river crossing.
I would suggest using a good waterproof switch. The latest switch provided that was supposed to be waterproof, was not.

 

[BenChiew]

I would not mix both amber and white at the same time. The mixed beam does confuse me.
The amber will appear half as bright as a similarly rated white beam. But once your eyes gets used to it, you can see.
Depth perception for me is much better with the amber. Holes and undulations is picked up better using amber.

 

[Hilldweller]

You can get the Rigids in a yellow now rather than amber; less loss of lumens.
I can't think any use for the amber ones really.

I was able to put a meter to a Rigid 10" lightbar a couple of days ago ----- the LUX numberw were dismal at 50 yards.
Just to repeat, I like Rigid lights. They have a place in the offroad market and fill a need. Just don't confuse them with real driving or fog lights. They don't work for either of those purposes.

 

[cmacclel]

You can get the Rigids in a yellow now rather than amber; less loss of lumens.
I can't think any use for the amber ones really.

I was able to put a meter to a Rigid 10" lightbar a couple of days ago ----- the LUX numberw were dismal at 50 yards.
Just to repeat, I like Rigid lights. They have a place in the offroad market and fill a need. Just don't confuse them with real driving or fog lights. They don't work for either of those purposes.

I would not expect any LED lightbar to have good lux numbers at 50 yards. I can say when I had my Jeep with the Dually D2's and the Truck-Lite LED Headlights the D2's put out a ton of light and was impressive for such a small package. They where brighter than the Truck-Lite headlights.

Mac

 

[FJedi]

Are these lights blinding to the oncoming traffic? I am looking for a set of lights to supplement the poor low-beams on my FJ Cruiser and I saw someone install D2s on their bumper. I am thinking about getting D2 wide amber to be using on highway/city driving in bad weather.

 

[Hilldweller]

Are these lights blinding to the oncoming traffic? I am looking for a set of lights to supplement the poor low-beams on my FJ Cruiser and I saw someone install D2s on their bumper. I am thinking about getting D2 wide amber to be using on highway/city driving in bad weather.

Yes they blind oncoming drivers.
They are NOT for use on the road. They're miserable lights for use at speed anyhow.

 

[FJedi]

Oh man, how come.... They get such great reviews on other sites. Even the wide-beam ones?

 

[Hilldweller]

Oh man, how come.... They get such great reviews on other sites...

People on "other sites" are looking at them, not with them.
And when you look at these lights, boy howdy. They do dazzle...
But that's not the point of lights, right? You want to look with them at things, not blind your fellow motorists, etc.

Now offroad, that's a different story. I'm all for stupid amounts of unfocussed light there if that's what you've got to work with.
And I really like these lights because they're small, use very little power, and are tough. But they're really only good for going slowly offroad. Everything else you read about them is overstated.
IMHO of course...

 

[BenChiew]

Which wavelength in the yellow is best for fog penetration?

You can get the Rigids in a yellow now rather than amber; less loss of lumens.
I can't think any use for the amber ones really.

I was able to put a meter to a Rigid 10" lightbar a couple of days ago ----- the LUX numberw were dismal at 50 yards.
Just to repeat, I like Rigid lights. They have a place in the offroad market and fill a need. Just don't confuse them with real driving or fog lights. They don't work for either of those purposes.

 

[Hilldweller]

Which wavelength in the yellow is best for fog penetration?

http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/lights/light_color/light_color.html

To me the yellow just softens the blow to my eye.

I metered the Dually over the weekend. It had about as much light at 25 feet as a sealed beam 7" Jeep headlight or a low-end H4 on lowbeam. It lacks focus, like I've been saying, but does put out a bunch of light for it's size and power demand.
I still like them for wheeling in slow/tricky areas or for backup lights on an offroad rig.

 

[-Virgil-]

Which wavelength in the yellow is best for fog penetration?

N/A. Yellow ligt does not penetrate fog any better than any other color -- that's a common and pervasive misunderstanding. Hilldweller has already linked to the article I was going to point at.

 

[Hilldweller]

They are far from Ideal but 100x better than the Brand new Silverstars I had installed for a week before buying the Trucklites.

Mac

Update: The Trucklite headlights that I called "miserable" were the Phase 6 lights with individual LEDs ------ I like their new and improved Phase 7 lights that only use 2 LEDs and complex reflectors.
They're not perfect but they're a good product for the Jeep community. Low power demand, bright, reliable, wide spread of light.

I still think the overall main benefit of LED lighting for the offroader is the low power demand. That frees us up to use our winches, fridges, and other farkles with fewer worries.

 

[TEEJ]

N/A. Yellow ligt does not penetrate fog any better than any other color -- that's a common and pervasive misunderstanding. Hilldweller has already linked to the article I was going to point at.

Maybe "penetrate" is a confusing term.

I know from experience that a blue light for example is terrible for seeing in fog...and that yellow/amber light allows me to see more than I can with a blue light.

The eye sees the yellow better than it does the blue, less strain on the eye, etc.

Daniel Stern, etc, also mentions this IIRC.

In addition, the article cited in posts above is really more about falling snow than about fog.

Fog can be quite small particle-wise, with some studies indicating 40-50 nm range particles, ~ an order of magnitude smaller than even the yellow spectrum.

The cut-off for fog is 50 um, as larger than that is classified as mist instead.

Most fog particles are considered to be in the 0.2 - 50 um range.

0.2 um = 200 nm

200 nm is about half the wavelength of yellow light. This can induce scattering attributed to sub-wavelength effects.

As the fog particles are present in a range, some can induce scattering due to these effects, and some won't.

I'd assume that one fog system might be courser or finer than another...so that there is no one particle size distribution for all fogs. The nucleation sources, etc, will be different and the resultant fog particle sizes will reflect that.

Generally, nucleation mode particles are smaller, with aitken, accumulation and course modes being progressively larger...but course mode is still everything larger than 0.1 um.

So if nucleation mode is in the <0.02 um range, aitken in the 0.02 - 0.1 um range, and accumulation mode in the 0.1 - 1.0 um range...there are certainly periods of any given fog system that will be present in sub-wavelength ranges.

This means that a shorter wavelength light source will reduce the required particle size that can induce glare. This is analogous to IR systems being able to see through this sort of thing better, etc.

All that means is that some proportion of the fog present might be small enough to induce glare from scattering effects, and the actual amount of this effect can be expected to vary immensely depending upon the actual fog you are trying to see through.

 

[Alaric Darconville]

Maybe "penetrate" is a confusing term.

It's not confusing, it's simply incorrect.

 

[-Virgil-]

Maybe "penetrate" is a confusing term.

No, it's quite a clear term. It's just not applicable to the interaction of light and fog.

I know from experience that a blue light for example is terrible for seeing in fog...and that yellow/amber light allows me to see more than I can with a blue light.

I don't think anyone's disagreeing with that, but it's not the same statement as "yellow light penetrates fog better". Can you see better in fog with yellower light than with bluer light? Yes. Is it because the yellow light penetrates fog better? No. All of this is well documented and not really worth rehashing.

The eye sees the yellow better than it does the blue

That's not a supportable statement.

In addition, the article cited in posts above is really more about falling snow than about fog.

The difference is irrelevant.

Fog can be quite small particle-wise

...but not small enough for Rayleigh scattering. There's no need to assume or guess or suppose or hypothesize about it; there's ample data on the matter.

 

[TEEJ]

No, it's quite a clear term. It's just not applicable to the interaction of light and fog.

Hence the confusion by the asker...the term was confused with other terms.

I don't think anyone's disagreeing with that, but it's not the same statement as "yellow light penetrates fog better". Can you see better in fog with yellower light than with bluer light? Yes. Is it because the yellow light penetrates fog better? No. All of this is well documented and not really worth rehashing.

Correct, again, the confusion about the correct term to use.

That's not a supportable statement.

You mention seeing with it better, but not because of better penetration...but, that statement actually does support it.

The difference is irrelevant.

Fog particles can be smaller than the wavelength of the light, so, its relevant...as snow is NOT.

...but not small enough for Rayleigh scattering. There's no need to assume or guess or suppose or hypothesize about it; there's ample data on the matter.

Data on the matter says the fog particles can be smaller than the wavelength of light, which is required for that scattering to occur.

 

[-Virgil-]

Data on the matter says the fog particles can be smaller than the wavelength of light, which is required for that scattering to occur.

It's not clear whether you're misunderstanding the data or misapplying it, but one way or the other I think you're mistaken.

 

[TEEJ]

Measurements of fog particle sizes showed a range that included sub-200 mn. If visible light wavelengths are larger than that, say over 400 nm...then the fog can be sized smaller than the wavelenth of visible light.

As fog is not a homogeneous particle sized cloud, but a range of sizes...SOME of the particles will be larger, and some will be smaller than the visible wavelengths.

The large enough particles will interact as you have described, and the ones smaller than that will interact as I have described.

The key here is for us to agree on what the potential range of particle sizes can be...as I believe we already agree on what constitutes the visible spectrum.

I have data collected by reearchers measuring fog particle sizes. You may have data as well. I am sure that if you review the available data, perhaps newer data, you will see the smaller ranges referenced, and see what scattering effects might be able to occur as a result.

If we agree on the wavelengths of light, and the fog particles sizes smaller than that...we will have put this to bed.

(Unless the particles being smaller than the wavelengths is not the scatter related issue in question)




example: http://www.ias.ac.in/jess/aug2010/jess170.pdf

 

[BenChiew]

Hi guys, thanks for all that. Some street level lingo may help me understand.

 

[SemiMan]

Hey! This is like the old days of CPF when I actually learned something ... or at least pressed myself to learn something ... or remember things long forgotten.

TEEJ, I can see where your thought process is going, but I believe you are mistaken in your conclusions.

There is a simple "test" that shows that yellow/red does not penetrate any farther. What color is fog when your cars headlights are pointed at? It's the white of your headlights. That is because an equal amount of light of all wavelengths is being scattered backwards (or retroflected). If yellow/red penetrated further, then the fog would have a bluer cast. Or look at it from another direction ... the cars coming at you. The lights just appear dimmer, not not a different color. If yellow/red penetrated further, then there would be a significant shift in the apparent color direction towards red.

For round particles in and around the size of the wavelength, Mie's solution to scattering would apply and you would see little difference in the scattering for different wavelengths. For the even larger round fog particles, they become retroreflecting spheres but as the index of refraction of a water droplet is low, they don't reflect directly back, but off access.... perfect for directing headlight beams back to the drivers eyes.

Droplets would need to be really small before Raleigh's scattering approximation came into play but again, if it did, fog would appear blue which it does not.

Semiman