Best LED for throw.

Hi everyone,

I just came back to the flashaholic world after a short break of about a year. At the time, the best LED for throwing is the XR-E R2 (from what I know). I would just like to know whether it is still true now, if not, what's the better alternative?

Thanks for your help!

berry580

XP-C Q5.

The XM-L seems to be the best of the bunch all around right now.

The "best" LED thrower is very subjective and has to depend on the size of your application. For a standard P60 sized light, then the XP-C used in the DEFT EDC/LR is possibly the best, as you go up in size, the old XR-E is still one of the best. Heck, i have seen dedomed and overdriven XM-Ls sitting behind huge aspherics and pre-colliminators doing 200 000+ lux. It all depends on the size you're willing to carry around.
However, i wouldn't really bother with LEDs if you are really looking for throw. LEDs are a long way in terms of throw/useability from even long-arc HIDs and will definitely never reach the throw of the short-arcs, not in a 100 years time.

yifu said:

The "best" LED thrower is very subjective and has to depend on the size of your application. For a standard P60 sized light, then the XP-C used in the DEFT EDC/LR is possibly the best, as you go up in size, the old XR-E is still one of the best. Heck, i have seen dedomed and overdriven XM-Ls sitting behind huge aspherics and pre-colliminators doing 200 000+ lux. It all depends on the size you're willing to carry around.
However, i wouldn't really bother with LEDs if you are really looking for throw. LEDs are a long way in terms of throw/useability from even long-arc HIDs and will definitely never reach the throw of the short-arcs, not in a 100 years time.

Click to expand...

+1 Application is everything

Sorry guys, I'm still a relatively non-technical flashaholic.

I mean the "best" LED for throwing in a P60 sized light. However, I wouldn't mind if you fill me in on other areas as well.

Thank you.

berry580 said:

Sorry guys, I'm still a relatively non-technical flashaholic.

I mean the "best" LED for throwing in a P60 sized light. However, I wouldn't mind if you fill me in on other areas as well.

Thank you.

Click to expand...

That depends on whether or not you want to use an aspherical or TIR lens. Look at the DEFT EDC LR

I do have an aspherical lense, so I would probably have it on most of the time. What is a TIR lens? Total Internal Reflection? How does that differ to the "recoil design" that show up on Dealextreme?

Which is better for pure throw?

Here's a good thread you can read if you missed it; http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?325827-Dedicated-throwers

Here is Dr Jones recent table from December 2011 on emitter specifications and surface brightness.
Under normal recommended operating conditions, like you previously said, the XR-E EZ900 with a 0.73 sq mm die size is still the best surface brightness at 347 lumens per square millimeter.
Our common everyday XM-L U2 bin has a peak surface brightness of only 244 lumens per square millimeter; well off the pace.

If you wish to drive the emitter beyond Cree's recommended specifications, and you have innovative and fancy active or passive cooling methods like Saabluster, with special adhesives and pure copper heat sinks etc, then you can really overdrive an XP-C Q5 like in Saabluster's Deft EDC LR to get even greater surface brightness than the Cree recommended specs...

... only appears to the typical P60 insert:
(zoom lenses might be better for throw only, but there is nothing else they are good at)


more throw: get a P60 insert with an XP-G
more flood: get a P60 insert with an XM-L
--> ONLY WORKS, when both are about the same current level of - say - about 1A-1.4A (max for the XP-G)

If You sacrifice runtime by pushing the XM-L on full power, then this "better throw" of the led with smaller emitter plate is just a useless laboratory value.

Give or take, thats how it apperars visually.

The XR-E, while best of the crop at its persent days, now does not stand a chance to a similar XP-G insert. Its roughly 1/3 less bright at same current



PS: a light of thís size class is not meant to be a thrower, so why wanting to have it do something its not good at and not have it use its features?

berry580 said:

I do have an aspherical lense, so I would probably have it on most of the time. What is a TIR lens? Total Internal Reflection? How does that differ to the "recoil design" that show up on Dealextreme?

Which is better for pure throw?

Click to expand...

If you want the best throw possible period in a P60 sized light, send your C2 in to Saalbuster for a DEFT EDC LR upgrade. That overdriven XP-C behind 2 sets of aspherics will net you 60 000-64 000lux, 4 times as much as the best reflector P60 drop in- 2A XR-E. Just to put that into perspective among the lights you have, a Quark AA has less than 2000 lux and a Quark MiniAA has just over 1000 lux. That is a 60 times increase in lux observed at any point of the beam or nearly 8 times increase in absolute throw distance.
Still extremely from from even a normal 75w short arc, which typically yield around 4 000 000 lux or a Nightsun 1600W short arc used in helicopters, yielding around 100 million lux at 1m, depending on the configuration. They cost as much as a car though, and even the bulb cost more than a lot of people's light collections on here and i understand that not a single CPFer owns it yet.

So in reality all you need is an EDC light that would throw adequately far (100-200m), in that case a Vinh/Nailbender XML drop in at 3A or more behind a smooth reflector would do and pop right into your C2. If 100m is not enough for you, you definitely need a bigger and more expensive light. And i was talking about short arcs in the previous post, but even long-arcs are very good throwers behind a 4 inch or more reflector size. A punny 35W L35 yields in excess of 250k lux, heck even the newly release Magic Fire 40W at around 150k lux throws better than all reflectored LED lights in a small and cheap (150 dollars with the group buy going on) package.

berry580 said:

I just came back to the flashaholic world after a short break of about a year. At the time, the best LED for throwing is the XR-E R2 (from what I know). I would just like to know whether it is still true now, if not, what's the better alternative?

Click to expand...

How far does the XR-E R2 throw? 1,000 feet? (330m) Well, I have a $50 Maglite LED flashlight that throws a little further than that...

Mag-man said:

How far does the XR-E R2 throw? 1,000 feet? (330m) Well, I have a $50 Maglite LED flashlight that throws a little further than that...

Click to expand...

If you put an XR-E R2 EZ900 into your Maglite, with appropriate electronic circuit drivers for optimal amperage, it will out-throw the LED in your current Maglite.
That's because throw is ultimately dependent on surface brightness of the emitter, and presently the XR-E R2 has the greatest surface brightness of all the LED emitters, when driven to manufacturer's specifications.
If overdriven to higher than manufacturer Cree's spec's by special cooling methods, then the XP-C can throw further with even greater surface brightness.
The reflector or lens acts like a motor car's gearbox.
The reflector or lens multiplies the surface brightness, at the expense of decreasing the surface area of illumination.
Thus, a bigger reflector makes the hotspot more intense, but smaller in size, and therefore less practical in illumination, especially at short distances.
An aspherical really increases the intensity of the hotspot, at the expense of almost no flood/spill at all.
A TIR Total Internal Reflection optics is a hybrid of both the reflector and the lens, so the output beam is intermediate between a conventional reflector flashlight and an aspherical.
A TIR beam eg from a Surefire, typically has an intense yet extra large hotspot, but very minimal spill/flood...

Mag-man said:

How far does the XR-E R2 throw? 1,000 feet? (330m) Well, I have a $50 Maglite LED flashlight that throws a little further than that...

Click to expand...

I would highly doubt that. There is not a stock Maglite LED out there at any size that does more than 10 000lux. Using the inverse square law and taking 1 lux as the endpoint for throw useability, you get a range of 100m throw, calculated as root of 10 000 lux. An XR-E overdriven and behind a good aspheric lens aka the DEFT or maglite with aspheric lens mod, does around 160 000lux. This means that at any point in the beam, the DEFT would appear 16 times brighter, and would have a maximum range of 400 m (root of 160k lux). This can be confirmed by a lux meter at any point along the beam.
Now i really won't get into the short-arcs, 160 million lux nets around 12.64km of throw to 1lux...

According to the odometer in my car, i do in fact light up the house 0.3km away. Now, who said it was stock? I just said it costed $50, actually it was more like $46.

Maglites can throw pretty terrific distances.
The Maglite incandescent can throw 434 meters, while a Maglite LED can throw 388 meters.
The incandescent bulb is tiny, therefore it's surface brightness is naturally high, however the hotspot is tiny, yellow, and impractical.
The Maglite LED throws shorter, due to the larger surface area of the die hence less surface brightness, but it's hotspot is large, white, and more practical in size.

Like Yifu says, the XR-E or XP-C, custom overdriven with special cooling, and an aspherical lens, can deliver 160 000 lux and nearly 800 meters, till the brightness falls to 0.25 lux, according to ANSI FL-1 Standards, which is roughly double the throw of the Maglites.
In Post #16 above, Yifu has estimated a throw of roughly 400 meters, till the brightness falls to 1 lux.
Remember that we must increase the lux four-fold, in order to double the throw...


MagCharger NiMH/Halogen incandescent:



Maglite LED 2 Cell:

Well here's a Mag-Lite XP-E at 350yds.

And here's a Dereelight DBS-T XR-E at 375yds. This is zoomed in on 18X optical zoom.