LED Lenser Acrylic Lens Copies

Phased_Array

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Does anyone know if any of the parts suppliers are making a copy of the LED Lenser Acrylic lense for modding to other flashlights. I understand the unique patented features of the lens, but also understand the China ability to copy a 'good thing'.
This lense allows a short bezel design, an advantage over a 'long reflectors' for long throw compact flashlights.
Side by side LED comparisons of long reflector vs lenser lens are promising, but cannibalizing Lensers are cost prohibitive.:D
 

AnAppleSnail

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Does anyone know if any of the parts suppliers are making a copy of the LED Lenser Acrylic lense for modding to other flashlights. I understand the unique patented features of the lens, but also understand the China ability to copy a 'good thing'.
This lense allows a short bezel design, an advantage over a 'long reflectors' for long throw compact flashlights.
Side by side LED comparisons of long reflector vs lenser lens are promising, but cannibalizing Lensers are cost prohibitive.:D

Well, 'patented' and 'unique' are very different. Aspheric lenses have been used for light projection for centuries. DX has several aspheric lenses of varying quality, and there are some P60 mods (Ahorton Aspheric) to make an aspheric P60. While the throw of an aspheric is impressive, the output and usefulness of the beam pattern is often suboptimal. When working on flat surfaces, or with little range of depth to view, aspherics work well for me. For distance spotting, an optimum reflector or aspheric both do well. For all-around beam patterns, I get wrist pains adjusting the aspheric widget to do what an orange-peel reflector does automatically.
 

Phased_Array

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AnAppleSnail,
Yeah I'm with you on the faults/advantages of the aspherics, having used them. But the goofy aspheric convex surface bothers me too. I'm looking for a specific purpose lense here, and it's not the spot-wide beam angle 'thingy' feature.

I want the shortest P60 type LED thrower(ZL SC600 length of 4 inches), the Lenser lense is the shortest answer so far to sharpen the flood. It's shorter than the long smooth reflector necessary for throw(such as a Jetbeam BC25 spot). And shorter than the focal length+convex aspheric bulge solution(and square die spot).
My Lenser H7 throws a better smaller round spot then my BC25 with less Lumens.

Well, 'patented' and 'unique' are very different. Aspheric lenses have been used for light projection for centuries. DX has several aspheric lenses of varying quality, and there are some P60 mods (Ahorton Aspheric) to make an aspheric P60. While the throw of an aspheric is impressive, the output and usefulness of the beam pattern is often suboptimal. When working on flat surfaces, or with little range of depth to view, aspherics work well for me. For distance spotting, an optimum reflector or aspheric both do well. For all-around beam patterns, I get wrist pains adjusting the aspheric widget to do what an orange-peel reflector does automatically.
 

Gunner12

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Maybe buy a broken or cheap LEDLenser for the optic? The body could be a battery carrier or used as a host for another mod.

What about other tight optics? I'm not sure how they'll compare to the LEDLenser optic though.
 

Fireclaw18

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The optics in my Lenser P5 are definitely different than a traditional aspheric. The lens has a pocket in the center and actually wraps completely around the LED rather than just sitting in front of it. The LED itself isn't on a traditional star. Instead it sits mounted on a post that extends into this pocket. When the light is zoomed into spot mode, the sides of this pocket slide from behind the LED to its side. This combined with the relatively short travel distance reveals one of the unique features of lensers compared to a traditional aspheric... in ceiling bounce test lensers produce about the same amount of light in both flood and spot modes.

This is much better than a traditional cheap zoomable aspheric light that can see their light output drop by 50% or more when cycled from flood to spot due to lumens being absorbed into the inside the sides of the bezel.

One downside however is that lensers don't appear to be good hosts for modding. The optics are engineered for a specific type of emitter. Try putting in an XM-L and chances are it won't look good at all. Also since the emitter itself isn't on a traditional star, anyone attempting to swap emitters will have to use an oven or stove to reflow the emitter. A simple soldering iron won't be enough.

Swapping the optic onto a cheap generic light also won't work. Generic lights use traditional stars where the emitter is mounted flat and not on a post. In such a light, the star itself will prevent the optic from retracting into it's proper position around the LED and you won't get a good flood mode.

The lenser's pill doesn't seem well suited for a higher current emitter anyways. Half of it seems to be made of plastic and clearly wouldn't be able to handle the heat generated at high currents.

My conclusion for those wishing to mod a Lenser is that the best that could be realistically done except by the most advanaced modders is probably replacing the driver.
 

Fireclaw18

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I think most of those lights use an aspherical lens, but there might be a few that don't.

Yes. There are lenser copies on DX, but they use standard aspheric lenses and conventional stars, much different from the custom engineered lenses and special led mounts in LED lensers.
 

Walterk

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Hi Phased,

I have bought a P7 Ledlenser from China Ebay seller.
I do not know if the light was a fake, the price was competitive but not DX-level.
I found the beam horrible with the XR-E. Maybe it was meant for another emmitter. Anyway I've modded it into a Ahorton aspheric, see thread.
Build quality was a blizz. Beam and throw was disappointing.

BTW -I have a question for you on the ELR in the thread Rank your lights because yr inbox is full.
 

AnAppleSnail

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Isn't it just TIR with an abnormally large aspheric spill collector and wide collection chamber?

No. It's broadly speaking a paraboloid with curvature such that light hitting the parabola refracts instead of passing through. Some other features control the spill/spot ratio.
 

Walterk

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It pretty much looks like this: (measured from my P7, with led on post, making it focusable by sliding the bezel outwards)
7273101976_b09948f3f7.jpg
 

bshanahan14rulz

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Thanks for that drawing, walterk. The one on the bottom, must be the ahorton version you modded it with? This is the chinese clone that you said performed very poorly? Wonder if it has to do with the aspheric surface not being correctly scaled to the air column.. Did you keep the lens and try it on anything else? Kind of hard to do I guess LED has to be mounted on the pedestal.
 

Walterk

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No sorry haven't tried. But I think same housing is sold with XPG so imagined that they screwed up the parts with assembly, could explain ugly beam.
 
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