Does it really work?

[matt304]

I want to make this short and simple. "Re-reflectors", AKA, the "Wavien ring". Gimmick?

Based on looking at their models of these reflectors, all I see is some design made to look like it's doing what they say it is. First red flag, "80% brightness increase". Heh, yeah, I bet.

One guy in here I caught saying that light bouncing back onto the LED die "phosphorus" will steal light and change light temperature for the worse. Then it just became confusing, because, who is really right?

I believe the kelvin temp change idea in theory. Now, how in the heck can re-shining the spill light back at the LED dome actually do anything for a projected light? I get it, it's just more added light to project. But something wonders within me, if this was really the case, Wavien reflectors pin-pointing light back on the die increase brightness, ah hem, then why not just shine an LED from the front side with a second LED focused to a point and get all that light stacked up on the one main surface? I don't believe it works like that. I believe a gain is possible, but with everyone saying Wavien ring lately, I want to see the truth in this before a mass gimmick spreads. Anyone have real data anywhere on their performance?

What happens when light enters an LED backwards, anyways?

This should be interesting.

 

[schizeckinosy]

At first I said "gimmick" - but then I read the patent and saw that it does what it claims. The trick is that it is not increasing the total lumens, but rather the flux out the front of the LED. Rather than use a reflector to send the side spill out the front, it reflects the side-spill back to the phosphors, thus brightening them somewhat. I suspect the overall efficiency is much less than with a reflector, and the overall lumens is less.

 

[RoGuE_StreaK]

Hmm, maybe it's not actually re-exciting the phosphor as such, but simply the "wasted" light bounced back is now reflecting back off the phosphor? Just a passing thought that I'm not sure was explored last time the topic came up?

 

[matt304]

I bought a mounted one to test on a large die Luminus so I could better see the effect. Lower kelvin temp? I don't know, Wavien won't respond to me at all about my questions pertaining to my $200 order. They won't tell me the BINs I received, proof of that BIN, etc. I see an aperture effect, yes. I'm pretty sure I even found their source of domes which they grind down. I just made an order on some. I am going to grind them mounted to a mandrel on a lathe, and see what the effect is of a "tuned" ring. You could say this would be producing different plane-heights, resulting in different beam return, and different aperture openings. The fact I can see right through the ring and see the LED says to me, "hey, where's the rest of the reflective coating at?". It's like they 90% coated the inside, but not 100%. I should look and see a silver reflection, NOT the led, I would think. Some of my earlier statements were that each LED would require a specially tuned collar as each has a different size, shape, and beam angle, not to mention a negative focal-point would exist as it's a spherical mirror. So it seems to work, but they will give me no data whatsoever so that I can prove or disprove its effectiveness on large to small-die LEDs. How is someone supposed to know which size to choose? Do you buy your jean sizes in small, medium, or large? This is something a little more critical, unless I am being over-critical. :)