Light pipe

[Alloy Addict]

Robert E. Fischer, CEO, Optics One Incorporated, Westlake Village, CA. Light Pipe: A new flashlight innovation that behaves like a kaleidoscope, creating near perfect light uniformity at the output end of the pipe.

The quote is copied from the bottom of the page found at the following link.
http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2006/03/the_modern_marvels_invent_now_2.html

I'm not sure what more I can add to this, since I don't know much. I did find the website for the company.

http://www.optics1.com/

For all I know, Robert Fischer is a CPF regular. I hope this hasn't been posted before, I'm not having any luck with the search tonight.

 

[Navck]

How much output is lost first...

 

[Alloy Addict]

That's what I was wondering too.

 

[rgbphil]

That looks like the magic breakthrough that we need to finally get proper RGB mixing......as long as not too much light is lost that is. Would love to see how a 3W Prolite or an RGB array would go with that.

 

[JohnnyLightOn]

I saw Robert Fischer's Light Pipe invention at Grand Central Station a few weeks ago. The History Channel Modern Marvels Invent Now Challenge had their 25 semi-finalist inventors on hand along with their inventions. The Light Pipe really works. It's fascinating - like a cross between a flashlight and a laser. The output of the Light Pipe appeared to be quite bright, and was a coherent rectangle.

Here's a link to a webpage about the Light Pipe:

http://www.historychannel.com/invent/index.jsp?page=semifinalists_fischer

I have e-mailed Robert the address of this great forum. Hopefully he will drop in and explain his invention in detail, including some photos.

 

[yellow]

This reminds me to one of my least used lights, a "Docter Apsherilux Midi 125".
Basically a 4 AA projection flashlight, working like the automobile projection headlights.

How it works: inside there is the bulb and a mirror that almost covers 2/3 of the bulb, projecting to the front and concentring the emitted light. Then there is a plastic part with a small hole in the middle, where most of this concentrated light can pass through, ALL THE REST (e.g. everything going directly from the bulb to the front) will not leave the light and thus IS WASTED.
After that "light stealing" hole thing, there is a strong lens that evens the concentrated light from the reflector.
Light output is much the same as the light in question, except for a round beam (the shape of the hole makes the shape of the beam, so if it were square shaped, the output were like the light in question).

As anyone will notice from the photos, there is NO spill an thus any of these lights sucks bad. Perfect for a video beamer, but not for a flashlight.
PS: did I say my light, working the same, does not see much use?
PPS: even joe average might be able to notice that the beam of that poor Maglite could be made better

 

[JohnnyLightOn]

I agree that the Maglite in the photo could have been adjusted much better.

But I can think of one application for his invention I would use almost every day: a book light! I hate the spill I get from my current method for reading at night, and would love to see something that's uniformly bright and that just lights up the book.

 

[Tritium]

It looks very much like the light pipe homogonizer that was used in the Ultratech Stepper lamp condenser assemblys that I used to work on in the Semiconductor industry 15 years ago. I have one of these multi thousand dollar units somewhere. I will do some testing when I find it. Basically it repeated the lamp image reflection to the point that all the images overlayed were totaly homogonized.


Thurmond

 

[loalight]

Hunh. I've stuck a lioncub into the mirror bits of a kaleidoscope, and it does produce a rather nice but unusually shaped beam. didn't occur to me to patent, haha.

woops, i guess...

 

[batman]

Albert Einstein once said: "Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction."

 

[Alloy Addict]

Thanks for the update JohnnyLightOn.

Any new(ish) technology looks useless and silly in the beginning. The first horseless carriages were little more than toys for rich men. Orville and Wilbur's first working model was great if you wanted to fly from one end of the beach to the other. It's what new technology becomes that makes it worthwhile. Anybody cruising this forum on a Sinclair?

The Light Pipe may be nothing to get excited about, or it may become something wonderful.

I saw Robert Fischer's Light Pipe invention at Grand Central Station a few weeks ago. The History Channel Modern Marvels Invent Now Challenge had their 25 semi-finalist inventors on hand along with their inventions. The Light Pipe really works. It's fascinating - like a cross between a flashlight and a laser. The output of the Light Pipe appeared to be quite bright, and was a coherent rectangle.

Here's a link to a webpage about the Light Pipe:

http://www.historychannel.com/invent/index.jsp?page=semifinalists_fischer

I have e-mailed Robert the address of this great forum. Hopefully he will drop in and explain his invention in detail, including some photos.

 

[Nubo]

You could frost part of the lens to get some spill back. :lol:

 

[trivergata]

Batman - I quote that all the time, and the university people/engineers look at me like I just said my dog craps gold. Simple people in high places.

Josh