Luxeon Star questions...

hotfoot

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Got these quick questions - appreciate any help, so thanks in advance, guys!

1. Is there a good way to remove the black plastic collimator holder thats glued onto an LS heatsink? Which would be better - cutting the glue or dissolving it (if its even possible)?

2. Is there any *safe* way to remove the bare emitter from an LSw/O heatsink/pcb?

3. Is that aluminum heatsink on a LS with optics enough on its own? ie. operating at max specs in by itself in ambient room conditions?

I've been reading about a lot of mods that don't use the collimator or heatsink, but don't wanna waste the couple of LS w/Os that I just bought
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<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by hotfoot:
Is there a good way to remove the black plastic collimator holder thats glued onto an LS heatsink? Which would be better - cutting the glue or dissolving it (if its even possible)?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I've found it's very easy to remove this piece by just pulling it (slightly at an angle) off by hand. It just comes right off. You just have to pull kind of hard.
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As far as overheating them, Just put your finger on the heatsink (aluminum side), if it gets real hot you need more heatsink area. If it just gets warm then no problem. I've never burned an LS up. I even applied 6v by accident!
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Didn't burn up.
 
I might also add that if over glued, as I've found some recently, simply pulling the collimator collar off runs the risk of destroying the Luxeon. I had one 'snap' off, taking the still soldered Luxeon with it. I got lucky, some how it ripped the leads and all off the board without destroying the Luxeon.

I recommend placing your finger on the lens of the LED and holding it in place when pulling the collar off. Push down on the LED as you pull, you can see and hear the collar break free. Also, seems if warmed a little, that the glue gets a little softer.

Also, I trim off any glue around the base of the collar with a knife before trying to pull off.
 
Remember that you can simply buy the bare emitters. They cost a bit less than the Star/O devices. You can also buy the Luxeons mounted on heat sink PCBs without the optics.

This doesn't help if you own a Star/O and want to discard the optics, but if you are buying a Luxeon for a mod where you need to get rid of the PCB and mount the optics elsewhere (eg. the mini-maglight mods), then you can buy the emitter and the optics separately, and not risk ripping them apart.

Regards,
Jon
 
Thanks, guys, for all the advice. I've tried as Sean suggested and - voila! It worked! Now I have just an emitter mounted on the pcb heatsink
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I'm gonna skip detaching the emitter 'cos its surface mounted, at least until i can get more for spares. =D Thanks again!
 
According to my contact at Lumileds, you can now buy just the bare emitter without optics or heatsink. Future Electronics is listed as the seller of this part.
 
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