Could Luxeons match incandescents in throw?

It's well known to people who own various lights of both types that incandescents throw (ability to project a beam far away) better. If you do a ceiling bounce comparison between available Luxeon light and a incan light that throws the same, the Luxeon bright has substantially more output, meaning the for given output, it doesn't throw as well.

I think the reason is the size and the place of the light source. A filament is closer to a pinhead spherical point source and emits light in all directions, excluding obstruction by lamp base.

Luxeon LED is a small square that only emits light above the horizon line and I am guessing the beam is somewhat conical shaped.

Given a Luxeon and a incan lamp each producing exactly the same output, are they capable of producing the same throw if were to use a larger, different shaped reflector to adjust for larger light source and conical beam pattern of Luxeon?

has been suggested that the difference in color output may also affect their ability to throw.

It looks like Elektrolumens has figured out how to make one throw.
K2 Longthrow

"Throw" has a lot to do with the human eye. In reality, a white luxeon light might be throwing more photons further, but the incandescent will appear to be throwing further to the human eye. I imagine this has a lot to do with how the visible spectrum of light emitted reflects off the object pointed at and back to the human eye. It seems the more limited spectrum of light emitted from the LED gets absorbed more than reflected, whereas the wider spectrum from an incandescent has more opportunity to reflect back to the human eye. Vegetation and rocks will tend to absorb more of the blue spectrum of the LED whereas a white wall will reflect it well. So light sources and reflectors being equal, the incandescent (outdoors) will seem to always throw further to the human eye.

leukos said:

"Throw" has a lot to do with the human eye. In reality, a luxeon light might be throwing more photons further, but the incandescent will appear to be throwing further to the human eye. I imagine this has a lot to do with how the visible spectrum of light emitted reflects off the object pointed at and back to the human eye. It seems the more limited spectrum of light emitted fromt the LED gets absorbed more than reflected, whereas the wider spectrum from an incandescent has more opportunity to reflect back to the human eye. So light sources and reflectors being equal, the incandescent will seem to always throw further to the human eye.

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I think you nailed it. Couldn't have said it better.

The LED Mag-Lites is one of the best examples I could think of that has very good throw. One could try comparing the incandescent and the LED based versions since they bascially use the same body and reflector shape.

yuandrew said:

The LED Mag-Lites is one of the best examples I could think of that has very good throw. One could try comparing the incandescent and the LED based versions since they bascially use the same body and reflector shape.

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Mag throws better with the incan. The reflector needs to be enlarged to compensate for the larger emitter size...

Could Luxeons match incandescents in throw?

Yes, they could, and already do.

etc said:

Could Luxeons match incandescents in throw?

Yes, they could, and already do.

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Of like output?
what I'm saying is, if Luxeon III puts out 60 lumens, then it has to be compared to a incan. bulb that puts out 60 lumen.

Handlobraesing said:

Mag throws better with the incan. The reflector needs to be enlarged to compensate for the larger emitter size...

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Why do you think that? Is this your subjective impression?

If so, this discussion is worthless.

The 3D-incan has datas from FR: throw: 78.65, overall output: 23.00

3D-led: throw: 86.60, overall output: 47.50

Not to speak from the fact, that the datas will decrease after the first minutes much more with the incan against to the led.


Best regards

_____
Tom

Leds will not throw as well as incans. Leds are emitters, approx 120 degrees; much of their output is lost without hitting the reflector. Incans radiate light close to 360, most of which hits the reflector. This is why led throw reflectors are so deep and conical, to try to catch the photons before they escape. They do well, but an incan will do better.

NewBie posted some pics of Lux+aespherical lenses. Those son-of-a-guns throw like mad-men.

So, yes, in theory, a Lux can possibly outthrow an incan. Part of the issue with throw is that much of it depends on how our eyes perceive light from incan or LED sources; we're "programmed" to perceive incan light better. So, although the photons may be reaching the same distance (and the possibly are), we may not be able to perceive them adequately.

We ran into this problem when trying to come up with a way to assess whether the donut hole actually diminished throw or not. Bernie had some really good points as to what this would be hard to do.

Like this Luxeon III LED throw shot from early 2004?




Or the Lux V with the large source?

Short answer. NO they can't.
There is no led today that can compare to an incan when it comes to surface brightness.
Sure you could make an incan glow a faint yellow light to output the same light per square mm as a luxeon do but that would not be fare now would it.
But as you see you can make a led throw like crazy. But so can incans.

If you did not understand that please ask Ra as he is the king of things like this.

David_Web said:

Short answer. NO they can't.
There is no led today that can compare to an incan when it comes to surface brightness.
Sure you could make an incan glow a faint yellow light to output the same light per square mm as a luxeon do but that would not be fare now would it.
But as you see you can make a led throw like crazy. But so can incans.

If you did not understand that please ask Ra as he is the king of things like this.

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The question was NOT, which lightsource is be able to produce more throw? At the moment there exist no single Led which is comparable to a 150W bulb for example.

The question was: " Given a Luxeon and a incan lamp each producing exactly the same output, are they capable of producing the same throw if were to use a larger, different shaped reflector to adjust for larger light source and conical beam pattern of Luxeon? "

In this case the answer is YES.

If you don't understand that please explain me, why the 3D-Magled can throw further than the 3D-Incanmag.

Best regards

____
Tom

Long John said:

The question was NOT, which lightsource is be able to produce more throw? At the moment there exist no single Led which is comparable to a 150W bulb for example.

The question was: " Given a Luxeon and a incan lamp each producing exactly the same output, are they capable of producing the same throw if were to use a larger, different shaped reflector to adjust for larger light source and conical beam pattern of Luxeon? "

In this case the answer is YES.

If you don't understand that please explain me, why the 3D-Magled can throw further than the 3D-Incanmag.

Best regards

____
Tom

Click to expand...

The 3D-incan has datas from FR: throw: 78.65, overall output: 23.00

3D-led: throw: 86.60, overall output: 47.50

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For one thing, you're comparing against something with over twice the overall output. . .

Handlobraesing said:

Mag throws better with the incan. The reflector needs to be enlarged to compensate for the larger emitter size...

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So I think I don't understand the whole thread here

You compared the same lights with the wrong result. So I showed up the right result and now it was the wrong comparison.

A Magincanbulb needs more wattage than the Magled. The led is brighter and throws further, with less consumption.

So please tell me, which 2 lights (light sources) you will compare, that I can understand what you want.


Best regards

____
Tom

Long John said:

So I think I don't understand the whole thread here

You compared the same lights with the wrong result. So I showed up the right result and now it was the wrong comparison.

A Magincanbulb needs more wattage than the Magled. The led is brighter and throws further, with less consumption.

So please tell me, which 2 lights (light sources) you will compare, that I can understand what you want.


Best regards

____
Tom

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It's a theoretical question. given a Luxeon and an incandescent source both giving off the same amount of lumen, would Luxeon be able to "throw" as far as the incandescent? The reflector doesn't have to be the same. You can make the reflector larger with the Luxoen source to compensate for the larger "light source".

Phaserburn said:

Leds will not throw as well as incans. Leds are emitters, approx 120 degrees; much of their output is lost without hitting the reflector. Incans radiate light close to 360, most of which hits the reflector. This is why led throw reflectors are so deep and conical, to try to catch the photons before they escape. They do well, but an incan will do better.

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Now this makes a lot of sense. So basically, the spill of a well throwing LED light consists of light that escaped the flashlight without hitting the reflector. If I look into the spill of a LED flashlight I indeed see only the direct light of the LED and no indirect light bounced off from the reflector.

Phaserburn said:

Leds will not throw as well as incans. Leds are emitters, approx 120 degrees; much of their output is lost without hitting the reflector. Incans radiate light close to 360, most of which hits the reflector. This is why led throw reflectors are so deep and conical, to try to catch the photons before they escape. They do well, but an incan will do better.

Click to expand...

How about the rarely seen side-emitting Luxeon emitters?