Lens to withstand constant Mag85 operation

mdarby

Newly Enlightened
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Feb 4, 2005
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50
Location
Cupertino, CA
Recently, I found my Mag85 with a discolored reflector and a melted, nippled lens. I gather my 5-year old son turned it on and left it on, as the batteries were also drained. It usually stands upright, lens-down so if he put it back in that position it would only exacerbate the heat build-up.

I am not sure, but I think that I had installed a UCL or Borofloat lens on this light. Does this make sense, would either of those lenses melt with constant operation?

Is there any lens that can withstand 30 minutes of constant operation for a Mag85 bulb? A glass lens? What does the MagCharger use?

Thanks,
Michael
 

Aaron1100us

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Dec 3, 2005
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649
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Cedar Rapids, Iowa
What lense and reflector do you have? A glass lense would not melt or discolor. Borofloat or ultraclear lense is what is used with those. Do you have an aluminum reflector? If not, the plastic one will melt. Oh, I found out with mine, the stock mag swith gets hot and starts to melt when left of for a while, I going to upgrade to a kui one soon
 

js

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Aug 2, 2003
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Upstate New York
Borofloat will most definitely stand up to an 1185 for an infinite length of time. Borofloat is what is used in the 100 watt USL mag mad, so I can safely say that it will handle 35 watts. UCL's, on the other hand, have been known to crack running with the 1185.

But in any case, no glass lense would melt or nipple in any way. Possibly you get a hardcoat polycarbonate lens mailed to you by mistake? Did it come with a protective sticky paper on both sides? If so, it was polycarbonate and not glass.
 

Lightmania

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Sep 10, 2006
Messages
214
*ahem*... Being new to this ROP business, this happened to me, too. I couldn't understand how a borofloat that came highly recommended here at CPF did melted on my ROP LE. (Deformed, actually -- I stopped it in time before any serious damages occurred.) Then I search this site looking for answers as to why the Borofloat lens melted but when I realized that the folks here was refering to this lens as a borofloat glass. mmm, I wonder... so I went back to my ROP LE and tapped the deformed lens. sure enough, it rang hollow instead of the solid tap I was expecting. Somehow, I had mistakenly put back on the stock lens. :ohgeez:Duh.

I took out the melted lens and compared to the borofloat lens and to my untrained eyes, they did look very similar except for the outer-ring bevel on the stock lens, where the borofloat lens has an all smooth surface on both sides. I popped in the right lens and since then, nothing more happened with the borofloat lens with both low and high ROP bulbs.

If this is not the case with you, well... at least, I hope you've enjoyed this little story... :eek:

Hope you find the answer here.

Lightmania
 
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leukos

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Apr 8, 2004
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3,467
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Chicagoland
mdarby said:
It usually stands upright, lens-down so if he put it back in that position it would only exacerbate the heat build-up.

That scenario would produce a lot of heat. Some folks have melted holes in things like TV's this way. I don't know the chemical properties for UCL or borofloat, but to melt mineral glass would have to be around 2500 degrees. I imagine you would have been pulling your mag out of the ashes of your house if it was that hot.
 
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