Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions UPDATE 1/29 11,740 lux@1meter

Today, I received my shipment from the SS with some Seoul P4's and I just finished the first LE build with a Seoul P4, so here are some impressions.

I ordered 4 Seoul P4's from SS and the ones I received seem to be real lottery losers :thinking: I guess it just goes to show you that the lottery is still very much alive. All of mine have a very cool tint, almost to the point of looking slightly purple. This is a real bummer I don't know how these are in terms of brightness/flux with the "typical" Seoul P4 but I think they're losers also...read on...

The builds between the seoul P4 and a regular Luxeon LE are pretty much identical, except the Seoul P4 gets a small spacer to raise the die into the correct position for optimal focus. It is also important to bend all the leads from the LED down as the whole LED basically sits inside the reflector. Without doing so will cause a short. Other than that, there is no difference in the procedure than the 30+ Luxeon LE's I've built.



Here are the test subjects

Chrome A3, Bare Al. A3, S27-PD, HAIII A1

front

A3-LuxIII, A3-XR-E, S27-PD, A1-Seoul P4

Closeup of Seoul P4 in A1


Closeup of Seoul P4 in A3



The nice thing about the Seoul upgrade is that there are no reflector modifications needed. Simply plug 'n play.

After completing this build, I can't say I'm too pleased/excited. It's very disappointing to do the builds working with some real lottery losers :sick2:

The beams are pretty much identical in terms of their pattern with the luxIII. The seoul gets a brightness advantage, though.

Here are my somewhat rough lux@1 meter readings

A1 UVOJ Flupic burst 4600 spill 40
A1 Seoul P4 Flupic burst 5700 spill 60
A1 UXOJ NG1000 4580 spill 40

A3 UXOJ NG1000 6400 spill 40
A3 Seoul P4 Flupic burst 7700 spill 60
A3 UVOJ Flupic burst 6100 spill 40

A3 Cree XR-E NG1000 1130 spill 120

As you can see, I gained about 1000 lux with the McR27 and 1300 lux with the McR38. In all fairness, the luxeon's were hand picked for brightness, so I would definately expect a larger gain when compared with a "typical" Luxeon. Add to that getting some better Seoul P4's, and you have some worthwhile upgrades.

The Cree XR-E in the A3 seems to be a pretty good lottery winner...excellent warm tint and spectacular output. The NG1000 drives the LED very very hard, though.

I'll be honest in that I'm really disappointed in the results. I don't think it is because the emitter is not focused properly...the beams are exactly like their Luxeon counterparts. I think it is more on the line that
the LED's I received were just really bad :mecry::mecry:

I know these Seoul P4's definitely have potential, given by the readings from my S27-PD

S27-PD high(525ma) 4900 spill 60

The emitter in that light has a great tint and incredible flux as well.

I'm going to try to find a better source for the Seoul P4's...perhaps photonfanatic will get some better LEDs...

Update: See post 37 for new info

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

What a bummer
Aren't the emmitters from the shoppe specified as P4 bin? That just seems weird, a P4 bin shouldn't give the U bin luxIII any chance to compare...

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

cryhavok said:

A3 Cree XR-E NG1000 1130 spill 120

The Cree XR-E in the A3 seems to be a pretty good lottery winner...excellent warm tint and spectacular output. The NG1000 drives the LED very very hard, though.

Click to expand...

Isn't this a typo? :thinking:

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Nope, not a typo. I built that Le when I first got my P4 XR-E's in and was too excited to wait for a decent converter to arrive. Using a NG is not the ideal converter, so I think it pushes the LED much harder than a DB1000 would. The lux reading pretty much falls a few lux every second...I only use it for short bursts.

I have made a XR-E w/ a DB1000 and it was just under 10k lux@1 meter and steady.

I too was expecting some decent Seoul P4's...but the ones I received are pretty much rubbish. The same holds true for some U-bin Luxeons I've ordered from the shop in the past. I don't know why, but I never have any luck with the SS and LEDs.

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

tino_ale said:

What a bummer
Aren't the emmitters from the shoppe specified as P4 bin? That just seems weird, a P4 bin shouldn't give the U bin luxIII any chance to compare...

Click to expand...

The SSC P4 here is the name of the new seoul semiconductor LEDs, not a bin rating. These LEDs are binned (coarsly) as T-bin or U-bin.

Havok, were these T-bins or U-bins? Do you know the color bin?

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

cryhavok,
Thank you for your forthright evaluation.
It is so nice to get 'real world' feedback as opposed to
the praise that gets heaped on ' new stuff' just because its new
and so called improved.

I am 100% certain that there are perfect S-P4's out there. The trick is going to be for us modders ..... how to purchase small quantities of known quality.

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

U-bins.

The Sandwich Shoppe doesn't disclose the tint bin. Just labeled "white"

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Cryhavok,
I would agree that your results are disappointing. Actually to the point that something just doesn't seem right! I haven't picked up on it but you did elevate the LED with a disk or something to raise it by about .030"?

Lux readings aside, with a ceiling bounce, are you noticing an obvious increase in flux with the Seoul over a Luxeon driven at comperable drive levels?

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Don, he did mention raising the P4 with a spacer to focus in the first post.

My copper spacers from the Shoppe were not in the box when I recieved my P4`s yesterday so I couldn`t build a Souel Aleph LE last night as I was hoping. Can`t wait for the spacers to be mailed after reading this so time to sand down an old penny. BTW, I bought 10 P4`s.

Cryhavoc, thanks for posting your findings.

Ken

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Ken,
Thanks! My bad. It was right there in front of me. Well then I am more mystified as that might have been part of the reason. :thinking: :shrug:

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

cryhavok said:

Nope, not a typo. I built that Le when I first got my P4 XR-E's in and was too excited to wait for a decent converter to arrive. Using a NG is not the ideal converter, so I think it pushes the LED much harder than a DB1000 would. The lux reading pretty much falls a few lux every second...I only use it for short bursts.

I have made a XR-E w/ a DB1000 and it was just under 10k lux@1 meter and steady.

I too was expecting some decent Seoul P4's...but the ones I received are pretty much rubbish. The same holds true for some U-bin Luxeons I've ordered from the shop in the past. I don't know why, but I never have any luck with the SS and LEDs.

Click to expand...

So the A3 XR-E was 11,300 and not 1130, correct?

If so, that is awesome! What was the Cree bin?

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Nitroz said:

So the A3 XR-E was 11,300 and not 1130, correct?

If so, that is awesome! What was the Cree bin?

Click to expand...

:lolsign: thanks for pointing this out. It is 11,300 instead of 1,300. For some reason my brain felt an order of magnitude wasn't important I thought Icarus was pointing it out as a typo because the lux readings were very high.

The main thing that shocked me when testing these is the tint. It is so cold that it looks like it has a purple hue. All four have the same tint, with one having a noticeable tint shift at edges of the beam towards a more natural white) It is nothing like the beautiful tint I received from Don in my S27 (Thanks Don! It is without doubt the best and most beloved flashlight I own) Regardless of flux, this alone would make me not want to put them into LE's, for myself or anyone else. :sigh:

Anyway, Sunday I guess I'm going to assemble another FluPIC LE, and put another one of my Seoul P4's to work. I already know the tint will be crappy, but perhaps there was something wrong with my FluPic or the flux of the led. If it is the same result, I can always just tear out the LED from the 2 LE's and put in a good Seoul P4, when I can find some.

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

I think I see something that might be explaining some of this.



In the picture of the Light engine I see the left side wire connection is a large amount of solder. This appears to be higher than the top of the light engine. If so, then the reflector will not go all the way down and sit on the top of the light engine.

Here's a picture of my A1 with Seoul.


I know you are not happy, but, I don't think it's very nice to qualify a sample of one and then to quantify that the whole lot is bad or worse yet call them junk.

If you set the reflector on the LE, it should sit flush with no gap. See if that is a what's occuring on your light engine. ( I would also remove some for the other side two as either one could short to the reflector)

-Wayne

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Wayne,

I appreciate your reply. My intention with this thread is just to present the facts. A lot of sugar coating usually exists when new things come out, but my experiences are my experiences and I feel others should be entitled to them.

I don't recall claiming your whole lot of Seoul P4's as "junk" nor do I have the intention to. We all know a lottery exists and unfortunately all 4 of my emitters have purple tints. Had the shift been towards yellow or green, maybe my response to the tint wouldn't have been so bad. I personally just really hate purple tints. I have seen the mods by EngrPaul(sp?) and he seems to be very pleased with the tints of the LED's he received from you (and they do look like they have very nice tints). These LED's are not very cheap, so is it worth it to spend another $48 buying 4 more that may have the same problem? Perhaps I've just been too spoiled with good tints...

The highest point of the solder blob is below the lip of the LE (made sure of this when I built it) and IIRC the reflector's base rests on this lip. I have a spare McR38, so I can make sure that the reflector is resting against the lip of the LE, and therefore the LED is as far as it will go inside the reflector. Unfortunately, I don't have the LE in front of me at the moment to check this, but I will report back tomorrow. I'll also try to get some beamshots/pictures.

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

As a simple reader, I can say this was my understanding. I don't feel like cryhavok has directed this thread against anyone, just sharing a disappinting experience...

As it has been suggested before, I believe the bounce test with similar current drive would be a good clarification. If the overall light produced is still so weird, there may be a problem somewhere. Wrong led bin? Does that sound possible, even if such an error seems very unlikely? Wrong current going to the led? Again, is there room for an error to be considered?

cryhavok said:

I don't recall claiming your whole lot of Seoul P4's as "junk" nor do I have the intention to. We all know a lottery exists and unfortunately all 4 of my emitters have purple tints.

Click to expand...

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Do the Seoul LEDs have any type of color binning? I don't really like the colder tints.

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Another thought is the LED plastic might be catching the reflector. It's a tight fit and since the LED protrudes through the reflector I've noticed in some of my builds that the LED can catch the reflector and the light engine will stop. You may have to fiddle with it a bit and then the light engine screws in further.

In looking at the picture of your front end you should be able to see more of the black plastic of the Seoul protruding into the reflector.

-Wayne

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

My one and only experience with a SSC P4 was installing the one I got from the SS in a Fenix L1P. Mine also had a blueish purple tint.
The P4, while brighter than the SWOH Lux 1 that it replaced, was too cool for my taste and was promptly removed. The SWOH was reinstalled.

What I learned today.
Lesson one: Never buy a LED without knowing the color bin.
Lesson two: Brighter is not always better.
Lesson three: I can live with what I have.

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

Just to redress the balance, I received 2 SSC P4 (U-bin) LEs from the SS and
couldn't be happier with them in every respect.

http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=149510

Re: Finished my first Seoul P4 Aleph LE...Impressions

cryhavok said:

Wayne,

I appreciate your reply. My intention with this thread is just to present the facts. A lot of sugar coating usually exists when new things come out, but my experiences are my experiences and I feel others should be entitled to them.

I don't recall claiming your whole lot of Seoul P4's as "junk" nor do I have the intention to. We all know a lottery exists and unfortunately all 4 of my emitters have purple tints. Had the shift been towards yellow or green, maybe my response to the tint wouldn't have been so bad. I personally just really hate purple tints. I have seen the mods by EngrPaul(sp?) and he seems to be very pleased with the tints of the LED's he received from you (and they do look like they have very nice tints). These LED's are not very cheap, so is it worth it to spend another $48 buying 4 more that may have the same problem? Perhaps I've just been too spoiled with good tints...

The highest point of the solder blob is below the lip of the LE (made sure of this when I built it) and IIRC the reflector's base rests on this lip. I have a spare McR38, so I can make sure that the reflector is resting against the lip of the LE, and therefore the LED is as far as it will go inside the reflector. Unfortunately, I don't have the LE in front of me at the moment to check this, but I will report back tomorrow. I'll also try to get some beamshots/pictures.

Click to expand...

i just got one p4 seoul from the shoppe and my experience is similar to cryhavoc. Just put it in a Luxogen LR12 Cr2 light with a flupic. i can handle some tint, but if this was a luxeon emitter it would get thrown away. It's brighter, but also WAY more purple than any of my other lights. As cryhavoc states, i would have a better reaction if the tint was in another direction. When the seoul started showing up, i thought it would absolutely replace the cree, with the easier package. But no cree i have seen has been this far from white, in any direction.(I have played with around 15-20 crees) The shoppe has some very real issues trying to stay viable as Wayne has discussed in another post. The shoppe is doing great work like the mcr17xr I got puts out a simply beautiful beam with the new cree emitters. But i am very torn on buying unbinned seoul emitters anymore. I hope the binned seoul emitters can become affordable enough for the shoppe to carry, they are a big part of CPF and need to be supported.

my 2 cents