Thinking Mag 2Cs only came in black, imagine my surprise when I walked into Home Depot and stumbled onto a rack full of Mag 2Cs in purple and pewter!
So anyway I bought some pewters (and purples!) and set about putting together the next small run of Space Needle II mods. Here are the first two I made this weekend, next to a standard black:
But to my dismay the light output from these first two also came out -- green! The HDs initially tested out bright and seemingly white on the strip, but when I actually installed them into the new Mag bodies they both had that greenish cast. It is not noticeable when you first fire them up by themselves, but when I brought out my own Space Needle II for comparison, you can see the difference in beam colors:
Of course they are still nice and bright with the now-familiar ungodly throwing distance when focused down to a tight beam, and outside shining them around in the trees and bushes they are clearly whiter than any incandescent. Also these Mags are constructed in such a way, with internal dimensions and machining so different from the "old" style of Mag 2Cs, that I had to fabricate completely new and different heatsinks.
I first made one with a post to ensure that the reflector would still travel below the bottom of the HD's base to provide full focusing range. But after putting it together and calipering the distances I discovered that due to different positional relationships because of the new setup, a post was not needed at all. A flat heatsink will allow the reflector to screw down just far enough to place the Luxeon in the optimal focusing plane:
But the main issue here again, is that I'm afraid all the Luxeons I now have will produce this color temperature when assembled, so my question to those here on the Forum is -- should I sell these as "seconds" (at a reduced price of course) or just stop altogether and start up later, when I am able to get some whiter 5W HD Luxeons?
So anyway I bought some pewters (and purples!) and set about putting together the next small run of Space Needle II mods. Here are the first two I made this weekend, next to a standard black:
But to my dismay the light output from these first two also came out -- green! The HDs initially tested out bright and seemingly white on the strip, but when I actually installed them into the new Mag bodies they both had that greenish cast. It is not noticeable when you first fire them up by themselves, but when I brought out my own Space Needle II for comparison, you can see the difference in beam colors:
Of course they are still nice and bright with the now-familiar ungodly throwing distance when focused down to a tight beam, and outside shining them around in the trees and bushes they are clearly whiter than any incandescent. Also these Mags are constructed in such a way, with internal dimensions and machining so different from the "old" style of Mag 2Cs, that I had to fabricate completely new and different heatsinks.
I first made one with a post to ensure that the reflector would still travel below the bottom of the HD's base to provide full focusing range. But after putting it together and calipering the distances I discovered that due to different positional relationships because of the new setup, a post was not needed at all. A flat heatsink will allow the reflector to screw down just far enough to place the Luxeon in the optimal focusing plane:
But the main issue here again, is that I'm afraid all the Luxeons I now have will produce this color temperature when assembled, so my question to those here on the Forum is -- should I sell these as "seconds" (at a reduced price of course) or just stop altogether and start up later, when I am able to get some whiter 5W HD Luxeons?
