Help needed with Mag Aspheric

My Mag with aspheric lens doesn't seem to have the throw it should and am hoping you all can help. I am using a 2 D mag with a Malkoff drop and a KD aspheric lens. I have removed the regular lens and the reflector and have focused the beam so you can see the LED shining on a wall. However, there still seems to be two layers of spill around it, which I'm sure is the reason I am losing throw. I don't get this spill with my Dereelight with aspheric and the throw is the same with the same light using the stock lens. What am I doing wrong? Any ideas?

Not the best pics, sorry. Both pics are of the same beam; just one taken closer up of the other. Here you can see that the lens is focused.
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This picture is supposed to show the other two "rings" of spill. The LED showing on the wall in the above picture is in the very center of this one below. The pic doesn't show it, but you can definetly see it on the wall. I would say that the LED outline was about 3 inches wide and the bright spot showing below was about 8 inches wide, followed by another 4 inch ring.
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You won't get a pure throw beamshot with an aspherical lens. There will always be a little bit of spill which means a loss of throw. I had several aspherical flashlights with different emitters and the XR-E is still best suited for use with the KD lens. When I use my KD aspherical lens with my SST-90 Maglite there is a quite bright ring of light in a 90° around the lens. The way you do it is the best way to get the most throw out of it. You could get a custom lens made for the most throw but I think this will be quite expensive.

rayman

Hi,
is the lense fully focused or have you run out of threads? With the KD drop in you can push the heatsink further into the torch and away from the lense to achieve a clearer image of the die. Also, that looks like it's an xpg which won't throw as far as an xre due to a couple of factors.

I have not had the chance of playing around with a XPG aspheric lens
setup but I have to agree with Rayman, the XRE is the ideal emitter for
an aspheric lens

Thanks guys. I hadn't caught the fact that it was an XPG, but when you said it it dawned on me that it was. Also confirmed it when checking out Malkoff's website. I did figure out one thing though. The light host it was in was silver. When I transfered it into a black host it made a lot of difference. Still get's smoked by the Dereelight with aspheric though. I'm checking the threads and shops I know of for XR-E drops for the Mags, but it seems there are not too many being made these days and/or seem to stay out of stock.

Anyone know of where I can get one that will work well? Thanks.

I made one myself. It's pretty easy. I took a P7 heatsink, glued a XR-E R2 on it and wired it to a 1.0A driver. You could also go with a 1.4A driver there is enough heatsinking for the XR-E in a Maglite. Worked great but unfortunately I had to let it go .

rayman

I have a Tiablo aspheric light which to my understanding has similar
performance to the Deerelight (I could be wrong ) and none of
my Mag aspheric lens throw as well as the Tiablo.

I dont have the lights with me right now, but have you tried the Deerelight
lens with your Mag ?


Hmm .... if your thinking about building your own aspheric Mag, instead of
XRE emitter, why not use a SST-50 or SST-90. They both work really well
with a lens and are a lot brighter than a XRE :devil:

I took a couple of photos for comparison last night to show the difference in projected die size between the xre P4(not sure which version of die) and xpg R4. Both torches are identical X2000's but brightness shouldn't be compared as they have different types of drivers.



I havent shimmed the xpg to fully focus as I don't need ultimate throw as it only gets used on an air rifle.



Photos taken from 5' away. I too would really like an SST-90 mag aspheric as I think it would be a very versatile tool

Instead of the KD lens, which works really well for the XR-E focus, try the DX 50mmx18mm Aspheric lens (~$5). I found that one to work much better with non-XR-E emitters like the stock Mag Rebel reflector and the SST-90 emitter. You'll need 30mm between the bottom of the lens and the LED die to focus it properly, but the results will probably be much better with the XP-G dome. (I think KD carries that aspheric lens too, but I've never ordered it to see if it's the exact same one as from DX.)

Left. DX 50mm lens, XRE R2 1 Amp.
Right. DX 66mm lens, XPG R5, unknown amp. (3x Ultimate Lithium AA direct drive)
(Theses are not done in Mags)

I like the XPG with the 66mm lens a lot, very clean.
Look at the reflection on the floor, you can see that the XPG on the 66 mm lens is brighter

Thanks all. I wanted something simple. I am planning on putting the light in my truck for normal use, then adding the aspheric lens when I needed more throw. I've contemplated making a SST-50 Mag, but have been a little weary with putting the money into it and then screwing it up. The idea of an SST-90 is pretty interesting too. Give me great flood and bright light, then with aspheric pretty decent throw. Actually, as I look at some pics of the SST-90 aspherics, it seems to throw a beautiful flood beam when unfocused. That may be the way to go. I'm not sure I'm that ambitious yet to take that size of a project on though. :thinking:

Well, I did end up having a SST-90 mag done, but I ended up not using the aspheric lens. You can read/see it here if you are interested: https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/279067