ARC LS Luxeon Star Color Shift.

Has anyone noticed color shift of the white luxeon as it ages. I have owned one (FIRST RUN SN#115) for about a year and a half. This light is used every day all day long while I do electronic service. Run times on a given day may be from several minutes to an hour. I must have over 600 hours on the LED by now.

The color temperature has seriously shifted toward the blue violet range. I suspect the phosphor that color corrects the LED is losing it emmission. Is this common? I am being subjective here since I look at colors all day long and the LS's color temp has shifted! It is becoming hard to distinguish some colors in the components I work on while illuminated by the light of the LS.

PETER, since this is one of the first LS's and is sort of special to me, is Luxeon practical to replace in this unit? I am using my new LSH-P now and it is great, better than the original ever was due to improvements in the Luxeon Star technology.

I still want to keep the original in top condition because it is special to me therefore my reason asking if you can fix it. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thinking.gif

Wow, if an underdriven LED is color shifting I wonder how much one would shift if it was allowed to overheat?

Or, Lumileds has improved the phosphor since then and that is no longer a problem?

Either way, you would like to replace the LED. It may be possible but it would be easier to replace the unit. It can be pretty hard to break the seal and get into the unit. Is there a reason you would want to keep the older housing or electronics?

Peter

Peter,

Maybee the unit has even more hours than I think, it still puts out good light, it just has gone purple. I wanted to keep the unit as it was in your legacy!

You have made such a contribution to the state of the art I do feel the "FIRST RUN SN# 115" is important.

I already purchased a new LSH-P from Marri and I received it yesterday. It is a marvel, and I wil purchase an L4 P when available.

Bottom Line, in your opinion, is to leave it like it is?

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif

Thank you! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

We can try to open it up. If it looks like it will be broken in the process, we will stop working on it and send it back.

Peter

I posted a little earlier about the potential to factory upgrade the current LS to a higher flux LED (and keep warranty in force). I guess, from reading this, the answer would be probably not. This brings up why I asked in the first place. I think that Arc planned to discontinue the current LS when the LS4 was introduced. If the LS4 is now six months or more away is there a chance of seeing the current form hang around long enough to have higher flux LED show up in them. I really just want the current form with the best available LED, will that be possible to have, say two years down the road?

[ QUOTE ]
BobG said:
I posted a little earlier about the potential to factory upgrade the current LS to a higher flux LED (and keep warranty in force). I guess, from reading this, the answer would be probably not. This brings up why I asked in the first place. I think that Arc planned to discontinue the current LS when the LS4 was introduced. If the LS4 is now six months or more away is there a chance of seeing the current form hang around long enough to have higher flux LED show up in them. I really just want the current form with the best available LED, will that be possible to have, say two years down the road?

[/ QUOTE ]

Great post Bob. I curious about this as well.