Instant full output possible?

Is it possible with hid's that are instantly on, without the warmup time?

Yes, the maxabeam will start up instantly to maximum power without any warm up time. I may be mistaken, but I believe
most true short arc lamps will instantly start without any
warm up time.

Depends on the lamp design. HID lamps used in car headlights have a different gas mix that allows for "instant" on and fast re-strike, but this makes the lamp much less efficient. (Note that all HID lamps have some warm up. But fast strike lamps warm up in a second or 2 as opposed to 10-20 seconds.)

So, do you want fast start up, or more efficiency (longer run time & more light per watt)?

yes please..


(both)

Okay.. I already have a 650 lumen 10w with long warmup.. Where do I look to find something decently efficient with relatively instant on.. In the 20-35 watt range?

The D2s and D1s are both 35W. They are not real instaant on. They use a very high power Xenon arcto produce all the light until the metal halides have evapourated. As the salts evapourate, the power fed to the arc is reduced until when all the salt is evapourated, the power is down to a nominal 35W (lamp). You will need the special ballast though. A normal ballast will not work. But since these are automotive lamps, the ballast is easily available. Efficeincy is compromised but not by too much. The same lamp can also be overdriven to 50W nominal with shorter life expectancy. The arc gap is some 4.2 mm, rather long. Wish they would come up with a 10-12W 1-1.2 mm arc gap lamp of similar design. It will be less efficient though.

4.2mm.. I don't know, but it might not be too terrible in a largeish reflector.

What bulb and ballast does the maxabeam have?

So far the ballasts for >10w's i have looked at are really huge compared to the 10w one. Do you know any reasonably sized 20-70w ballasts that uses bulbs that can go (almost) instant on?

AilSnail- 4.2 mm is not too bad for reflectors > 5"-6" but begin to look longish for 4" reflectors.

It is the lamp that cannot be turned on instantly, not the ballast.

The real instant on ones are the Xenon short arc lamps, the smallest of which is the ARC 20W lamp ARC . This is not very efficient though. It is probably the lamp in use in the Xenonics Nighthunter II. We all know that this flashlight is rather poor in its light output. I do not know of any quasi-instant on lamps under 35W. Only the automotive industry can make this happen. So for the moment, even if a very small 15W ballast can be made, there is no lamp to use it with.

The Maxa Beam uses a 75W Xenon short arc lamp with a ballast of thier own design. The luminous output is only 1000lm. As a reference, a 55W H3 gives 1600 lm, a 100W version 2300 lm. A D2/1s at 50W gives some 5000lm!

Hope that answers some of your doubts /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif

So the maxabeam makes their own bulb too, or just the ballast?

I am weighing the lumen/lux thing in my imagination.. I really do dig the pencil beams, though, and I don't think i'll be lugging around anything bigger than a 4" reflector.

I have found some rather compact D2/D1 ballasts, I think: Auerswald has a (35/50w?) ballast/igniter system of about ~2.5" dia, and nucon makes a 35w one with 3"+ dia that I think can be used with a D1.

I would love it if someone would give some hints about the short arcs though. They are too tantalising. Would it have to be a pure xenon (no mercury) to start up instantly? I am looking for something about 40w-80w, i think.
Are the ballasts as big as the D2/D1 ones?

AilSnail - No, PeakBeam make thier own ballast, not the lamps. Their ballasts are not obtainable as a seperate item though. They use standard 75W Xenon short arc lamps available from Osram, Ushio and other lamp manufacturers. If you need technical data on the Xenon short arc lamps, Osram has quite a bit under "download" on their website. These use pure Xenon gas as you said. I am not aware of compact ballasts for Xenon short arc lamps though. If you find any source please post.

I actually have a MaxaBeam. But I find that I do not use it very much. It only comes into its own at >100m really. The hot spot is very small so that at smaller distances something like the Light Force SL240 actually works better. Total output of a 75W Xenon short arc is only 1000lm. The SL240's 100W projector lamp has an output of 3600lm. Thanks to the very small source size, the beam of the MaxaBeam is actually much more intense (longer throw) than that of the SL240, but the area covered at a given distance is much smaller.