# SSR-90 on Dual Action Reflector/Aspherical Combo for increased throw



## ma_sha1 (Nov 26, 2009)

*
11/30/2009: Out door shots, before & after, are up on post #16*


This is an improvement effort on the Kel-lite SSR-90 I build a short while ago:
https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/238232
The LED was from the very top Bin, Neutral Tint: SSR-90 57K, GN201.

A few weeks ago, I took this light out for Halloween Trick-or-treating with my kids, there's a lot of people out with flashlights, mine was the brightest by a landslide. The light has so much spill that I blinded two old ladies with the spill, I wasn't even pointing the light at them.

So I thought, wouldn't it be great if I can harvest some of the mid range spill and apply it towards the center of the beam? I am not talking about typical aspherical, as I still want a round hot spot & I still want some spill, especially the immediate spill right next to me is necessary to light the walking path. I came up with some ideas, this is what I wind up doing: Duracell Daylight concept applied to a much more powerful flashlight.

First, I mounted a small aspherical lens on top of a spring, the diameter is about the same as the 
flat bottom area of the P7 reflector I used:








The idea is, it collect the light that escapes the reflector (The spill) only & send them to the center. 
But it does not cover the reflected light path!
This is important, as if it does (if lens is too big), you'll get messed up beam. 





When you screw the bezel on, the flat lens press the aspehrical lens in place so the whole set-up 
stays put & looks normal from out side.





With this set-up, you could get two distinct hot spots from a single flashlight if they are not aligned well, 
obviously, I am not trying to make a dual hot spot flashlight . 
However, I might be be the first one who produced dual hot spot from a single die





A little better, but this lens didn't work out, as it gives a square hot spot similar to regular aspherical 
when aligned. This is not what I want, otherwise I would have gone to 52mm Aspherical lens to begin with. 






Played with different lens, this this the result I wind up settling with:
The Corona is produced by the small aspherical lens & diffused.
It overlaps with the round reflector hot spot & corona making both brighter.

It rubs from medium distance spill & you can see the dark ring around the corona as a result of spill stealing. 





The ceiling bounce beam shot takes a bit to get use to, as you don't see this type of set-up in flashlights, 
but at a distance, you can start to appreciate the practicality of this set-up.

At about 15 ft, the field of vision where you are looking (the door) & it's surroundings are lit up by the SSR-90 Jumbo hot spot & Corona, the dark void can be seen only far out next to the light switch, which is out of your viewing zoon already, You don't even realize it's there.

This way, next year trick-or-treating, I can direct the beam away from people & place them off the Corona into the dark zoon, therefore minding my own business by pointing the light where I want it to be without disturbing people in the surroundings. Especially, at longer distance, 50-100ft, the dark zoon will become quite large & becomes practically useful. 

I wish there's a 52mm TIR for SSR-90 I can just purchase , I basically hand made a TIR type of beam, with may be some extra spill at my foot. 

This set-up does not reduce the spill towards the immediate surrounding, so I can still walk a bright path. 
The immediate spill is produced from the gap between the edge of aspherical lens & the reflector path. 





Another beam shot, down the stairs






One last beam shot, if you look very hard, try change the angle you are looking at the screen, you can see the
blending of two beams that forms the corona. Slightly yellower shade from reflector & slightly whiter 
squarish shade from aspherical lens. 





One last frontal shot, I think it looks pretty cool.





The end.


----------



## Der Wichtel (Nov 26, 2009)

Very good idea!! Do you have any before/after pics?


----------



## olrac (Nov 26, 2009)

interesting concept.:thumbsup:


----------



## ma_sha1 (Nov 26, 2009)

Der Wichtel said:


> Very good idea!! Do you have any before/after pics?



Not yet, I'll take some before & after shots in my backyard after dark. 

The lens mechanism is spring loaded & totally reversible, so I'll take some shots with & without.


----------



## marokero (Nov 26, 2009)

That's a good idea. I have some auto light bulbs in my car that have a built-in magnifying lens in front, which makes them appear brighter farther out than a regular light bulb.


----------



## Gunner12 (Nov 26, 2009)

I've seen one or two of those online before. Here's an example. 

Does the middle hotspot wobble if you move the light quickly?

(also, 5700K is still cool white, it's only a bit warmer then 6000K)


----------



## ma_sha1 (Nov 26, 2009)

Gunner12 said:


> I've seen one or two of those online before. Here's an example.
> 
> Does the middle hotspot wobble if you move the light quickly?



Those are TIR optics, not reflector despite that they call it reflector. The reflector looking frame is for holding the TIP optics in place only, does not assist in reflecting the light. TIR reflect light at the optics/air junction, does not travel out of the optics. I'd love to have a 52mm TIR, but no one makes them that big. 

The hot spot doesn't wobble. The spring load hold things in place pretty well.


----------



## pepko (Nov 26, 2009)

interesting idea ...
:thumbsup:


----------



## Gunner12 (Nov 26, 2009)

The optic did look similar to what you were doing, but I don't have that optic, so I can't say for sure. You might have had one before, so you might know more then I do about that optic.

I agree, a 52mm TIR reflector would be nice.


----------



## daimleramg (Nov 26, 2009)

Try one of these lenses...

http://cvilaser.com/Catalog/Pages/Template2.aspx?pcid=1136&filter=0

A member sold an aspherical mag mod with a KD lense that made a square hotspot and he had a MG lense that made a round hotspot found in the link that I provided.


----------



## ma_sha1 (Nov 26, 2009)

Thanks, but I am not trying to do Aspherical mod.

All apsherical lens are capable to producing round spots, regardless it's KD, DX or other lens, you just need to de-focus it.


----------



## jar3ds (Nov 27, 2009)

thanks for sharing! Can you do a distant outdoor beam shot?


----------



## ma_sha1 (Nov 27, 2009)

I'll do some outdoor shots in a few days, It's raining out here.


----------



## AlexGT (Nov 27, 2009)

Reminds me of this experiment Mcgizmo did a while back

http://dmcleish.com/CPF/reflector-lens/index.html


----------



## ma_sha1 (Nov 27, 2009)

AlexGT said:


> Reminds me of this experiment Mcgizmo did a while back
> 
> http://dmcleish.com/CPF/reflector-lens/index.html



Wow! That looks like exactly the same concept, Thanks for the link!
I am glad that others have thought about the same before. Again, like one posted above 
pointed out before, the principle has been it's been to car's head lights.

I've just finished playing with another lens, this time, I drill a big hole into 
a Mag plastic lens & press fit the Aspherical lens from Dx Led Lenser Clone into the center. 

This lens is slightly larger, captures more spill, but I wasn't able to use the spring, because when placed below the flat lens, it's too in focus & give the square die image. 





Talk about a large die, look through the lens, it's about the same size as the lens which is is 22mm,
you'd think I put egg yolk in there if it's round 





I love the look of this thing











Beam shot again, I can tell this lens took away more spill vs. the smaller one earlier, the beam hot spot is noticably brighter then before too. 





Same hall way shot as before, can you notice the increased contrast vs. the one before? I.E. brighter hot spot/darker surroundings out side of the corona. The total lumen is unchanged, obviously if the surrounding looks darker, it means more light has been dent to hot spot/corona area. 






The only thing I don't like is that the small aspherical lens now sticks beyond the bezel just a little, 
so I can't store the light bezel down anymore. 

My experiments are limited by the various small lens I have, one can imagine that if I have another 
lens with longer focal point that allows me to place it lower without being 'in focus" for square die,
I could potentially cover-up all spill & convert them to controlled throw, basically achieve TIR effect in a 50mm foot print. 
But I am still pretty happy with the results, It's like a 52mm TIR that able to allow immediate short range spill. 

For some reason, no one is making large TIR like 50 or 52 mm to fit a Mag, I would love to have one of those. 
Surefire is releasing a M3LT using 2-2.5" TIR, I can't wait to see that in action. Can you imagine a jumbo high 
quality TIR over SSR-90? :devil:


----------



## ma_sha1 (Nov 30, 2009)

Finally, Rain stopped, I was able to take some Before & After Beam shots
toward my backyard. 

*The flashlight is aiming at the ground on the other side of the white fence. *

First up, Before, with reflector only.
Notice the massive flood, lit up the whole ground of the backyard & the garage wall on the right side.





After, using combination of reflector & Center Aspherical lens:
Notice that the ground & garage wall is less bright but the center beam,
which is still massively broad is brighter & throws further?





The increased throw is not achieved by reducing hot spot size, as it does not change the reflector in any way,
It only collects the spill & send them to the center to enhance the brightness of hot spot & corona.


----------



## depusm12 (Dec 1, 2009)

ma_sha1 

What size Kel-lite is that I have a 2D that would rock like that.


----------



## wquiles (Dec 1, 2009)

ma_sha1 - nice work. Looks great!

These guys seem to have a commercial version of the same concept of using both a reflector and aspheric lens, similar to what you have implemented here - very cool:
LED LENSE Technology ...

Will


----------



## ma_sha1 (Dec 1, 2009)

Thanks Will,

That's a great find! looks exactly what I was trying to achieve & they were able to make it adjustable, also able to convert flood to hots pot completely, therefore achieving TIR effect.
I got to get one & try to swap a SSR-50 into it, only if I can figure out which one of the product actually use this system. 

I have a couple lanser lights with just aspherical lens, looks like they have a patent pending on this reflector/lens combo design. I hope they get the patent, I think they are doing a great job on innovative design.


----------



## wquiles (Dec 1, 2009)

ma_sha1 said:


> Thanks Will,
> 
> That's a great find! looks exactly what I was trying to achieve & they were able to make it adjustable, also able to convert flood to hots pot completely, therefore achieving TIR effect.
> I got to get one & try to swap a SSR-50 into it, only if I can figure out which one of the product actually use this system.
> ...



I have not seen one in person but from the animation, the change in focus from narrow to wide looks fantastic - really well done. It would definitely be interesting to see how they achieve such nice results, so that maybe we can build something similar.


----------



## ma_sha1 (Dec 1, 2009)

I had a duracell daylite that used reflector + lens same logic, but the optics is tiny & not really effective. From their site, the lenser one looks like a better design.


----------



## wquiles (Dec 1, 2009)

ma_sha1 said:


> I had a duracell daylite that used reflector + lens same logic, but the optics is tiny & not really effective. From their site, the lenser one looks like a better design.



I see what you mean. We really have to give credit to the guys at Lenser for what looks like a very nice design


----------

