Why are pathetic LEDs still blinding?

strantor said:
This is just my observation and I'm curious if anyone else has noticed that "bright" or "super bright" LEDs like those in cheap flashlights, cheap aftermarket LED headlights, and sometimes even just status LEDs on different circuit boards or appliances can be blinding to look at, while providing an unintuitively disappointing amount of illumination.
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The illumination is disappointing in my experience because so much 'focusing' is done by the attached lensing.
A few LED items have beam-spreading optics (usually a slide-to-focus second lens) and make a good area illuminating
flashlight, but others just send out a circa 20 degree narrow beam. Catch that central beam in your eye, or
try to see things at the periphery, and the experience isn't great.

Some illuminators use flat-face (no molded lens) emitters, have a 'Lambertian' broad light spread.
 
whitmore said:
The illumination is disappointing in my experience because so much 'focusing' is done by the attached lensing.
A few LED items have beam-spreading optics (usually a slide-to-focus second lens) and make a good area illuminating
flashlight, but others just send out a circa 20 degree narrow beam. Catch that central beam in your eye, or
try to see things at the periphery, and the experience isn't great.

Some illuminators use flat-face (no molded lens) emitters, have a 'Lambertian' broad light spread.
Click to expand...

I have a half dozen different models (maybe more, I don't like to count) of 18650 LED flashlights. This is by far my favorite! It has an incredibly flat projection field without any hot or cold spots. My oldest one is over 5 years old and still works perfectly. The model is Ultrafire SK98 and I recommend the 3 mode L6 version. The flash and SOS modes of the 5 mode T2 version are just annoying to me.


You will need to buy 18650 batteries (It is a 1 x 18650 battery flashlight) and a charger separately.

P.S. They are currently $7.27 per flashlight which is a heck of a deal in my opinion.
P.P.S. The lumen rating of the flashlight is any where from 800 to 3000 depending on who you buy it from and how big of a liar they are. My personal lumen rating for this flashlight is "plenty bright enough".
 
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ozzie46 said:
At first glance I thought you were talking about car headlights. They blind me.

Ron
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I've really had _enough_ of the silly decorative led lights that people now have across the front of their cars around the headlights and such. They are often quite bright and distracting, whether they are coming towards you are riding your rear bumper.

Now, the truth is out. I am a grumpy old man.
 
While white light of any ºK temperature can be obtained by proper balance of red, green, and blue light, it won't make a complete spectrum. This is especially true with LED's where the individual LED's are relatively monochromatic. In between the three LED's, there are dark areas in the spectrum. As a result, certain objects will look artificial. in that light.

White LED's used for area lighting are somewhat better in that they are actually fluorescent devices, the difference between them and traditional fluorescent tubes being the excitation comes from a blue LED rather than UV from a mercury vapor tube. A mix of phosphors is chosen to create a reasonable semblance of white light. Because the phosphors have fairly broad emission spectra, the overall spectrum is closer to that of sunlight or incandescent light. The degree of faithfulness to the continuous spectrum is measured by the CRI (color rendition index) with 100 being perfect. Most current area lighting is in the 90's.

COBB lighting is somewhat better in regards to glare. Rather than a few bright LED's, it uses an array of dimmer LED's to provide the same lumen output. As mentioned in previous posts, addition of a diffuser will greatly reduce glare as well.
 
LEDs are never going to replace the ruff service bulbs in my drop light. Heard they might stop making them so I bought a lifetime supply.
 
Karl_T said:
LEDs are never going to replace the ruff service bulbs in my drop light. Heard they might stop making them so I bought a lifetime supply.
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oh, those bulbs are so hot, and I've seen many service men with burns on their arms from them. And drop one and it breaks.. I started using CFL's when I discovered less heat, then LED since.. They don't fail on drop.. You just have to get higher wattage bulbs for the light to be effective (100w equiv)
 
RJSakowski said:
While white light of any ºK temperature can be obtained by proper balance of red, green, and blue light, it won't make a complete spectrum. This is especially true with LED's where the individual LED's are relatively monochromatic. In between the three LED's, there are dark areas in the spectrum. As a result, certain objects will look artificial. in that light.

White LED's used for area lighting are somewhat better in that they are actually fluorescent devices, the difference between them and traditional fluorescent tubes being the excitation comes from a blue LED rather than UV from a mercury vapor tube. A mix of phosphors is chosen to create a reasonable semblance of white light. Because the phosphors have fairly broad emission spectra, the overall spectrum is closer to that of sunlight or incandescent light. The degree of faithfulness to the continuous spectrum is measured by the CRI (color rendition index) with 100 being perfect. Most current area lighting is in the 90's.

COBB lighting is somewhat better in regards to glare. Rather than a few bright LED's, it uses an array of dimmer LED's to provide the same lumen output. As mentioned in previous posts, addition of a diffuser will greatly reduce glare as well.
Click to expand...
A great little video on blue helping to create white light.
 
You guys are funny. Thanks for the smile this morning.
 
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