Dive Light Myths

I hope that others find this useful.

There has been a good bit of myth about light which is understandable. A little information about my background might help. I am by no means an expert when it comes to light, I know people that have forgotten more than I will ever know on the subject. However I do have an industrial engineering background and have worked in the corporate lighting industry both as a consultant and employee.
When discussing light there is are complicated factors that affect what is produced especially when it is concentrated into a tight focused beam such as what we use for diving. Hopefully I won’t make this too boring and will use related examples to simplify which won’t be exact but should put things more in layman terms. As far as comparing LED & HID it is easier to just see for yourself with our light comparison videos & photos

Focus: Sorry to bust everyone’s bubble but there is no such thing as a “focusable” beam. Before everyone jumps on me let me clarify. Optics are designed to focus as much light output that they can collect within a specific beam angle. Without getting too technical because even beam angle gets highly technical all optics work at a specific point the most efficiently. When the reflector is moved from that point even a mm the efficiency drops considerably. The HID “focusable” head is a good example.

See our blog for the rest of the story.

Bobby:

Focus: Sorry to bust everyone’s bubble but there is no such thing as a “focusable” beam. Before everyone jumps on me let me clarify. Optics are designed to focus as much light output that they can collect within a specific beam angle. Without getting too technical because even beam angle gets highly technical all optics work at a specific point the most efficiently. When the reflector is moved from that point even a mm the efficiency drops considerably. The HID “focusable” head is a good example.

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The proof of the contrary is our VB-50 LED head. Here is no reflector moved, but the distance from an aspheric lens in front of the LED changed.
The result is a light beam from 8° variable up to 36° with absolutely uniform illumination within the respective light angle.

Michael

Bobby:

.... snip....

As far as comparing LED & HID it is easier to just see for yourself with our light comparison videos & photos

Focus: Sorry to bust everyone’s bubble but there is no such thing as a “focusable” beam. Before everyone jumps on me let me clarify. Optics are designed to focus as much light output that they can collect within a specific beam angle. Without getting too technical because even beam angle gets highly technical all optics work at a specific point the most efficiently. When the reflector is moved from that point even a mm the efficiency drops considerably. The HID “focusable” head is a good example.

See our blog for the rest of the story.

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Well... this just looks like piss poor marketing to me. Inventing "myths" about the competitor's product that by comparison is supposed to make us all think that your product doesn't suffer from the same issues.... all backed up with dubious video evidence.

Personally I have a major allergy for marketing that's based on telling us what's wrong with the other guy's product. If you can't tell us what's right with yours then.... meh. It just makes the other guy's story sound that much more credible.

I'm in the market for a new light this year and I'm probably going to replace my older HID with and LED model... but it won't be one of yours.

R..

Diver0001:

Well... this just looks like piss poor marketing to me. Inventing "myths" about the competitor's product that by comparison is supposed to make us all think that your product doesn't suffer from the same issues.... all backed up with dubious video evidence.

Personally I have a major allergy for marketing that's based on telling us what's wrong with the other guy's product. If you can't tell us what's right with yours then.... meh. It just makes the other guy's story sound that much more credible.

I'm in the market for a new light this year and I'm probably going to replace my older HID with and LED model... but it won't be one of yours.

R..

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Diver0001,
Sorry that you feel that way. We did not invent the myths they are taken from what people have posted and the blog is only meant to clarify. We are not and did not attack any manufacturers in the blog and yes everything we discussed applies to our lights as well. We feel that the blog actually defends, in a way, dive light manufacturers as we discuss the difficulties associated with understanding and having equal comparison from the light manufacturers spec sheets.
We would like to know what you find dubious about our video comparison. In the video we clearly state how we put it together and the effort to have a level field for all the products. We seriously would like input regarding how we could make it better or more fair.
There are a lot of good dive lights on the market with ours fitting into a rather small range of diver market. If our video's, blogs, and/or FAQ pages put you off to our products we can only offer our sincere apologies. The intent is to help inform anyone interested as best we can. We make every effort not to attack or degrade other manufacturers and openly acknowledge the things they do well.

Wow, that LM 35W HID really kicks ass.. do you sell that one with an E/O cord?

mbsub:

The proof of the contrary is our VB-50 LED head. Here is no reflector moved, but the distance from an aspheric lens in front of the LED changed.
The result is a light beam from 8° variable up to 36° with absolutely uniform illumination within the respective light angle.

Michael

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Michael,
I replied to your post yesterday but somehow it is now not here, I will try this once again. You make a good product that many divers seem to be very happy with. In your response you were careful to only discuss "uniform" illumination which had nothing to do with what I had posted. The point that I was making had to do with efficiency of a focused versus unfocused beam and the myth regarding focusable beams, which don't exist in dive lights.
The beam shots on your website show fairly well the point I am making. An ashperic is rather inefficient in the amount of light it gathers from the source to be projected out. Aspherics are good at focusing what light they do gather into a dense beam and tend to make up for their losses in Lumen output with a high Lux concentration, when they are properly focused. In the beam shots on your website the focused narrow beam has a solid concentrated beam in a square pattern and the unfocused beam looses a considerable amount of light output with a round beam.
For divers that have a preference for being able to change beam angle over having the most amount of light and efficiency your light is the best choice. Other divers that want/need the most amount of light output and efficiency then our light may be a good choice.
As was discussed in my blog Lux is only useful if the exact same parameters are used making it virtually impossible to compare Lux statements between manufacturers. Your specifications give Lux only for the high output and tightest focus. It would be more useful if you gave Lux for both focused and unfocused on your MB-50 model and all light levels available on your products. Then those that are interested would be able to have a more clear understanding of what your lights do.
Since you opened the conversation, clarification on your products specifications would be helpful. Your products that use SST-50 LED's have 1250 Lumen specs. I am confused as the max spec for that LED is 1150 with 100% efficiency. The same is true for your XM-L products, you have 1,000 & 2,000 Lumen specs for your single and dual LED's respectively when max output is 975 & 1950 respectively again at 100% efficiency. An overall luminaire efficiency of 90% is rather difficult to achieve with 110% efficiency impossible. If the products are over driven enough to reach the Lumen outputs that you have stated then I am curious what the element life rating drops to and how you did the math to determine the Lumen output beyond the manufacturer specification? We have over driven some prototypes LED's for testing purposes and have a decent amount of data regarding life expectancy and power draw.

ScubaInChicago:

Wow, that LM 35W HID really kicks ass.. do you sell that one with an E/O cord?

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Really, the LM 35 is a heavy club. In a Bar fight it's a great weapon.

Bobby:

Diver0001,
Sorry that you feel that way. .

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I liked that response.

Perhaps I jumped the gun. I thought I recognised the guerilla marketing tactics that are so common in the industry. Maybe I was wrong.

As for the "dubious" video, I'm not convinced that the evidence compares apples to apples. My first impression is that the LED lights offered by the manufacturer who made the video are better than the competitors' HID lights.... which makes me suspicious. I've seen so many "marketing lies" that I'm slow to accept video "evidence" as proof of anything....

R..

Diver0001:

I liked that response.

Perhaps I jumped the gun. I thought I recognised the guerilla marketing tactics that are so common in the industry. Maybe I was wrong.

As for the "dubious" video, I'm not convinced that the evidence compares apples to apples. My first impression is that the LED lights offered by the manufacturer who made the video are better than the competitors' HID lights.... which makes me suspicious. I've seen so many "marketing lies" that I'm slow to accept video "evidence" as proof of anything....

R..

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Diver0001,
No problem and thanks. We actually get as much if not more frustrated with the hype that is out there. As far as the video goes we did what we could to create a level playing field. We also put in a number of other LED lights as well. We are seeking input for how we could do it better. We had many past attempts at putting a video together and failed miserably. If we can do it better in the future we will make the effort.

Good luck with your next light search and if we can do anything to help please let us know.

What I want to know is whos got an external battery to extend the life of two sola 2000 lights while diving Any geniouses out there with a solution?? LOL
Even light and motion said they dont have one. there only good for about 70mins and im not buying more lights. Way too expensive already