Luxeon LED Source

[AndrewTR30]

I got mine here: http://www.lumiledsfuture.com/

[PH-SCP]

Originally Posted by the_other_dougreeves

I totally forgot to ask, but did you make the mounting piece yourself or was it provided?

All I got were the two pairs of Luxeon Star LED's. Had to make the mounting plate, heat sink and connections myself. Not hard to do, just very time consuming.

[RyanM]

This may be a dumb question, but what are recog-lights?


Ryan

[mannanj]

Try www.digikey.com Do a search for luxeon led. These guys have a catalog 2 1/2" thick. I've ordered several things from them. Very good service. $25.00 min. order unless you want to pay $5.00 surcharge.

[the_other_dougreeves]

Originally Posted by RyanM

This may be a dumb question, but what are recog-lights?


Ryan

Lights that are bright enough to be seen, i.e., so that others can recognize your airplane, but are not unnecessarily bright enough to be a real landing light.

[Paul Eastham]

Originally Posted by PH-SCP

Mine are Luxeon 1, with a 10 degree beam angle, they sell at ? 12,50 each in the Netherlands, that's about $ 16,00 your money....ordering 10-99 gives a 17% discount and ordering 100 or more, 30% discount. I just love their light output for the amount of current they draw, should work great for recog-lights.

Please note that 10 degrees is not enough to be "legal" in the US per AC 20.74, which requires a 110-degree spread. Here are some installation ideas:

My airplane (5x 1W lambertian, 2 of them tipped back to get 110 degrees):





Eclipse 500 (insanely bright -- lambertian and batwing used):



As for where to get luxeons, the cheapest source I found is the company that the manufacturer recommends: Future Electronics. To find the parts, it's easiest to follow the links from lumileds.com . The Future Electronics site is truly awful, the worst I've used in at least 5 years -- but it's 10x cheaper than every other source I found.

[mlw450802]

Originally Posted by Paul Eastham

Please note that 10 degrees is not enough to be "legal" in the US per AC 20.74, which requires a 110-degree spread. Here are some installation ideas:

I don't believe there is a beam angle requirement for landing lights, just for the nav lights.

could be wrong.

-mike

[Paul Eastham]

Originally Posted by mlw450802

I don't believe there is a beam angle requirement for landing lights, just for the nav lights.

Sorry, thought we were talking position lights here. I am unclear on the usefulness of this other sort of light...

[the_other_dougreeves]

Originally Posted by Paul Eastham

Sorry, thought we were talking position lights here. I am unclear on the usefulness of this other sort of light...

Paul - sweet but simple setup for your nav lights. I am thinking of doing the nav lights with 2x Lux III lambertian powered by a single driver. Did you put any electrical isolation between the stars and the aluminum mounting plate?

Recognition lights are designed to help the aircraft be visible, but don't consume so much power that you can't use them for long periods of time. They are often used in wig-wag / pulselight systems. An example would be the lights in the wing root area of the 737 - SW has these on a wig-wag that (IIRC) it is SOP to use below 10k'. (IIRC, Boeing calls these "runway / turnoff" lights). Here is a page that shows the pattern of such lights.

Why not just use your landing light all the time? Well, it uses 100W, maybe more (more power, Scotty!), and you don't want the darn thing to burn out from over use when you turn it on some dark evening.

These lights are certainly not required and some will question whether they are needed on a RV. However, I fly under / around Class B a lot and the traffic can be very busy. Anything that I can do to make me more visible is good. The lights are simple, light, draw less than 2A (4 x Lux III), don't require a lot of install time and will never burn out.

A good alternative is to use a HID landing light(s), which uses less power and has a long life. Another is to make the landing light from LEDs, but that might require too many emitters and would require a lot of rethinking of the mounting.

[Mike S]

It seems that most of the folks who post here concerning Vans stock landing light, are not too thrilled with the output. However the bulbs are cheap, and relatively easy to replace.

Seems to me that the stock Vans light in the tip would be good for wig-wag recognition lighting, and a set of HIDs in the leading edge for landing lights.

At least that is where I am headed with my lighting at this time.

Mike