Van's Air Force
Don't miss anything! Register now for full access to the definitive RV support community.
Landing /Taxi light
- Thread starter jacksel
- Start date
fabricflyer
Well Known Member
Grote makes a LED that works well and it fits the round landing light kit from Duckworks that Vans sell.
The part number from vans is LL DW-02 RV-4/6/7/8
The Grote light is 638215. Napa sells them, but class8truckparts.com has about the best price, which is $116.99. Carquest had them at one time for $118.00, don't know if they still do.
Kuntzleman Electronics, Inc. @ KEatrobes.com makes a wig wag kit that works with the lamps. It is under the (LED Beacon & LTR) tab. Part number is WW.
The part number from vans is LL DW-02 RV-4/6/7/8
The Grote light is 638215. Napa sells them, but class8truckparts.com has about the best price, which is $116.99. Carquest had them at one time for $118.00, don't know if they still do.
Kuntzleman Electronics, Inc. @ KEatrobes.com makes a wig wag kit that works with the lamps. It is under the (LED Beacon & LTR) tab. Part number is WW.
Last edited:
jay.pearlman
Well Known Member
I purchased AeroLED microsun lights for the wing tips and they fit well. Look at their catalog on the web. Also there are pictures if you do a search on this site.
The Grote has 900 lumens, AeroLED microsun is 1800 lumens, the Rigid Industries is pumping out 3400 Lumens. http://www.rigidindustries.com/product-p/62010.htm
Last edited:
AeroLEDs_Support
Well Known Member
Van's does have the AeroLEDs Aerosun lights, they are sold as part of the RV-12 lighting kit. I am pretty sure if you call them they will sell them to you. They work well for leading edge installations. The new version has 50% more LEDs than the previous version did. The datasheet can be found here:
http://www.aeroleds.com/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=fi95ioYcjfQ%3d&tabid=6269&mid=13202
http://www.aeroleds.com/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=fi95ioYcjfQ%3d&tabid=6269&mid=13202
ppilotmike
Well Known Member
Dean,
No bashing, but what's your take on the Rigid Industries R-Line of LEDs? they claim high lumens and fairly good throw by the looks of their little graphs...
AeroLEDs_Support
Well Known Member
The Rigid guys make good off-road lights, and I have met the owner, and he is a decent guy and an ex-airline pilot.
The lumen value he is giving for that particular light is raw lumens from the LEDs as specifed by the LED manufacturer. The problem with raw lumens numbers from the LED manufacturers is that they come from turning the LED on briefly when the die temperature is at 25C. Once you put the LEDs into a real world system, you lose lumens due to temperature effects, current density effects, and lens losses. In practice, the lumens that wind up in the focused beam are typically 60% or so of the raw lumens. All of the lumen values we are using in our datasheets are measured beam lumens (what is actually going out the front of the light in the desired direction). We don't use raw lumens in our datasheets because they are meaningless lab values that don't represent what the user is actually getting.
So I would just caution consumers to carefully look at the specifications as the numbers are often not apples-to-apples comparisons.
The raw lumen value for the Aerosun is 2880 lumens while the beam lumens are typically around 1700.
Best Regards,
Dean Wilkinson
CTO, AeroLEDs LLC
The lumen value he is giving for that particular light is raw lumens from the LEDs as specifed by the LED manufacturer. The problem with raw lumens numbers from the LED manufacturers is that they come from turning the LED on briefly when the die temperature is at 25C. Once you put the LEDs into a real world system, you lose lumens due to temperature effects, current density effects, and lens losses. In practice, the lumens that wind up in the focused beam are typically 60% or so of the raw lumens. All of the lumen values we are using in our datasheets are measured beam lumens (what is actually going out the front of the light in the desired direction). We don't use raw lumens in our datasheets because they are meaningless lab values that don't represent what the user is actually getting.
So I would just caution consumers to carefully look at the specifications as the numbers are often not apples-to-apples comparisons.
The raw lumen value for the Aerosun is 2880 lumens while the beam lumens are typically around 1700.
Best Regards,
Dean Wilkinson
CTO, AeroLEDs LLC
Last edited:
Thanks Dean, it's nice to get facts on numbers. I didn't realize those were manufacturer lumens either since the Rigid site expresses their lights are twice as bright as the competitors it seemed to add up that they must be 3400 real lumens. Still, i hear their products are brilliant, so i mean no ill will. Just good to know.
polishpilot
Well Known Member
Vans also sell their RV10 LED Landing Light kit. They fit well into the RV9 wingtips. A slight adjustment is made when installing.
Landing/taxi light
Some unverified info. I was at a lighting store yesterday and the owner said a good "rule of thumb" when comparing lumens to watts on light bulbs is a16:1 ratio. 16 lumens roughly equals 1 watt in light output. Again, unverified but problably is in the ballpark. Dan
Some unverified info. I was at a lighting store yesterday and the owner said a good "rule of thumb" when comparing lumens to watts on light bulbs is a16:1 ratio. 16 lumens roughly equals 1 watt in light output. Again, unverified but problably is in the ballpark. Dan
JonJay
Well Known Member
Not even close. Maybe for some incandescent light bulbs. We are seeing commercial LED sources exceeding 100 lumens per watt, which is close to what fluorescent sources have been for some time and HID.
As Dean mentioned, don't get hung up on raw lumens. It is all about what you can get at the task. That is all you care about.
There are a lot of factors to evaluate if you are considering LED landing lights. As an example the Rigid guys have a lot of raw lumens, but they also state a 25,000 hour life. If we can find out what LED they are using we could then get a lab test graph from the LED manufacturer and determine if they are overdriving the LED leading to the short life, which is what I expect they are doing to push out more raw lumens. That only tells us what it did in the controlled conditions of a lab. Also, what will it do when we stuff it in a wing and put a lens over it?
If you want to be able to make a true comparison, the LED landing light companies need to start testing to a uniform standard like is done in commercial lighting. LM79 is the testing standard we use. They can then adopt a life and lumen depreciation standard like L80. (Life is established it reaches 80% lumen output.)
As I side note, I just saw a new LED troffer 50,000 hours at L95 and 100,000 hours at L87. That is it will still produce 87% of its lumens at 100,000 hours. You can trust it will as it was tested according to LM79.
I use this
You can see these lights in action here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=0QG3KhN4Y78
You can see these lights in action here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=0QG3KhN4Y78
AeroLEDs_Support
Well Known Member
That is a Teledyne PAR36. The Teledyne consumes 45W just like our Sunspot 36, and puts out about the same number of lumens (1500), but is not as tightly focused as the Sunspot (lower peak candela).
The Paremetheus is a 17W PAR36 light that puts out about 600 lumens with a tight beam. Lumens are measured by shining the beam into an integrating sphere that is calibrated to measure total lumens.
Lumens is the total amount of light produced, candela is the intensity of the light in a specific direction and is calculated by Candela = Lumens/steradian where steradian is a unit of solid angle.
We have a demo setup that we take to trade shows that has a Q4509 bulb, a Teledyne, a Parmetheus, a Sunspot 36, and a 35W HID mounted side by side so that we can show the comparison between the different lights by shining them on the ceiling. This lets people see the relative intensities and beam widths.
The Paremetheus is a 17W PAR36 light that puts out about 600 lumens with a tight beam. Lumens are measured by shining the beam into an integrating sphere that is calibrated to measure total lumens.
Lumens is the total amount of light produced, candela is the intensity of the light in a specific direction and is calculated by Candela = Lumens/steradian where steradian is a unit of solid angle.
We have a demo setup that we take to trade shows that has a Q4509 bulb, a Teledyne, a Parmetheus, a Sunspot 36, and a 35W HID mounted side by side so that we can show the comparison between the different lights by shining them on the ceiling. This lets people see the relative intensities and beam widths.
I use this
You can see these lights in action here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=0QG3KhN4Y78
I know there's a lot of other people interested in the differences or advantages in LED lighting, I've been sort of obsessing as of late. The cost is quite a bit higher than HID, and we're all looking at ways to justify the upgrade. Thought this was an interesting article.
http://www.malibuaerospace.com/sitepages/pid73.php
Still, wishing there was an affordable kit that would replace my DW halogen with a "brilliant" LED setup. Something equivalent to a 55w HID. I talked to Richard at DW about the possibility of using two of his led lights side by side and he also thought about this, but didn't think it would be desirable. Anybody have thoughts, input or suggestions on how to get affordably (under $200) get usable 2k-3k lumens, vs raw lumens.
http://www.malibuaerospace.com/sitepages/pid73.php
Still, wishing there was an affordable kit that would replace my DW halogen with a "brilliant" LED setup. Something equivalent to a 55w HID. I talked to Richard at DW about the possibility of using two of his led lights side by side and he also thought about this, but didn't think it would be desirable. Anybody have thoughts, input or suggestions on how to get affordably (under $200) get usable 2k-3k lumens, vs raw lumens.
AeroLEDs_Support
Well Known Member
Sunspot 46 in L-39
Here are some photos of our new Sunspot 46 in an L-39 wingtip:
http://classicjets.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1783&p=5997
Here are some photos of our new Sunspot 46 in an L-39 wingtip:
http://classicjets.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1783&p=5997
Rigid R+
I have a pair of Rigid R+ lights that I picked up last year at Oshkosh. They appear to be well designed and well built. They project a well behaved beam pattern, and are unbelievably bright.
Unfortunately, I never got a chance to see a direct side-by-side comparison in action of the Rigid R+ next to comparable products from AeroLEDs (most direct comp: Sunspot 36LX). Doing that Pepsi challenge would have been ideal. But short of that, my impressions from seeing both individually are that both are excellent products, but qualitatively the illumination field (intensity, peak and distribution) cast by the Rigid was at least as good if not better, and the Rigid was substantially less expensive than the AeroLEDs (similar list price, but the Rigid guys were willing to haggle, the AeroLEDs guys were not).
As for AeroLEDs, as I've said, I've been impressed by their product offerings, and I give them credit for being a pioneer in this niche. But I'm glad they're finally encountering some serious competition. Hopefully that'll drive further improvement of the product, and drive the prices down.
I have a pair of Rigid R+ lights that I picked up last year at Oshkosh. They appear to be well designed and well built. They project a well behaved beam pattern, and are unbelievably bright.
Unfortunately, I never got a chance to see a direct side-by-side comparison in action of the Rigid R+ next to comparable products from AeroLEDs (most direct comp: Sunspot 36LX). Doing that Pepsi challenge would have been ideal. But short of that, my impressions from seeing both individually are that both are excellent products, but qualitatively the illumination field (intensity, peak and distribution) cast by the Rigid was at least as good if not better, and the Rigid was substantially less expensive than the AeroLEDs (similar list price, but the Rigid guys were willing to haggle, the AeroLEDs guys were not).
As for AeroLEDs, as I've said, I've been impressed by their product offerings, and I give them credit for being a pioneer in this niche. But I'm glad they're finally encountering some serious competition. Hopefully that'll drive further improvement of the product, and drive the prices down.
RV10 LED landing light
Can you point me to this RV10 LED landing light plse?
I cannot find it on the Vans website.
Thanks.
johan
Can you point me to this RV10 LED landing light plse?
I cannot find it on the Vans website.
Thanks.
johan
TCONROY
Well Known Member
Last week I was holding short of the runway at KUAO and the Van's demonstrator RV-9A was on a 3 mile final. Before I could see the airplane, I saw the incredibly bright leading edge landing lights. I've seen many other RV's come into Aurora with the halogens and they are barely noticeable during the daytime. So this week I installed two AeroLED Sunspot 36LX landing lights to replace the Duckworks 100w halogen bulbs in our RV-7. WOW!! They are unbelievably bright!!! I can hardly look directly at them from 25ft without squinting. We don't fly at night much, but we are in a busy area and I wanted better anti-collision visibility. It's also nice that the LED's draw less than 1/4 of the current the halogens were drawing on the electrical system. We have the VP-X programmed to wig-wag above 100kias which I also really like.
Last edited:
Canadian_JOY
Well Known Member
This is much the same result as I've seen with the Baja Designs Squadron Pro lights. When compared to a regular GE4509 bulb, there pretty much is no comparison. The 4509 is a pencil of yellow light, and within that pencil there are shadows caused by the filament posts, etc. The Squadron Pro produces a white light over a much broader beam, and that beam is very smooth with no shadows.
To give a practical comparison, I aimed the lights out our hangar door, across the grass tiedown area, across the runway, across the grass on the far side of the runway and against the line of trees waaay over there. The 4509 allowed me to discern there were trees over there but it was pretty fuzzy. Definitely no way to get a clear outline of the trees to judge their size, density etc. The Squadron Pro allowed me to be able to pretty much tell which species of tree I was looking at. It was a comparison akin to the difference between having your parking lights turned on versus the low beams of your headlights - it really is that stark a contrast between the two lighting systems.
I'm pretty happy that I've got a Squadron Pro out on each wingtip, as well as a pair of 1500lm spot beam lights in the engine cowl. I think I'll be using the cowl lights to taxi because I suspect the Squadron Pros will be too bright to use when other aircraft are operating nearby on the ground.
