LED ?'s

[zachtheterrible]

I want to make an LED light to attatch to my paintball gun that i converted to an airsoft gun. Anyway, I have this LED headlight that is white light, and then I have this little blue keychain light. The keychain light is JUST AS BRIGHT as the headlight. I'm wondering what color would make things the most visible. My white light makes for terrible visibility. Also, with the viewing angle, i would imagine that 15 degrees is more concentrated than 30, right? How many mcd does 1 lumen equal? One last question, how many mcd is your regular keychain light?

 

[bmcculla]

The human eye is the most sensitive to green light. You're right that 15 degrees is more concentrated than 30 degrees. I'm not sure what the mcd rating of a normal keychain light is but you should be able to find some very bright green leds

Brent

 

[zachtheterrible]

thanx a lot

 

[Oznog]

Most powerful LEDs in the T1-3/4 case that can go into keychains are a 10,000 mcd red and a green just over 11,000.

 

[gerty]

Here's a place that has some green leds at 13,000 mcd and 8 degrees..
http://superbrightleds.com/leds.htm

 

[zachtheterrible]

I think I just might have to order some of these.

 

[bmcculla]

Take a look at https://www.lumileds.com I saw some of these at the Embedded systems conference that hurt your eyes too look at (one dissipated 5W!). You might take a look at Red to see how bright you can get with those. Red has the advantage of not ruining your night vision.

Brent

 

[Eclipze]

If you want to use this at night, but still keep your night vision sensitivity, then you need to use red. Astronomers wait 20..30 minutes before their eye get fully adjusted to the night sky, then only use red light when necessary to prevent losing their sensitivity.

 

[zachtheterrible]

Do you think that red will create just as good or better visibility as green? Because with the blue and white LED's, anything that is just a little dark, like plants or dirt, just become shadows, and all I can see are the outlines.

 

[bmcculla]

The human eye is much more sensitive to green. A green laser pointer looks maybe 3 times brighter than a red one with the same intensity. But red's worth a try.

 

[zachtheterrible]

there is an electronics store down here, so i just might have to try both.