Monster 100W LED Flashlight Produces A Whopping 8500lm!

100W LED Flashlight

[Yannick] got a hold of a 100W LED diode recently, and like any self-respecting hacker, he just had to turn it into a ridiculously over powered flash light.

The tricky thing about these diodes is that they need a high amount of DC voltage, anywhere from 32-48V typically. [Yannick’s] using a 12V sealed lead acid battery coupled with a 600W constant current boost converter which ups it to 32V at around 3.2A. He also managed to find a giant aluminum heat-sink to keep the diode from getting too hot. A 120mm fan helps to keep the heat sink nice and cool, which allows the light to be run constantly without fear of burning it out. But just in case he also has an Arduino monitoring the temperatures — oh and it provides PWM control to adjust the brightness of the light!

To focus the flashlight he bought a proper lens and reflector which can be mounted directly to the diode. At full power the LED puts out around 8500lm, which is brighter than almost all consumer projectors available — or even the high beams of a car!

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a 100W LED diode being used as a flashlight, but the builds are definitely getting fancier!

33 thoughts on “Monster 100W LED Flashlight Produces A Whopping 8500lm!

  1. And here am I with a tray of 6 100W LEDs… and the only thing I have done with them is blind people (including myself) and project the dies on a wall.
    Does the radiator and fan really need to be so big? I used a small old stock P4 radiator with its fan, it was holdable.

    1. I use a similar (actually larger) heatpipe sink for my 60W and 125W LEDs, with a sink that large you can have a nearly silent fan instead of having to run it at high speed with lots of noise.

      My 25W LEDs are on a slightly smaller sink, but completely fanless.

    2. of course a smaller heatsink would work if there is a strong fan.
      Actually i wanted to use a smaller one but this large heatsink just looks great and i won’t have to worry about any cooling issues.
      Could run forever without getting too hot.

  2. What sort of 100+ watt diodes (they’re actually multiple chips on one die right?) are worth buying now a days? I did a reef aquarium light with Rebel ES, I’ve used Cree XML, but I don’t know about what to play with that’s a small, and very bright package.

    1. the one here looks like the cheapest ebay 100W COB ones. Those are fine when you don’t mind a little less light and lower CRI at a lower price.

      For anything serious i would recommend a proper brand, at the moment it looks like Bridgelux is the only brand for really powerful COB with any quality. Cree is fine, but since they have lower CRI and higher price i wouldn’t recommend them at the moment.

      1. Yes. The lead acid battery was just used before the terminals were mounted to the case.
        Of course i am using a lipo or power supplies now.
        The photo was a bit older. In the video you can see the banana terminals for power.

    1. As a fellow cyclist I ask that you please do not mount this on your bike. Blinding other users of the road is a hazard to all.

      If you’re shredding the singletrack at night, well, carry on then.

  3. I’ve been working on a similar project, but have been trying to keep the cost and parts count down. I found a simple op-amp based current limiter circuit that may work for this monster LED. The pot in the circuit can be used to vary the light level (i.e. limit current, thus limit lumens). The only thing in the circuit that would need to be changed for this LED is the sense resistor.

    http://eositis.wordpress.com/2014/07/18/simple-constant-current-driver-for-a-high-power-led/

  4. With LEDs of this power capability and brightness available, I wonder why we are not yet using them for headlights in automobiles. LEDs have replaced every other automotive light, why are headlights still Haolgen or H.I.D.?

  5. 90 watt LED flood light for our house is fairly impressive in the backyard, If I throw in an inverter & a motorcycle battery, it could get interesting. PIR trigger hung off of a tree makes a instant “Howdy Neighbor!”. I hope they like afterimage and pay attention to which drive they use next time.

  6. I am thinking of putting this out in my back yard connected to a movement detector…if someone or something comes onto my yard uninvited they are going to get the fright of their lives!!

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