# MCE VS P7 Beam Shots Single Head



## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

Driver from kaidomain.com
Assembly process cross post 
MCE and P7 both using Boom SS
For P7 Boom SS is sanded to 11 mm in height and opening increased to 9 mm using step drill bit. 
Camera set to "Night" Fuji A350 auto exposure of 2 seconds, determines own f-stop.
Bucket at 40 ft, 60 ft, fence at 75 ft

P7 C bin








P7 D bin








MCE J bin








MCE M bin








Trion 600 LED








Alias HID








Light Body


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## troutie-mtb (Sep 20, 2007)

Nice comparisons there Odtexas 
should that be K bin I dont recall any J bin 

Interesting the different colours I have not noticed that with my 2 different bins.


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

Not sure.:crazy: Too much soldering fumes and retina burns from being LED flashed. 
Cutter calls that halogen yellow looking one this though.
MCE4WT-A2-6B0-J0-0-00001 Warm white, 320 min lumens, E6


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## Cat-man-do (May 16, 2004)

The photo of the MC-E, M-bin I think was the most impressive of the lot as it looked to have a bit more spill compared to the P-7's. The P-7, D-bin was interesting in that it looks to be slightly warmer in color than the P-7 C-bin. The warmer color seems to bring out more detail in the terrain and looks very much like the MC-E M-bin. Up until now I didn't know there was a P-7, D-bin. I'm very impressed with the output of your build...:thumbsup: :thumbsup:


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## HuffyPuffy (Jun 9, 2008)

Thanks for the pics. According to the EXIF data for the pics, they were all taken at f2.8, 2sec, ISO200, so they are an apples to apples comparison. I was surprised how well the MCE M bin did. The color of the MC-E does not look too cold either. The MCE J bin looks almost too warm which usually ends up looking dim in comparison to cooler LEDs IMO.


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

Cat- There is a very obvious difference in color between the C and D P7 when seen by eye. That difference even shows a little in the photos. The C is a blue-ish white harsh. The D is a little more natural looking. Much less harsh. 

Huffy- The "J" really does look like a halogen. Some people like the halogen color. I think mixing the two would make for a tasty light. I can mount 2 lights on the helmet easily enough. Can't wait to go and blind my friends.
Thanks for the information on the pictures. I am going to play on google and see if I can figure out how you pulled that information out of the file. I would ask straight away, but it's good to have tried working through new information on your own for a bit. Sort of like all this LED stuff. :thumbsup:


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## msxtr (Dec 10, 2006)

Wowwwwwww, very nice beamshots, thank you very much!!!!

The MC-E M bin and the P7 D bin work really well...

Greetings - Saludos

msxtr


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## Turveyd (Sep 30, 2007)

I like the Blueish ness of the C Bins, D Bins should be similar to MC-E M's then I guess in colour 

That J looks like a 50watt Halogen doesn't it nasty.


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## Vienna1 (Nov 5, 2008)

Didn't you mistake the order the photo of Alias HID and Trion600?
I also have Trion and don't think it is so blueish light.


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

Nope, that is how it looks. Crappy light. Plan to rip out the emitters and put something decent in it. If it didn't suck so bad I probably wouldn't have been motivated to start building my own.
If you look closely at the HID picture you can see the striations in the light at the bottom right corner.
Besides I wrote down the light order as pictures taken.


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## StevelKnivel (Jun 23, 2007)

Nice beamshots.

Do you know the tints of the LEDs you tested here? For both the P7 and the MC-E the bins you are referring to are "output" bins not "tint" bins. The color of the light has nothing to do with C,D,J or K.

P7 tint bins are "Sxx" and MC-E tint bins are "Wx" for the cold-white or an two digit alpha numeric code like "5D" or "7A" for the neutral and warm-white.

The J-bin MC-E puts out 320lm @ 350mA/die while the M bin MC-E hits 430lm @ 350mA/die, likewise the C bin P7 is lower output than the D bin.

A P7 with the CSVOx bin will be more natural (less blue) than a CSXOx bin, while a DSVOx will have the same tint as a CSVOx but puts out more light. Just wanted to clarify so that no one orders LEDs by output bin expecting a certain color of light.

The code from your Cutter order, MCE4WT-A2-6B0-J0-0-00001, means that LED is a "J" output bin and a "6B" tint which is very warm. A "J" bin with a "WH" tint would put out the same amount of light but be much whiter.

There is a great set of tint charts here.


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

That information and more available at kaidomain site links.

Hopefully what you order and what you get are the same. I ordered the D's as a star but recieved bare emitters.

 p7 D
 p7 C
Cutter for MCE
MCE4WT-A2-0000-000M10 Cool white, 430 min lumens,WC Tint
MCE4WT-A2-6B0-J0-0-00001 Warm white, 320 min lumens, E6

That is the tricky part of the bin thing. Efficiency, tint, etc. Hopefully this helped to clarify things a bit.:thumbsup:


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## Cino (Oct 31, 2007)

There has got to be something wrong w/ your Trion 600. It is comparable to the Dinotte 600l, which is brighter than both the Seca and the Trinewt, all of which get good scores in the Lights Shootout. Are your lights that much better than all of those?


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

All the lights are significantly brighter than the Trion. My buddy has the Cygolite TridenX Triple. My Trion looks as bright on the trails as his. His beam pattern is much better though.:thumbsup: 
Using the HID and the Trion was to provide a reference for comparison. Most of us know what a HID looks like. The Trion was used since the makers claim it to be 600 lumens.
I will stick with homebrew lights from here on out.


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## sdnative (Aug 10, 2008)

You have to set everything identical to be truly side by side comparable. Same Exposure time, Same F stop, Same ISO, same White Balance ...and obviously, no flash ..lol.


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

Yep,

On my first shot the flash went off. Felt pretty stupid. 
Huffy has some neat abilty to pull that information out of the image file and verify that all settings were the same.
Nothing I have can peak inside the image data file. However I know its possible and how to do it now. I would just need to purchase a specific type of program for the computer. 
Information always comes in handy sooner or later, so I owe Huffy for educating me.:thumbsup:


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## bikecop (May 20, 2004)

so odtex are you selling these lights? They look pretty impressive. what are the numbers, I'd like to plug them into my pugh matrix.


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

I don't sell things. I do give them to people I ride with and they can order battery packs for them.

Besides my customer service sucks.:madmax:


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## bikecop (May 20, 2004)

odtexas said:


> I don't sell things. I do give them to people I ride with and they can order battery packs for them.QUOTE]
> 
> WOW with a price of $0.00, your score is Infinity, so i guess you win.


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## Geir68 (May 2, 2007)

sdnative said:


> You have to set everything identical to be truly side by side comparable. Same Exposure time, Same F stop, Same ISO, same White Balance ...and obviously, no flash ..lol.


Agree!
A Fujifilm FinePix A350 has to set in manual mode to set the White Balance. Since these are shot in "Night" mode, the White Balance is automatic and the camera will compensate for the white balance of the light.

Geir


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## NuMexJoe (Jan 12, 2004)

Apologies for digging up an old thread, but I'm thinking this type of build will be my first attempt at a MCE light, and I'm curious what you used as the internal heat sink/transfer medium? Would you be willing to divulge? Looks like a very simple, straightforward design. Thanks,
- Joe



odtexas said:


> I don't sell things. I do give them to people I ride with and they can order battery packs for them.
> 
> Besides my customer service sucks.:madmax:


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## odtexas (Oct 2, 2008)

There is a build cross post link  in the first post of the thread.

The heat sink is just a chunk of aluminum cut to tightly fit into the 1 inch square tube. This happens to be 7/8's of an inch square or .875 inchesand about 3/8's of an inch thick. Use some AA epoxy to put it together and then to hold it in place once inside the 1 inch square tube. It is a very simple build with a Boom SS. The Ledil CMC RS is a better lens choice, but tolerances are less.
I would also suggest using a fatman from task led and the MCE wired as 2p2s. The kaidomain driver isn't bad, but reliability is reported as as issue on CPFs.
Or you can do the newest version right here


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## NuMexJoe (Jan 12, 2004)

Thanks!
- Joe


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## AVANTI-SCRATCH (Apr 5, 2009)

This might be a little off topic, but I came across this light the other day http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.20233
What I like about it, is that it fits 3 x 18650 batteries. If they were to use the same torch body but put the batteries in parallel and replace the 7 leds with 1 P7 then you could get well over 2hrs on high mode with the P7. I don't know why this hasn't already been done, because the biggest limitation of these lights is the run time and not so much the lack of illumination.
I hope Ultrafire is listening because if they can make this light as described I would definitely buy one. 
Also it should cost no more than $50 with one P7 led.


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## shuffles (Oct 7, 2008)

And with a smaller head, too. That thing is really wide.


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