Alternatives:
a) Built in heatsink - anyone do a basic, cheap, range of deep red LEDs
3W+ with its own heatsink eg TO3b) Heatsink compound with some kind of mechanical fixture to a standard heatsink
Too bulky. I'm thinking of densely mounted LEDs for portable lighting.
This is a prototype that I photographed:
The dense mounting allows for momentary use at extremely high intensity or continuous use at low power where the LEDs are most efficient. I'm using the final product as a bicycling and hiking light. It normally consumes under 2W but can temporarily operate at up to 60W for finding landmarks in remote areas. It continuously adjusts from a faint glow to brighter than car highbeams.
I'd like to build a more compact version using smaller lenses but I don't have a good solution for transferring such a concentrated source of heat. Building with aluminum rather than copper, pyrolytic graphite, and carbon fiber would simplify the design a lot too.
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