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Sound Reinforcement - Forums for Live Sound Professionals - Your Displayed Name Must Be Your Real Full Name To Post In The Live Sound Forums => Lighting Forum => Topic started by: Tim Weaver on October 06, 2019, 10:52:01 AM
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I kinda want to put up 3 ACL 4-bars in our youth room. I have been looking around for a modern LED version of this classic and can't really find one.
There are several moving, multi-headed types of lights, but it's not exactly what I want. I wish they made those heads in stand-alone par type fixtures, but with the super tight beam.
Maybe I could use some of the newer LED pinspots if they are bright enough. This is a smaller stage. I'll be using some 60 watt LED movers (Intimidator Scan 305) and your basic mismash of LED pars. So it doesn't have to compete with pro lights, but I want it to be bright enough to punch through a wash.
Got any suggestions?
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Here's my wash lights. You can see this is a smaller stage. Maybe 25x15 or so.
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I kinda want to put up 3 ACL 4-bars in our youth room. I have been looking around for a modern LED version of this classic and can't really find one.
There are several moving, multi-headed types of lights, but it's not exactly what I want. I wish they made those heads in stand-alone par type fixtures, but with the super tight beam.
Maybe I could use some of the newer LED pinspots if they are bright enough. This is a smaller stage. I'll be using some 60 watt LED movers (Intimidator Scan 305) and your basic mismash of LED pars. So it doesn't have to compete with pro lights, but I want it to be bright enough to punch through a wash.
Got any suggestions?
There might be some, but there wouldn't be much motivation to package them as 4 bars. Aircraft Landing Lights (ACL) were 28V lamps, so were packaged as bars of 4 in series to use with 120VAC. Since any modern replacement wouldn't require the series wiring they could be packaged individually. Any bright narrow beam unit should be be able to simulate what ACLs did, which was usually beams in haze or streaks on backdrops.
Mac
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There might be some, but there wouldn't be much motivation to package them as 4 bars. Aircraft Landing Lights (ACL) were 28V lamps, so were packaged as bars of 4 in series to use with 120VAC. Since any modern replacement wouldn't require the series wiring they could be packaged individually. Any bright narrow beam unit should be be able to simulate what ACLs did, which was usually beams in haze or streaks on backdrops.
Mac
True that.
It's mostly that I'm accustomed to seeing them in groups of 4. I figured there might be something out there to simulate this effect. It probably doesn't sell very well though since it's kind of a one-trick pony.
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Well, Elation has the cuepix4 and ChauvetPro has the Strike4 but they are rather overkill and no doubt above budget. Looking around at Amazon, I was intrigued with the U'King and Donner "beam pinspot" fixtures. They re 19W, RGB(maybeW), dmx control and have a yoke. I could see rigging four of them in a quad.
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Well, Elation has the cuepix4 and ChauvetPro has the Strike4 but they are rather overkill and no doubt above budget. Looking around at Amazon, I was intrigued with the U'King and Donner "beam pinspot" fixtures. They re 19W, RGB(maybeW), dmx control and have a yoke. I could see rigging four of them in a quad.
Here's the white only (I think) version of that light. These are all over eBay, and I've thought about making a 4-bar of these just to see how well they work.
https://ebay.to/2ASqSLm
This Donner light has a reviewer showing that it does have RGBW led's (see pictures):
https://www.amazon.com/Donner-Spotlight-Pinspot-Lightning-Control/dp/B019GFDK10
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I have a 10w white only version of the above led pinspots and IMO it beats the 12v ACL, don't remember if I bought that fixture online or locally but I had to search for the white only version.
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Here's the white only (I think) version of that light. These are all over eBay, and I've thought about making a 4-bar of these just to see how well they work.
https://ebay.to/2ASqSLm
This Donner light has a reviewer showing that it does have RGBW led's (see pictures):
https://www.amazon.com/Donner-Spotlight-Pinspot-Lightning-Control/dp/B019GFDK10
Just not sure how much punch those little guys would actually have. I ended up buying 6 of the American DJ Saber Spot. https://www.adj.com/saber-spot-rgbw
I'll let you know how well they work. I figure I'll do three groups of two lights to start with. I just want to get some beams happening in there. If they work out I'll add some more next year.
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I have a 10w white only version of the above led pinspots and IMO it beats the 12v ACL, don't remember if I bought that fixture online or locally but I had to search for the white only version.
By 12v ACL do you mean a pinspot? It wouldn't be hard to beat that.
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By 12v ACL do you mean a pinspot? It wouldn't be hard to beat that.
Yes.. but to be clear this is comparing a chauvet 30w acl pinspot to the 10w led pinspot.
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Just not sure how much punch those little guys would actually have. I ended up buying 6 of the American DJ Saber Spot. https://www.adj.com/saber-spot-rgbw
I'll let you know how well they work. I figure I'll do three groups of two lights to start with. I just want to get some beams happening in there. If they work out I'll add some more next year.
Please do. Those ADJ's look like the real deal, and you can at least believe the 15W claim. With that narrow beam, those should be nice.
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Please do. Those ADJ's look like the real deal, and you can at least believe the 15W claim. With that narrow beam, those should be nice.
I like how the beam comes out collimated. It doesn't "flip" after it leaves the lens like the cheap ones do.
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Tim, I was wondering what your conclusion was. Searching on line I find a lot of aircraft LED replacement lamps, but nothing like the various 28V PAR lamps that were (are) used in concerts.
I have used both the 250W and 600W PAR 64 - 28V ACL's. I also came across PAR56 30V locomotive headlights which made for slightly smaller lower powered "ACL" effects in the pre LED days. The 28V PAR36 ACL lamp was used to make "mini ACL 4 bars". When I first bought 4 light "audience blinders" I used these wired in series instead of the "correct" 120V 650W DWE wired in parallel. A few of the audience member were very well lit! I was corrected by the LD after the first show. Now the new LED audience blinders contain some amber LED to emulate the glow of dimmed DWE's without needing 2600 watts of dimmer per set of four!
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Tim, I was wondering what your conclusion was. Searching on line I find a lot of aircraft LED replacement lamps, but nothing like the various 28V PAR lamps that were (are) used in concerts.
I have used both the 250W and 600W PAR 64 - 28V ACL's. I also came across PAR56 30V locomotive headlights which made for slightly smaller lower powered "ACL" effects in the pre LED days. The 28V PAR36 ACL lamp was used to make "mini ACL 4 bars". When I first bought 4 light "audience blinders" I used these wired in series instead of the "correct" 120V 650W DWE wired in parallel. A few of the audience member were very well lit! I was corrected by the LD after the first show. Now the new LED audience blinders contain some amber LED to emulate the glow of dimmed DWE's without needing 2600 watts of dimmer per set of four!
The lights have been delivered, but I took the week off to do a bunch of projects around the house. I'll get back to it this coming week.
Thats funny. I could just imagine a 4 light loaded up with ACL's! haha
Yeah we used both flavors of ACL in the bad old days too. If we had the 120k rig out we had four 4-bars of Par 64 sized ACL's/ For club shows we had another four 4-bars of par 38 ACl. They really made an impact in a club! We would routinely put up 24-36k of pars plus the 4 little ACL's.
Man, what a pile of work we gave ourselves back then........
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Let me know what you think please. I'm about to order 4 of the Saber Spot Go battery versions. They cost a lot more than pinspots but I think they will do a lot more, as well.
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Let me know what you think please. I'm about to order 4 of the Saber Spot Go battery versions. They cost a lot more than pinspots but I think they will do a lot more, as well.
I recently noticed that 4Wall/usedlighting.com has some ADJ B-stock units for sale.
https://www.usedlighting.com/44262/adj-saber-spot-go?ref=weekly
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I recently noticed that 4Wall/usedlighting.com has some ADJ B-stock units for sale.
https://www.usedlighting.com/44262/adj-saber-spot-go?ref=weekly
I found probably the same supply but on amazon. I payed 99 each for 6 of them.
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Here's a little update on the "LED ACL" prject.
I got the Saber Spots in and I am fairly impressed with them. I also got some B-stock Intimidator 305 scanners as well. More on that later.
To be right up front about it, these are club level lights!. I will be using these on a stage with a 10 foot height, about 12 foot deep and maybe 25 feet wide. Not a big space at all! The seating in there is maybe 150 if they are packed in.
Now on to the show.
I unpacked one of each light and threw it in automatic mode just to see whats up.
White and white the Saber Spot seems a little lacking.
(https://i.imgur.com/XCd6Hyfl.jpg)
But things change dramatically when the Spots are using color. Colors out of the saber spot seem a good bit brighter than just the white.
(https://i.imgur.com/nrDCjhWl.jpg)
The Intimidator 305's are a 60 watt LED source. Pretty dang bright for the size, weight, and price I'd say! Here is a few shots of the two lights overlayed so you can see relative brightness. The 305's in a royal blue will allow beams from the Saber Spots to highlight pretty well I think.
(https://i.imgur.com/wQqTB2Tl.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/xwoWPzol.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/7UOTXM4l.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/RRkFGG9l.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/h49uQbDl.jpg)
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Just FYI I was about 20-25 feet away from that wall. No lights on in the room, but there are large windows on my right. It's an overcast day though, so make of that what you will. Ambient is brighter than a club, darker than most churches.
So here's a bit about the Intimidator 305's.
I chose these because the brightness is clearly there for a club sized fixture, but also they have one extremely important feature that makes them look like big-boy lights. Rotating Gobos. Yes. They only have one gobo wheel, but they rotate. Plus it has a simple 3 facet prism so you can split those rotating gobos and have some real texture on stage. The cracked glass gobo will be especially useful I think!
Did I mention they were small?
(https://i.imgur.com/IWFNDz5l.jpg)
The Saber Spot is in the window back there.
Gobos and prisms.
(https://i.imgur.com/GcuWkCbl.jpg)
(https://i.imgur.com/UBhS1oNl.jpg)
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Thanks Tim. I was hoping the Saber Spots were brighter, but they are what they are. There are some LED ACL aircraft replacement lamps out there. Some are very pricy! I found a comparison video for incandescent, HID, and LED versions of the PAR 36's. I don't have the link, but it was interesting. I'll try to find it. The LED and HID were very pricy compared the 28V PAR 36.
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That's awesome Tim.
I have to light a disco ball and the little pinspot go lights just didn't seem like I would even get another use out of them. Seems like the Saber Spot Go will be useful in more situations. Definitely plenty of light output for accent lighting at events. Wedding cakes will never be the same now.
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Thanks Tim. I was hoping the Saber Spots were brighter, but they are what they are. There are some LED ACL aircraft replacement lamps out there. Some are very pricy! I found a comparison video for incandescent, HID, and LED versions of the PAR 36's. I don't have the link, but it was interesting. I'll try to find it. The LED and HID were very pricy compared the 28V PAR 36.
The non-certified aircraft lights are cheap enough:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008UBVC26/?coliid=I2PB1G77OUBIUN&colid=1ZA0LKMGHFMHQ&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it
In the questions, the manufacturer states that they have a narrow beam version. Might be worth looking into.
https://amzn.to/2plk5qW
I'm interested in seeing the Saber Spots with some fog or haze.
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That's awesome Tim.
I have to light a disco ball and the little pinspot go lights just didn't seem like I would even get another use out of them. Seems like the Saber Spot Go will be useful in more situations. Definitely plenty of light output for accent lighting at events. Wedding cakes will never be the same now.
They also come with some lens options for making a wash, but I don't know how well those work. I'm only interested in the beam. If I get time to mess with that stage this week I'll take some pics of the different lenses. Maybe with some haze.
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Set them up with some haze. Just doing automatic epilepsy mode.
By themselves in the dark
https://i.imgur.com/6HWOEGY.mp4
With the wall wash
https://i.imgur.com/nwQfjqz.mp4
Wall wash and rear wash together.
https://i.imgur.com/RZLdACY.mp4
Full spaz mode. This is what is running during the hype-up bit while kids are entering. It's a youth church service.
https://i.imgur.com/nKZJKs2.mp4
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Also, I guess my phone can't handle shooting in the dark with a bunch of haze in the air. The image stabilization was going wacky. I had the phone resting on the doghouse while shooting these, thinking my hands were shaking, but it wasn't me!
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Set them up with some haze. Just doing automatic epilepsy mode.
By themselves in the dark
https://i.imgur.com/6HWOEGY.mp4
With the wall wash
https://i.imgur.com/nwQfjqz.mp4
Wall wash and rear wash together.
https://i.imgur.com/RZLdACY.mp4
Full spaz mode. This is what is running during the hype-up bit while kids are entering. It's a youth church service.
https://i.imgur.com/nKZJKs2.mp4
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Thanks for the videos, I was wondering if these Saber spots would stand up for use like this as stage highlights. Guess they will be OK. I just got my in and I'm underwhelmed with the jerky color fades on the auto shows.
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I have yet to see a budget LED light recreate the true look and feel of the vintage ACL lights. The color spectrum, the beam pattern, the intensity and the cooling time and temperature change of the lamp are all pieces that go into the effect.
Now, a close second place that I've used in small venues that is truly dirt cheap is 300 watt halogen work lights.
You can find them for about 10 bucks each. Remove the existing floor bracket and bend your own and it looks like something that belongs on a truss.
Yeah, they aren't LEDs, and draw more current, but you're likely only using them for a few seconds at a time, so that's not that huge of a concern, as long as you wire them up correctly.
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I have Intimidator 260's and a pair of Intimidator 375's that I'm happy with. Wasn't sure if you wanted anything like that.
Have a look at these, Inno Pocket Z4. The zoom works fantastic and color and motion is real good too - responsive and quiet. Real versatile little lights - flood, wash or spot.
https://www.adj.com/inno-pocket-z4
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I haven't ordered or seen these but they are 40 watts, RGBW, and a manual zoom of 4 to 60 degrees, and fairly inexpensive if you can deal with ordering direct from PRC.
https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/LEAHUA-Wedding-40W-led-pinspot-light_1600076636378.html?spm=a2700.themePage.1022881076417.9.219c5d28V7DL43
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Back from the dead I see.
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Thanks for the videos, I was wondering if these Saber spots would stand up for use like this as stage highlights. Guess they will be OK. I just got my in and I'm underwhelmed with the jerky color fades on the auto shows.
I don't notice it on DMX. These would most likely be fine for edge-of-stage fixtures, but they aren't the cheapest thing out there and they don't wiggle.
I have yet to see a budget LED light recreate the true look and feel of the vintage ACL lights. The color spectrum, the beam pattern, the intensity and the cooling time and temperature change of the lamp are all pieces that go into the effect.
Now, a close second place that I've used in small venues that is truly dirt cheap is 300 watt halogen work lights.
These two things are not equal. The halogen work light has long been a staple "crowd blinder" on the club level for decades. But they do not throw beams, which was the point of an ACL. For my use these Saber Spots can kinda-sorta replicate a decent fat beam on a small stage setting. Bonus is that the change color.
I have Intimidator 260's and a pair of Intimidator 375's that I'm happy with. Wasn't sure if you wanted anything like that.
Have a look at these, Inno Pocket Z4.
These were on my short list, but were a little too pricy for this project. I didn't need moving fixtures even though it would have been fun to have.
I haven't ordered or seen these but they are 40 watts, RGBW, and a manual zoom of 4 to 60 degrees, and fairly inexpensive if you can deal with ordering direct from PRC.
https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/LEAHUA-Wedding-40W-led-pinspot-light_1600076636378.html?spm=a2700.themePage.1022881076417.9.219c5d28V7DL43
I mean, give them a try, but I don't think you'll get the same effect out of these. I'm guessing that the light will come out of the lens, get narrower at a focal point, then spread again at some random angle. This is not collimated light like a true "beam" fixture. Plus the beam will probably not consistently mix the colors.
The Saber spots are completely different optically, which is part of why they are 100 bucks a piece.
That's not to say these pinspots wouldn't work fine for doing pinspot suff. I'm sure they will.