What this page is about:

This page lists, in no particular order, suppliers of items that may (or may not) be useful to the optical experimenter.  This can include lenses, LEDs, photodiodes, photomultipliers, or whatever else that I happen to put here.

Because things change, do not be surprised if items appear/disappear from stock, companies change their URLs, or go out of business.

Important Notes:

• The links below are not listed in any particular order.
• I have not done business with all of the listed suppliers.  I have listed the businesses below on good faith and, at the time of writing, have no negative reports on any of them.
• The listing of the suppliers on this page are not intended as overt endorsements and I have no pecuniary interest in any of them.  Having said this, however, various comments have been added to some of the listings:  If you know facts to the contrary or can provide updates, please do so using the link found at the bottom of the page.  In some cases where I have dealt with the listed company, I will mention this - but I can speak only of my own satisfaction in dealing with the company in question.  Please note that the lack of comments does not imply any disapproval, but rather that I have not done business with that company.
• Because some of the suppliers are surplus dealers, the available stock may change and/or some of the items may be used, refurbished, and/or surplus.  As with the case with any surplus outlet, items tend to appear and disappear, depending on their popularity and availability.
• The suitability of the materials and/or components from these sources cannot be guaranteed.  It is up to YOU, the costumer, to do your own research to determine the suitability of the particular items that you are ordering.
• Some of the items obtained from these suppliers (such as large lenses, power supplies, lasers, etc.) may be hazardous if used in an irresponsible manner.  It is up to YOU to become educated as to the safe manner in which these items are to be handled and used.
• Your mileage may vary.  Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball (tm).
  

Lenses (Fresnels, individual lenses, lens assemblies, etc.):

• Edmund Optics:  America - Long-time supplier of quality optical components to Industry, researchers, astronomy buffs, and hobbyists alike.  All sorts of lenses and mirrors are available in varying grades of precision.  (Go to http://www.edmundoptics.com if you aren't in the U.S.)
  
• Edmund Scientific's Scientifics - This is the company that has the neato science and educational-related things, including inexpensive lenses.  Enter "Fresnel" (or other important search terms) in their online site search.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Anchor Optics - This is a division of Edmund Scientific (above) and they have a good selection of both "professional" and "experimental" grade optics - including a reasonable variety of fairly inexpensive Fresnel lenses in their "experimental" line.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Surplus Shed - This place has a large array of inexpensive lenses and optical components of all sorts - some of it new, much of it surplus.  Enter "Fresnel" (or other important search terms) in their online site search.  While this company was the source of the Fresnel Lenses used in several of my optical transceivers, they may or may not have Fresnel lenses in stock!  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• 3dlens - This company (based in Taiwan) specializes in supplying all sorts of Fresnel lenses of different sizes and types.  They accept PayPal.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• bhlens - This company appears to be the manufacturer of many of the inexpensive Fresnel lenses available nowadays and may be the supplier of at least some of the products sold by 3dlens (above.)  They only seem to accept direct payment.  (Even though bhlens is cheaper than other suppliers, opinion amongst those on various chat groups seems to indicate that it is more convenient to avoid the payment hassle and buy from 3dlens unless a "group buy" is done.)
• Electronic Goldmine - This surplus place has small assortment of lenses and related items, often including some rather larger Fresnel lenses - use the on-site search engine to find what you are looking for.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• American Science and Surplus - This company has a wild assortment of science-related items - some of it surplus, some new.  They also have a limited variety of various lenses, including some Fresnel lenses.  This company was the source of the "full page sheet magnifier" Fresnel lenses (and of the very inexpensive acrylic DCX secondary lenses) used in my cheap optical enclosure.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Alltronics - This surplus outlet often has a small assortment of optics - including some very large Fresnels.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• All Electronics - Another surplus outlet that often has high power LEDs and LED assemblies - look in their "LED" section.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Marlin P. Jones and Associates - Yet another surplus outlet that often has LEDs and optical things:  Look under "LCD, LED & Lamps -> LEDs".  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Ultra Optix (Fresnel Lenses) -  This place has a variety of small and medium (page) sized Fresnels.
• Laurel Industries - Another specialty lens company that can supply many types of lenses, including Fresnels.
• Fresnel Technologies - A specialty supplier of Fresnel lenses.
  

Optical-related electronic components:

Many suppliers of electronic components happen to stock many components that are useful to the optical experimenter.  There are also several surplus outlets that also have suitable components as well.

• Edmund Industrial Optics - Long-time supplier of quality optical components to Industry, researchers, astronomy buffs, and hobbyists alike.  Many types of optical detectors - both solid state and vacuum-tube based (like photomultipliers) are available.
• Mouser Electronics - Amongst the vast variety of electronic components, Mouser stocks a large variety of PIN Photodiodes such as the BPW34.  They also carry more-specialized photodiodes of various sizes, including Avalanche Photodiodes (APDs.)  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Digi-Key Electronics - Like Mouser, Digi-Key also has a wide variety of electronic (including optical) components.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Arrow Electronics - Another supplier of wide varieties of electronic components, and distributer of some of the Cree high-power LED devices.  It is unknown if small, hobbyist quantities of the Cree devices are readily available from this supplier.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Electronic Goldmine - This surplus place often has several types of detectors, such as PIN photodiodes (like the BPW33 or S1223-01) among a few others.  At the time of writing, they also have an LED-CdS cell "Optical Coupler" (used as OC1 on the Linear Current Modulator) which is P/N:  G15396.  Use the on-site search engine to find what you are looking for.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Lumileds - This is the best place to get the data sheets and design information for the Philips Luxeon (and related) LEDs.  While it was possible to order Luxeon LEDs from this site in the past (via Future Electronics) one is now directly linked to the Future web site (see below) for those products that have such links.
• Future Electronics - This is the supplier to which the "Lumileds" site (above) linked:  For the U.S. this is the main supplier of the Philips Lumileds line.  In the past, I have been able to purchase small quantities of Luxeon LEDs through the Lumileds site.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Note:  Philips is apparently phasing out the Luxeon I, III, and V lines in favor of the lower-power Luxeon Rebel devices.  Since I have not used those other devices, the techniques described here may not directly apply.  For the time being, however, the Luxeon III devices are still available from various sources.
• A direct link to the Philips Lumileds line may be found here.  Select the "Filter by - CUTT" tab along the right side of the page to view those devices that are available in single-unit quantities.
• Comment:  As of 12/2009, I noted that some of the pages on this web site tended to cause difficulty with some web browsers, requiring occasional "reloads" or even closing and re-launching of the browser due to apparent problems with various Javascript apps that are used.
• The LED Light - This is another place that stocks high-power LEDs in all sorts of varieties, from individual LED emitters to LED-Lens assemblies to retrofits for flashlights.  While this place is often more expensive than ordering direct from Lumileds/Future, they stock different items and may have available product when Lumileds does not.  This company also sources some of the Cree high-power LED devices, but color availability may be limited.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Avnet Electronics - Another general-purpose supplier of electronics components, including photodiodes and LEDs, including some of the high-power Phlatlight varieties.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
• Spark Fun Electronics - This place has all sorts of neat components and component modules - including some high-power LEDs.  (I have ordered from this company and have been satisfied with their products and/or service.)
  
• Sphere Research Corporation - Phototubes - This company sells a wide variety of surplus gear, including photomultiplier tubes.
  

Important notes concerning PIN photodiodes:

• If you are using a PIN Photodiode for detection of VISIBLE light, make certain that any photodiode that you get is in a  clear case.  Many such devices are intended for infrared only and are housed in a dark plastic that will pass very little visible light.
• Also note that conventional silicon photodiodes operate best in the RED and Near-Infrared spectrum and that they do rather poorly in the green-blue spectrum.
  

Important notes concerning Luxeon LEDs:

• Other pages on this site use the high-power Luxeon III LED emitters.  Please note that the Luxeon LEDs come in a variety of different configurations:
• Color:  Remember that the longest wavelengths are most appropriate for atmospheric transmission, as well as falling within the most sensitive part of the response curve of silicon photodetectors.  For such applications, the RED (627nm) Luxeons are the most appropriate.
• Beam pattern:
• For use with Fresnel and other types of lenses, you will want to use Luxeons with the Lambertian pattern - that is, light is emitted in a cone-shaped pattern from the "top" of the LED.  Note that even with this beam pattern, additional optics are usually required for best efficiency when used with lenses.
  
• For use with Parabolic reflectors, you may find that the Side-Emitting pattern is more appropriate for illumination of the reflector.  As the name implies, light is emitted from the sides of the LED, rather than the top, possibly making it more useful for the "deep" parabolic reflectors often found on small searchlights and larger flashlights.  It is up to you to determine which pattern is best for your optics.
• Package style:
• Luxeon Emitter:  This is the "Raw" LED in a package with leads on the side and a metal slug on the backside for heatsinking.  Applying full power to an emitter before it is attached to a heatsink will result in its immediate destruction.  Prior to powering up a device in this package, it must be properly attached to a suitable heat sink using an appropriate thermally-conductive epoxy.  It has been found that "JB-Weld" (an inexpensive, metal-filled epoxy found at many hardware stores in the U.S.) does an excellent job in terms of both adhesion and thermal conductivity.
• Luxeon Star:  This is a Luxeon Emitter that has been attached to a small, aluminum heatsink.  Note that the heatsink that comes attached to the LED WILL NOT dissipate full power of the LED, so this heat sink must, in turn, be attached to a larger heatsink.  The advantage of the Luxeon Star package is that one can use screws and heat sink compound to attach the device to a larger heat sink.  Note, however, that under the best of conditions, the Luxeon Star has 10-15% higher thermal resistance than a Luxeon Emitter that is properly mounted directly to the heatsink.
• Luxeon I versus Luxeon III:
• The Luxeon I is a lower-power device (nominally 1 watt) that preceded the Luxeon III and is capable of handling a continuous current of only about 350 milliamps.  As you might expect, it is not capable of the amount of optical output of the higher-power Luxeon III.
• The Luxeon III is a newer device, capable of handling at least 3 watts of power - with the Red, Red-Orange, and Amber versions rated for a bit over 4 watts.  It has a potential luminous output several times that of the Luxeon I.
• There are other types of Luxeon devices as well.  At the time of writing, none of the other product lines had devices that equaled the output of the Luxeon III devices in the Red wavelengths.

Cree High-power LEDs:

• Cree Semiconductor makes LEDs with output fluxes that are in the neighborhood of those of the Luxeon III devices.  I have not used any of these devices (yet) so I am not thoroughly familiar with their specifications.  A few of Cree's devices are available to the hobbyist from "The LED Light" listed above.
  

Additional comments:

• Because technology is always advancing, new products are appearing all of the time, so this information may soon become outdated.  If it does - and you know about newer products, please let me know.
• It has been reported that a number of the high-output devices have been counterfeited, with inferior "knock-offs" being marketed as brand-name devices:  Often, these devices may be identified by the presence of two LED chips inside the device rather than just one high-power die.  Reports indicate that attempts to run these devices at current levels appropriate for the "genuine article" will result in very rapid degradation of optical output as the inferior devices are destroyed by the excess power dissipation.  If you buy from other than a reputable distributer (I have reasonable confidence that those listed on this page are reputable - if you believe otherwise, please let me know) then please make sure that you do your homework to make sure that you get what you are paying for!  To my knowledge, these devices have appeared on the retail market largely in Asia and New Zealand/Australia and not from reputable suppliers in the U.S.
• If you buy LEDs over the internet - say, via Ebay, you should very carefully scrutinize the reputation of the seller to make sure that you are buying what you think you are buying!
  

If you have questions or comments concerning the contents of this page, if have information about other suppliers, feel free to contact me using the information at this URL.
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