New Lights from MRT

There is a new light on the market, and I had to give them a shot. I decided to compare them to, what I feel, are comparable lights on the market. Now, these don't even come close to any China made light, so after I lit these side by side with a set, I decided to not even bother. That being said, I compared them to the Rigid Dually Spot, and the KC Hilites LZR. Both are 3" cubes, and both are listed as 20 watts each, and use 4 LED's in each housing. These are 25 watts, and run 1 LED per housing. They are a 4.7" round light, with a composite housing. Since every manufacture rates lumens differently, I did an actual LUX test on each light, and at 125 feet away from the source.

First, some info on the lights:
Product Description

MRT LuxMaster LED Pod - 120MM
Single Light
Assembled in Las Vegas of primarily USA components.
25w Luminus Devices LED Chip
850ft x 50ft Useable Light Range
10 Degree Driving Beam
9-32v Operating Input
1800 Raw Lumens
Polycarbonate Lens
IP68 Rated
6000k Light Color
Hardware Included

The wire harness is quality stuff. They use deutsch connectors, 40 amp relay, and a nice switch. Light pattern, and color can be changed with "snap on" style filters. The filters have their own rubber gasket to keep any debris or water out.









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Click for full-size image (960 x 543)



Click for full-size image (960 x 543)


My first impression with these lights, was that they definitely throw more light than the others, but also have just enough "spill" to light the sides of the trail. At 4.7", they are on the "small" side of the round light spectrum. However, these throw way more light than a pair of 120 watt KC daylighters, and significantly more than a pair of KC's Gravity series round lights. However, I didn't get a chance to run those lights against a light meter, so I cant say exactly how much more light they put out in comparison.

I compared the MRT LuxMaster lights to the Rigid Dually Spot (1598 Lumens), and the KC 3" LZR Cube (2600 Lumens). The test was done side by side, and 125 feet from the lights.
First, I ran these lights for 1 hour continuous on a stationary vehicle to see how hot they get. The Rigid, and KC lights got around 8* warmer than ambient temp, while the MRT's only got 3* over ambient. Ambient temp was 79* . Clearly over heating isn't an issue.

Next up, actual light output. I used a Sekonic Illuminometer for the actual light output testing.
The Rigid registered 235 LUX, but would drop to 200 LUX 5 feet from center. 15 feet from center the light dropped to 160 LUX. This is mostly due to the Spot pattern of the Rigid light.
The KC LZR registered 225 LUX, and kept that LUX 15 feet from center.

The MRT light put out 345 LUX! (Im actually rounding this down a bit, as most of the time the meter was hitting 350).
That's over 100 more LUX with only 5 watts more power!?

In the beam shot pics, the power box was around 300 feet away, and a filter was used to capture the best light beam pattern. Same filter and camera set up was used for each light. As you can see, the MRT light hit the power box with much more light than the KC LZR. However, the camera setting doesn't do the side spill of light justice. The amount of light these put out, for their size, is fantastic.
KC LZR Cube:
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MRT LuxMaster
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From watching what these lights went thru in testing, to say they are "water proof" may be an understatement. These things have been submerged, frozen while submerged, dropped, etc.. Just short of being shot, these things should work well, for a long time. Chas from Total Automotive Performance has told me that replacement parts are readily available, if they are damaged outside of warranty (For example, if they are shot ).

Interesting note:

Notice how different the Lumen rating for each light is. The Rigids are 1598, the KC's are 2600, and these are 1800. However, these put out 50% more light than the others! Interesting to note.....You cant always trust the Lumen rating. KC might be fudging a little, but MRT is underrating these quite a bit.

 

Thanks for the good review....but why the jeep?

 

I wanted an SUV type vehicle, with off road abilities, so I decided to try the Jeep for a while.