Beam Patterns (Flood, Spot, Combo, Trapezoid)
A beam pattern describes how a lamp distributes its light: flood beams deliver wide, short-range illumination; spot beams project a narrow, concentrated beam over distance; combination beam lights provide both from a single housing.
Choosing the right beam pattern matters more than raw wattage: the same LEDs aimed through different optics either light a wide working area or reach far ahead of the machine, rarely both.
The four common patterns
Flood (wide beam, typically 60–120°): Broad, close-range coverage. Good for viewing wide angles at a moderate distance: cab, fender and reverse mounting locations, loading areas.
Spot (narrow beam, typically 10–30°): A focused, long-distance beam that lights the path far ahead. Ideal for roof-mounted forward lighting on machines that travel.
Combination (combo): Spot and flood optics within a single housing, giving reach at the centre and spread at the edges.
Trapezoid: A low, wide pattern shaped for travelling at moderate speed on roads without blinding oncoming traffic.
How to choose
Match the pattern to the mounting location and task: floods around the machine, spots ahead of it, combos where one lamp must do both. Our LED work lights range covers all four patterns; LED driving lights handle the long-range road-oriented duties.
Shop related products
Related terms
Raw lumens come from the LED chip datasheet; “effective lumens” is the trade term for the light that actually leaves the lamp after optical, thermal and electrical losses. The gap is real, typically 20–40 %, but no standards body defines the term and each brand measures it at a different point, so effective-lumen figures are not comparable between suppliers.
Color Temperature (Kelvin)Color temperature, in kelvin (K), describes the tint of white light. Established work-lamp brands specify 5000–5700 K, not the 6000–6500 K usually quoted, and several add 2700–2800 K warm variants for dust and snow. It says nothing about brightness or legal colour.
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