Some time ago I researched using a super bright LED in place of a crater lamp in my Western lens disk set:
http://www.earlytelevision.org/western_empire.html
I have a working crater lamp, but don't want to use it much because they are impossible to find.
At that time I discovered that bright LEDs had too large an aperture to produce the spot light source I need.
Does anyone have any ideas, or are there new LEDs now that I might use?