On Sat, 7 Dec 2002, Larry Alofs wrote:

> You might be able to spread the beam out by grinding/polishing a flat
> spot on the end to counteract some of the focusing effect.

That was going to be my suggestion.  If you look at the LED from the side,
you can see that most of it is just solid plastic.  The actual diode chip
is way down at the bottom.  I'd try grinding one down a little and see
what happens.