We haven’t thrashed this topic around for a couple of years. Anyone bought them lately and care to share an opinion?
Around here HD is promoting the Phillips ones
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Replies
Scott
Just installed some linear undercabinet LED's on a job. Ambiance by Seagull.
Not cheap.
But, the same thing in Xenon or Halogen, way hotter.
Warm your beer glass hot v. not hot of LED.
Price example-......................crap, out in the van.
Will go grab it later.
Nice white light on these, dimmable, mount the same as the other lamps from Ambiance.
.6 watts each.
Are still way too expensive pay for themselves.
>>>Are still way too
>>>Are still way too expensive pay for themselves.
Yeah, I wonder the same thing. On the packaging they make a big deal out of how much you'll save over time, and the fact that the bulb will last 15 years, but I have to wonder if that's only under ideal conditions.
We've been quite underwhelmed by the performance of CFLs in our pot lights. To the point that we wish we hadn't put pot lights in. CFLs, even those rated for "recessed lighting" don't seem to last nearly as long in the pots compared with exposed ones.
The problem with any of these new age bulbs is that the ballast is above he reflector so there is no way to radiate the heat down.
>>>The problem with any of
>>>The problem with any of these new age bulbs is that the ballast is above he reflector so there is no way to radiate the heat down
Zackly.
So it drives me nuts when you buy a bulb, actually recommended for "recessed lighting" of the design you describe, but then it fails after one or two years when it's apparently rated for seven years!
Sheesh.
Today's LED Lights
I've been installing LEDs gradually throughout my home; the one thing I don't like is the difference in color temperature necessary to produce the same lumens. I terms of sensation, I prefer a warmer color temperature, but to provide more lumens I've chosen mostly cooler bulbs in terms of color temperature. FWIW, the change in our electric bill has been rather dramatic, so I'm pleased even though the bulbs themseleves are pricey. (I haven't recorded specific differences, but subjectively they seem to be pretty big. Most of our lights are "pot" lamps (or "down lights") using 11mm (E11) Halogen spots, which put out quite a bit of heat. The high-lumen LEDS are much cooler, of course, both in heat and color tempurature.
Just got some
I made an impulse buy of a few LED bulbs at Costco the other day. They were fairly expensive. I not-so-long-ago got a LED bulb catalog from one of my electrical wholesalers, but I tossed it when I should have kept it... I bet their prices are better. The first LED I put in replaced the CFL in the ceiling fixture in my daughter's room, which was absolutely the slowest warm-up bulb I've ever known. It's a 12 watt bulb, comes on instantly, is dimmable, and the warm color tone is quite nice. Hopefully it'll last at least a decade. The second one I put in replaced a standard 75-watt incandescent in a floor lamp in the living room. We like it. You can stick your hand in the shade and grab the bulb and it's warm but does not burn you.
CFLs are OK. I have installed 100s of them for the electric utility's energy program. They are slow to warm up, not dimmable, and have slightly goofy color. Some people don't care at all, they want the savings.
The thing I hate about all bulbs is... made in China. As far as I know, only one company makes bulbs here, using imported parts. That's stupid.
Haven't tried LED bulbs yet, but probably will in the next couple of months. We converted to mostly CFLs several years back and it made a big difference in our electric bill, plus I don't have to change light bulbs every few days like I used to.
>>>plus I don't have to
>>>plus I don't have to change light bulbs every few days like I used to.
Yeah, we've used CFLs too, almost exclusively, but find that even those rated for "recessed lightling" don't last long in pots. I'm hoping the LED solution will fare better.
Scott
From my electrical supplier:
Seagull UnderCab in line lamp holder-5.00
Frosted lamp=3000K, 12v-15.00
Seagull 60 watt zero load driver-60.00
support track for cable-4'-7.50
cable-2.00/ft.
Running fully around cab bottom-side / front / side-14' with bulbs every 4"-about 65.00 per foot. Nice lite, dimmable.
You could also
look at LED tape light for an application like that. I've used a product from Jesco that worked well. Wonder if I have any pics around here... yeah, on the other computer, I'll post something a little later.
Thanks David
I'll look forward to checking it out.
JESCO tape light
Here's what the stuff looks like. There's an LED every 5/8" of an inch or so. It comes in 12" sections that can be joined together end-to-end. If you look closely at the photo you can see that it can be field-cut every 4". There are various power connectors that clip on one end of the total length. There are fittings for turning corners and so on. There is a small aluminum C-channel that the tape fits into, it's about 1/2" x 3/4" if I recall. There is a plastic diffuser that snaps into the face of the channel.
Overall, super-cool stuff. It's fairly expensive. You have to hide the power supply somewhere. I used it on the project in the photo, it is hiding under the overhang of the bronze top, lighting the glass, on both sides.
David
Who's the source for that?
edit: I'm sorry, borrowing this laptop and I'm not too good for reading either.
Jesco, I'll look it up.
thanks
Belated Thanksgiving salutations!
Thanks Calvin.
If you don't want to wait for LEDs, the thing to do with the pots is to change them out for commercial units with a separate ballast.
>>>If you don't want to wait
>>>If you don't want to wait for LEDs, the thing to do with the pots is to change them out for commercial units with a separate ballast.
Sounds like a ton of rewiring though, and probably tearing down drywall. Don't think I'd every get a return on my investment, especially with LED solutions on the horizon. Am I thinking right?
Yeah, if LEDs were 5 years further out it would probably be worth considering. It's a little late at this point.
CFL vs. LED
I am not sure about all this buzz about LEDs.
Just some ~very rough~ lumen/watt numbers:
Incandecent: 17
CFL: 70
LED: 80
In other words moving from incandecent to CFL yields something like a 400% increase in efficency.
While moving from CFL to LED yields just 15%.
On the CFL side I am very happy with the 4100K 23 watt "cool white" units we have used throughout our place. They are white to bluish-white, not that goofy green you normally associate with CFLs. Its worth trying different brands and colour temperatures. The ones you don't like can always be used in secondary locations like the garage or basement.
John
>>>While moving from CFL to
>>>While moving from CFL to LED yields just 15%.
Good point.
Although my concern is that i don't think I'm getting my 400% increase in efficiency (switching from tungsten to CFL) because many of our fixtures are pot lights and the bulbs die young.
If LEDs offer 15% more efficiency, and they are immune from the confines of pot fixtures, and they are rated for 15 year lifespan, and they have a reasonably neutral color temperature, then I'm in.
colour temperature AND colour rendering index
Scott
As I understand it you need to concern yourself with BOTH the colour temperature and the CRI.
Less expensive LEDs (and older fluorescents) have horrible CRIs. Their output spectrum can be a very narrow spike at the particular colour temperature you are looking for, however they provide a very low CRI. The result is some colours look right and others don't. (i.e. that paint you just bought won't look like it did in the store.)
In general you want a CRI of 90 or greater.
John
Yep, color temp is essentially the average frequence of the light waves, while CRI is a measure of how "flat" the spectrum (graph of amplitude vs frequency) is. A higher color temp produces an oddly "cooler" color, while a low CRI produces garish colors at any color temp.
In practice, if you look at the spectrum of most fluorescents you'll just see a sequence of "spikes", vs a smooth curve, but if there are enough spikes at the right colors then the eye won't notice the difference. An incandescent lamp, on the other hand, has a smooth "bell shaped" (though skewed) curve for a spectrum.
Keep in mind that the mercury/halogen discharge lamp that is the heart of the fluorescent produces light mostly in the ultraviolet range, but the phosphors that coat the inside of the glass (similar to the phosphors on the inside of an old TV picture tube) convert the UV into visible light. By using the right mixture of phosphors which fluoresce at different frequencies a high CRI can be achieved.
Yeah, I'm not real happy with either the color temp or the CRI of the LED products, but for some of our fixtures I'd consider them if the price were right and life expectancy were proven. It's still a young technology and I hope that things improve.
I've found I like the cheap CFLs you buy at Home Despot best -- better color and less flicker than the "name" brands.
keep trying different brands/non-brands...
Agreed, the essentially no-name CFLs I got from Rona are terrific!
(I wrote the specs on them with a sharpie. Bulbs say I installed them in 2007 so I've had a while to experience them!)
John
FWIW, I just installed a Feit 60-watt equivalent lamp in this room, as the 3rd bulb (two incandescent) of a 3-bulb overhead fixture. The lamp was $25 at Menards (marked down from $40).
Initial impressons:
The only reason that there were incandescents in this fixture was that it was the last dimmed fixture in the house where I had not gotten around to removing the dimmer. But this Feit 60-watt is advertised as "dimmable" (their 40-watt equavlent lamp was not), and on first try it dimmed very smoothly, and "in sync" with the two incandescents.
The advertised color temp is a "warm" 3000K, but the lamp is definitely "cooler" than the incandescents, and subjectively "cooler" than the CFLs in the next room.
No specification for the CRI. The light just is a hair jarring, but we'll see how it is when I get more used to it. In any event, it's not the garish color rendering associated with cheap fluorescents.
Can't sense any flicker, but I'm not terribly sensitive to that.
The lamp is similar to others of the same ilk, with a glass globe on top that looks like the top half of a light bulb, and with a finned metallic shroud instead of the bottom half of the bulb. This arrangement sends most of the light out in about a 100 degree arc, "up" when the base is down. Causes a shadow on the glass shade, but doesn't seriously affect light diffusion, given the way the fixture is configured. Some other brands have the fins arrange somewhat differently, and may diffuse the light better.
Great review; thanks.
I'd say the future looks quite bright for this technology. Har har har.....
Thought I should report that I still have the Feit installed in this room and everything is hunkey-dorey with it. I've gotten used to the whiter light in the room and it seems "normal". Doesn't interfere at all with using this laptop, or any other activities. No "eyestrain" issues.
I'm in the process of installing Cree LED lights in existing 6" cans and some in new construction. They have two versions; one with a GU-24 base, and one with an edison base. The light has a trim ring on it and three "spring" fingers to hold the inside of the recessed can after you pop it in place. Easy to install.
Tried one in our kitchen as a test light, the kitchen has 6" recessed cans in the ceiling, Over the years we've been though halogens, then move to CFLs once CFLs got good enough to use. The CFLs we have are pretty much "instant-on". That's what I thought anyway until I popped an LED in place of one CFL that went bad. Flipped the switch...bright, and fast. Made me realize that even though the CFLs are "instant on" compared to the older versions of CFLs, we were just used to our instant-on CFLs still taking a few seconds to get up to brightness.
The CFLs I'm replacing are 23W. I was worried that the 10.5W LED wouldn't give enough light. Ten foot high ceilings in the kitchen with a mix of lumen-eating charcoal black concrete countertops and teak countertops. Floors are dark brazilian cherry. Wow! Nice light, excellent color renditon and at 575 lumens I was worried but they are plenty bright. To the naked eye the amount of light put out is similar to the CFLs, but where they outshine (no pun intended) the CFLs in in color rendition. Very nice.
I liked the one light enough to go out and by 14 more.
The life of the CFLs in my kitchen has been hit and miss. Some have lasted years, at other times it seems I'm changing one out every few months.
Cree LED lights; 10.5W, 575 lumens, 2700K, CRI 92, $20 each
Forgot...
Wanted to add, I also installed two 3" LED can lights outside on the underside of my front porch ceiling (beadboard). I think they were 7W lights, I forget exactly. They are actually brighter than I thought they'd be, I was looking for a dim "night light" look. But I like them too. Like the Cree lights, they are dimmable. These units were $44.
Difference between these 3" LEDs and the Cree?
The 3" are a complete unit. 3" diameter light with trim ring, set in a 3" recessed can. On these lights there is a clear lens so you can see the four individual LED "bulbs". At first I thought that made them look cheap, but once installed it really doesn't bother me at all.
The 6" Cree lights that I described in my previous post have a frosted lens so you can't see the individual LEDs.
Thanks Mongo.
Good detail, and lots of info.
$44 seems a bit steep for a light, but if they are rated for decades of use it might make sense. Are you convinced?
Those led's sound like they are well worth trying out. Where did you purchase these for $20? HD here has them for twice that. Online buying is good for me.
HD had them in the store for $40, then when I was doing a generic search online HD had the exact same light, same SKU (SKU 499485), for $20 online that they were selling in the stores for $40.
Here they are online for $19.97 via HD:
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202240932/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053
MONGO!
Nice to see your smiling type once again.
I'm hoping to see a Cree rep at my supplier's Christmas gathering and LED info-session Wednesday aftn. Initially, a complete can I thought was close to a hundred at the supplier's. Could be a diff. model I suppose, and I would suspect so with that wide a range of price.....................
Thanks for your information!
And, Smitty is going to host next August it looks like-you game? Best bone up on the shoe game-Joyce looked real good this summer...............
BIG CAL!
Yo Big Cal brutha-man!
First, send Masterson back to Boston!
Second, I'll be up for Mike's. For the first time in years, August should be mine scheduling-wise, so it shouldn't be a problem. Heck, I was even wearing a "Crazylegs Fest" shirt yesterday.
Third, stand back if we're playing horseshoes. I wear eyeglasses now, and these progressive lenses have me walking crooked. Straight things look skewed, curved lines look straight. Maybe I'll get used to them some day. But give Mike a head's up that he might have to tear out a few more shrubs for a larger horseshoe landing zone if I get in the game.
Fourth...yup, the "LR" Cree lights are $80-$120 a piece. The one I'm referring to is the "CR" bulb. They used to be $70. Then $40. Now $20. Not sure if it's a permanent price point, or just a promotion or an LED tease to get people over to the new technology. The CR does have a smaller heat sink than the LR, which reduces the lumen output by about 10% and also reduces the projected life of the bulb down from 50000 hours to 35000 hours. Still, 35000 hours is roughly 10 hours a day for 10 years.
You'll be so eco-friendly delivering these Cree bulbs to customers in your sage-green Prius!
yessir
LR 6 and LR 6 C----110.00
They did point me to another brand-85.00
I'll pursue more info at the party.
Bi's now huh? I been with them for many years, tho I got away from the progressives-I know what you mean-couldn't wear them on a ladder...................flight insurance and all.
But, now I've been using the bi's up/down in the lens. That's a great feature-hell, when was my work ever just below me? I used to tilt my head so far back, I'd be sitting down in no time. But this up down thing is great-
The distance part of the lens is only a little bit straight on, that's a tad weird, but I'm used to it now.
Ladders/stairs, not as much a problem with the definitive lines of the bi's.
BUT
forget and go to golf league........................................that's a trip.
It does tend to keep the head down as you try to focus in through that narrow margin of the distance glass.
If you remember.
So practice up and let's go. Jimbo and Kathy are up for it, I'm sure Beckmans and Wicklunds wouldn't miss it...............good time no doubt.
Can't wait.
Are we going to be graced with the family card this year? Been great watching your children grow up.
And finally getting to meet that wife of yours.............at least in picture-Great! Make sure you talk her into the Fest, would love to meet her in real life.
Christmas fast approaches-we'll be going back down to Nashville to visit the daughter and family and Joyce's fave's-the two grand children. They sure are cute! Thanksgiving was a blast!
Mail delivery will be a little bit lighter...
Unfortunately, I won't be doing cards this year. Pull out last year's card, crumple it up, then flatten it out again. That'll add a few wrinkles to the photos and age them by a year.
But I will drag my wife to the 'fest.
Bummer to no cards
Always a treat to see young folks grow up. You notice the change slowly.............those I see once a yr I am overwhelmed.
And a good luck on dragging, try to ply her with chocolates and the promise of a good time.
And lest I forget..............
No to sending yet another getting better pitcher out of our pen. Wait till he wins the Cy Young, then you can have him.
I want to thank both you and Calvin for the led info talk. I'm putting new bulbs into new cans in my new house and want to do the best I can afford.
As to progressive bifocals.... If you've had trouble wearing these you might not have been fit correctly. You need to visit another optician and don't let them give you just anything. My first try was a disaster... headache city. Then a guy who really knows how to fit glasses got me squared away. I can wear them anywhere, including on ladders. I'll never go back to regular bifocals.
thanks
...for the eyeglass info. When the calendar turns over into the new year, I'm off for an eye exam, a new prescription, and new glasses.
Sap
Tonight I didn't get to talk to the rep from Cree.................
but, did talk with GE and Lutron. GE has some interesting bulbs, definitely worth taking a look.
Lutron did mention that just getting bulbs that say dimmable is a bit of a misdirection, if you intend to use a dimmer. Different bulbs/Manufacturers-require different dimmers to work. Study up on that so you don't order and then have to return.
And, if a dimmer is listed as 600 watts, that works for incandescent, but not so with LED's. You cannot power a bunch of lamps off of a 600 w dimmer. Do Not add up the listed watts for the LED lamps and expect it to work, seems many of the LED's only allow say 5 cans per dimmer.
GE among others list appropriate dimmers that work according to the bulb used.
There is a way cool addition to the undercab. light. David Meiland mentioned the tape, well from the same company comes a housed "strip" light with individual lenses maybe 4" apart. Can be ganged up or used as separate strips, comes in a few sizes for separate cab installations.
Just home from the LED event and puppy training class with the wife, stuff's out in the van and no way I open the door to the toolbox on wheels till tomorrow. Remind me to come back and puke out the minimal knowledge I gleaned last nite. I'll at least provide some links to the info and manufacturer.
One new thing I did find tonight-from Panasonic-bath exhausts with motion and humidity detectors on the unit. And a humidity sensor that takes the place of a switch space in a box-which besides an on/off switch-a humidity sensor. More on that once I read up on that.
the price...
At first, I did think the $44 was high for the 3" LED cans, but for a typical assembly you'd normally buy an air-tight recessed can light assembly ($15), a trim kit ($15), and then the bulb ($5 for CFL, pick a price for LED). This had them all-in-one, with the LED included. So I figured the all-in-one LED cost me $10 more than a put-together CFL would have cost.
And in exterior use, the LED gives a nice clean white light right off the bat in hot or cold weather, versus the lag time with CFLs, especially in winter. Considering it's a porch where when you want the light, well, when you need the light...I figured I'd suck it up and give them a shot since they're going to be the "night lights" on my front porch. Overall, a well-lit front porch for 14W of electricity, heck, I'll not argue to much over that.
The price for the Cree 6" has been all over the place. One day they were $40, the next day they were a tad under $20, I'll take them. Especially for longevity.
I've been waiting and wainting for LEDs to become more economical. They're getting there. Not all the way there, but they're better than they were a year or two ago.
>>>This had them all-in-one,
>>>This had them all-in-one, with the LED included.
Ahhh.... I didn't understand it was a whole fixture. That sounds like a great deal.
I am building a builtin corner bookcase. After much pondering I decided to go with LED strips to light the corner unit. I found the self adhesive 16 foot strip, dimmer and power brick on the web for just unter $100. Took two weeks from China but the look like they will be perfect.
I have cut the pieces I am going to use and mounted them on a 85 inch board to test out my soldering and be sure I did not reverse polirity. It all works great. Still building the bookcase pieces in the basement to be installed in January in our living room. Have to move some outlets first before the install.
Pics man, Pics!!
Just installed a 13w (60w equivalent) "Econosmart" brand lamp (HD house brand) out in the garage. It's rated 850 lumens, 3000K. Paid $24 at HD.
This lamp is a bit weirder looking than the Feit installed in this room. It has basically the same finned base as the Feit, but, in place of the incandescent-like globe it has a small, squat "mushroom" on top of the base. Makes it quite a bit more compact than the Feit (which is just a hair larger than a standard 60w incandescent. And the "mushroom" seems to distribute the light a hair more evenly.
Seems fine at first go. The color of the light is not really distinguishable from the fluorescent fixture about 6 feet away. No flicker that I notice.
If it's OK after a day or three I'll buy another to replace the burned-out bulb in the GDO.
Any idea if it's dimmable?
My current pet peeve is the lighting in our entry. There are times when you want lots of light in an entry area, like when people are coming and going at night, but otherwise the area bugs me with it's garrish CFL brightness. Dimmable CFLs were a failure for me (bulbs failed way too early, and the dimming curve was sketchy) so I returned to switched bulbs. I'm hoping that LEDs will solve the problem.
It's labeled dimmable, but there's no dimmer in the garage. The Feit installed in this room dims just fine, though (same dimming "curve" as the incandescents in the same fixture), so I would expect the Econosmart to be OK as well.
You do have to check the labels -- some are dimmable and some not. But it seems to that maybe half of the standard "light bulb" replacements are dimmable, and there's no obvious price premium.
The dimmer makes a difference
Check the bulb specs for listed dimmers that work with it.
The Edison-based standard replacements that I've seen just say "dimmable" (or not dimmable), with no further statement of compatibility.
The Ecosmart/HD bulb package did say to go to their web site for information on dimmer compatibility, but I went there and could find nothing.
I can just repeat what I heard from the sales reps..........
at an LED / Christmas party my local electrical supply house put on.
LED's do not work with ALL dimmers, nor will all dimmers work with every LED.
Yeah, I'm sure there's some combo somewhere that doesn't work. But I suspect that if one is using "standard" dimmable LED lamps and a "standard" dimmer then you're 90-95% sure it will work. The problem would likely be things like putting a few LEDs on a high-power dimmer, where the LEDs don't offer enough load for the dimmer to work.
(I do notice that it's the larger LED lamps that tend to be "dimmable". Likely part of the reason for not having smaller ones dimmable is that they simply don't offer enough load for normal dimmers.)
Here's the thing
So you don't do something stupid like go to the store, buy the lamps and some dimmer.............
come home and it don't work. Why? because of the reason I just gave, some aren't compatible.
So, b/4 you waste your time, the trip and the gas-check and find out. Buy what works. Install. Done.
But, like I said, most of these things don't have any specs for the dimmers. But the lamps are easy enough to install/remove, and expensive enough that if people install them and they don't dim well a lot will be returned. So I have to believe that the mfgrs are working pretty hard to achieve compatibility under "normal" circumstances.
The biggest problem would be load. Likely you need a minimum of 25-50w of load to make most dimmers work, so a single 13w lamp may not work. But a 3-lamp fixture probably will.
And like I said
you can't probably put more than 5 cans on one 600 w dimmer, heard that from the reps also. You don't add the wattage of bulbs for the complete equation.
And the rest was meant for someone that might not relish the thought of fooling around with returning anything. Time is money for the remodeler, so a waste of time is a waste of money.
LED is new enough that all is not known and any information may or may not be true, so.....................
Just a dumb carpenter.
I suspect we're talking about two different things here. I'm talking about unscrewing incandescents and screwing in LEDs in existing fixtures. I suspect your mindset is more on new installations.
I give up.
Forget I was here.
thanks.