LED Replacement Lighting

Posted by: Mike-B on 02 March 2013

I guess a few Naimish peeps have wondered about the ever growing array of new lamp types around these days.  I know some notable folks have some serious moans about the CFL’s  - not bright enuf, start-up time is too long & dim & not a “nice” light  etc…..  

 

This post is about LED lamps. 

I had already replaced my bathroom with LED using special (expensive) lamps that are IP65 water & air tight & was very impressed with the light & power saving – 360watts reduced to 36watts & a better light more suited to a bathroom.

 

Anyhow I have just replaced all the recessed downlight spots in my living room that had 50w Halogen Dichroic GU10’s.    I used 5w (five watt) that are an exact same size & fitment as the old lamps – i.e. same lamps – new bulbs.

The effect is just what I was expecting & looking for.

I used Warm White 2800K - to me the Cool Whites were a blue tint & not what I wanted in a living/listening/reading  room.

The light is completely uniform & the spread is wider,  so they are less a spot, more a flood.

They are claimed to give the same light (Lumens) as a 50w halogen.  I have to say they appear to give more light.  But even with my photo light meter its hard to tell for sure as the light is a lot more defused & uniform.

Small downsides – LED’s have a narrow light band (2800K) & on a dimmer they do not change the light Hz & dim down to a mellow gold as do halogen lamps,  they just go to less light but keep the same color.

The dimmer switch needs changing, my existing switch is rated at 25w – 400w so its minimum dim is whatever 25 watts is,  the new LED lamps have a total of 40 watts on full power, so 25 watts is only slightly less bright.  MK & a few others have LED rated dimmers, the MK Logic Plus “Intellegent” can handle both LED & halogen & are rated 5-70w for LED & 25-400w for halogen.      

 

I’m dee-lighted   

If you’re interested,  I advise go to a specialist shop that has them on demo to see if they ring your bell first.   But keep in mind that one day halogens will get outlawed.   They are expensive - £11 -  £13 but with an estimated 40,000 hour life they will never need replacing.

Posted on: 02 March 2013 by Derek Wright

I have replaced the Halogen Flood lights that operated by PIRs on the outside of the house with a set of LED Floodlights - I bought the first one from the great South American river and the next ones direct from a Mr Resistor in London. initial prices are high but the running costs are very low and it no longer matters if the feral population cause the lights to stay on 

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by Donuk

I think the LED  bulbs are wonderful.  I bought a few on line for only about £3 each for fun - the GU10 small spot sort.  About one watt!  Now they are fitted under the stairs and places like that - left on nearly all the time.

 

Just think you can now adequately light a couple of rooms for the power used by your hifi in standby.

 

Don, dull but LED-lit downtown York.

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by Steve J

When we had our bedroom fitted out we had downlighting placed in an overhang above the fitted wardrobes with 35W halogen spots. Unfortunately if a wardrobe door was left slightly ajar the top of the door was very close to the light and could cause it to burn. We soon changed the spots to LEDs which run cold. Much safer. Because the light was 'colder' than the halogens it looked a little incongruous with the warmer central light so we found a modern LED bulbed light fitting to replace it. We also have small blue LEDs for atmospheric lighting in the bathroom and white LED strip lighting inset into the top of the built in AV cabinet.

I think Derek's idea of LED floodlights are an excellent idea which I'll look into.

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by Forester

When I had a new kitchen fitted last year I had down lights fitted and used 5 watt GU10 bulbs. Visitors  are amazed at the output and many are now converted.  I have them connected to 2 switches so that I can switch on 2, 4 or 6.  Two give plenty of light for most activies.

 

That was a year ago and I recently replaced my office lights with 4 white light 6 watt GU10.  As my neighbour says it looks like the lights at Hampden from the street outside.  When buying these from the same place as I bought the ones for the kitchen I noticed that their price had come down by half in 12 months.

 

Not only they great at providing good quality bright lighting they have a lot of benefits at the other end of the scale.  My bathroom mirror has small LED bulbs built in and I leave it on overnight when I have visitors so that they can find sanctuary in the dark.  My extractor fan over the shower even has a LED bulb which is all that is needed to light the room when having a shower.  OK the saving is minimal compared to the power used to heat the shower but every bit counts.  I am definitely a LED convert.

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by Mike-B
Originally Posted by Donuk:

.......you can now light a couple of rooms for the power used by your hifi in standby.

I wasn't gonna mention that Steve  

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by fatcat

I replaced tungsten bulbs with LED's in my living room. Light was OK but they didn't last very long.

 

However

 

Surely the critical factor is not the running cost or light level output, but do they have an adverse effect on the sonic performance of our Naim kit. Do they spew any nasties into the mains.

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by fatcat

Before swapping to LED's it may be worth investigating the power factor of the proposed lighting. I think it varies with LED, but will be better than CFL’s which are a very poor 0.5.

Posted on: 03 March 2013 by Mike-B

Good points fatcat ............

 

The power factor of LED bulbs is extremely variable dependent start-up stage, running full brightness & the age/variant of the control circuit technology, but in all cases it is less than 1.0. Some of the older makes are as low as 0.6, whereas the latest & better ones have full brightness power factor of about 0.9 & that is better than CFL.

However LED PF performance using dimmers is very poor, depending on design. The bulbs do progressively consume fewer Watts (real power) as they are dimmed, but the apparent power actually begins to go up.  However we are charged for real power so we will save money by dimming LED bulbs.  But who knows,  that might get changed one day.

 

LED's do consume something better than 85% less energy than an equivalent Lumen incandescent bulb and are a genuine & the most significant low energy progression from incandescent thru halogen to LED & the next generation are expected to be even better with aprx 200 lumens per watt.  The added benefit is they have no hazardous mercury issues as do fluorescent.

 

LED lamps do emit EMI on the power supply; however there are regulations that govern the permitted levels, included domestic LED’s intended as replacement products for the standard incandescent light bulbs.  Reading the www burb it seems it’s a moving target, latest lamps supposed to be very low & additionally the so called “intelligent” dimmers also have EMI suppression in their control circuits. 

Posted on: 04 March 2013 by Donuk

Perhaps homes of the future will have 12 volt DC lighting circuits, with a transformer and smoothing circuits installed by the back door. 

 

This could be a use for all those unmodified 555PSs floating about.

 

Linn (Scottish) homes would have Switched Mode Power Supply of course.

 

Don, overcast downtown York