Picked up a LED bulb for my floodlight last night

[EatenByLimestone]

It was time to get new tires for the wood hauler last night. I got a great price at Sams and had some BFGs LT tires installed for $369. There is a sale running right now on a couple different BFG tire lines if anybody else is in the market.

So I start walking around the warehouse looking for neat things.

I came across some LED lights on a normal screw in light base. It said it produced the light of a 45W incandesant and used 5W of electricity. 10,000 hours of life IIRC. It was $12-14 I think. This weekend I'll climb the latter and give a report back on how well it works.

They had other LED bulbs there also. I saw packs of the small socket chandeleer lights and small, regular bulb lights. Since LEDs are directional they are probably for can lights or something.

I had seen the LED retrofits on the net, but never seen them in a store.

Matt

 

[EatenByLimestone]

just looked at the package. It's rated for 30,000 hours.

Matt

 

[Nofossil]

Been waiting for those to get cheap enough and bright enough. I use cfl bulbs all over the place, but there are several real shortcomings:

1) They don't work well in the cold.
2) The lifespan is dramatically shortened if they're installed in a recessed ceiling mount can.
3) They fail by gradually getting dimmer, so in many cases the useful life is much less than advertised.
4) They're not dimmable.

I know that some designs address some of these issues to some degree, but cfl technology is not the answer for many applications at this point. I'm hoping that LED offers a solution. Let us know how they work for you.

 

[Highbeam]

Don't forget that they are slow to put out full power, they need to warm up.

The instant on of the LEDs is what I like to hear about.

 

[karri0n]

I got an LED mag-lite and I think it's actually brighter than the standard krypton(?) bulb. Battery life is much much higher as well. Let us know how the LED bulb works out.

 

[d.n.f.]

They don't work well in a smoke filled environment.
If it is not going to be attached to your fire helmet then you can move along and ignore this.

 

[karri0n]

I would imagine, with the white light being the same color as the smoke, not great. Fortunately, I don't have any mag-lite duct taping projects with a helmet involved any time soon.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

The light is going to shine down the back lawn onto the drying firewood. Lets hope it keeps away from a smoke filled environment until it gets brought inside to the stove.

Matt

 

[Dune]

This is a good thread. We all need to be constantly reminded of any ways to cut energy use. Thanks.

 

[mbcijim]

My company bought some $250 LED Wall packs to replace 400W Metal Halide ones. The new LED wall packs aren't great, although they are 50W. I wouldn't recommend them yet. Not bright enough in that situation.

 

[Hansson]

In my new kitchen i put up cree leds in the roof and i very satisfied whit them.
I can dimm them to

 

[karri0n]

My company bought some $250 LED Wall packs to replace 400W Metal Halide ones. The new LED wall packs aren't great, although they are 50W. I wouldn't recommend them yet. Not bright enough in that situation.

What are wall packs?

 

[mbcijim]

The most common use would be installed on the exterior wall on a commercial building. A lot of time they are used in a rear parking lot, or a small parking lot where a pole isn't needed.

 

[rowerwet]

I got an LED mag-lite and I think it's actually brighter than the standard krypton(?) bulb. Battery life is much much higher as well. Let us know how the LED bulb works out.

I hope they have improved the quality on these lights, I work out side at night year round so I have to have a good small (belt carried) light, I bought two of the minimag leds, they both failed the same way inside of 3 months, other mechanics I work with found the same problem. We all found the rayovac 3w led to be the best, right now I have a cabelas 3w led on my belt (6 months and going strong), I don't want a flashlight that needs expensive batteries either, AA or AAA is stocked in our parts room.
with the new led technology maglite managed to get the minimag led to have dead spots in the contact points, the same as their large lights.
Walmart has led 40 and 20 watt bulbs, I am waiting until they are dimmable to try them out.

 

[karri0n]

I agree about the mini mag lites. Never had much luck with them. the keychain ones are even worse. I do like the full size D cell ones, pretty reliable in my experience and the price is right.

 

[Delta-T]

Odd, I've had a minimag with the aftermarket LED conversion by nite-eyez for several years with no problems. I beat on this thing too. I do backpacking and wilderness canoeing (nevermind using it for nearly every home repair situation), its also my 6 year olds fav "lightsaber", and have never had a problem with the LED's. The original bulbs would stop working if you looked at them wrong (probably why they come with the spare).

I would be interested to hear about any app of LED's with dimmers as well.

I also have an 8 LED flashlight (forget the brand) that takes those darn expensive special batteries that works like a champ and is quite useful for blinding yourself or others if used appropriatly. Hands down far superior to any incandescent bulb i have ever tried.

 

[rphurley]

In my new kitchen i put up cree leds in the roof and i very satisfied whit them.
I can dimm them to

Sharp looking setup, but here in the states we're probably 5 years behind in consumer LED technology, as is true with everything else. Except for weapons and space exploration of course!

 

[rowerwet]

Odd, I've had a minimag with the aftermarket LED conversion by nite-eyez for several years with no problems. I beat on this thing too. I do backpacking and wilderness canoeing (nevermind using it for nearly every home repair situation), its also my 6 year olds fav "lightsaber", and have never had a problem with the LED's. The original bulbs would stop working if you looked at them wrong (probably why they come with the spare).

I would be interested to hear about any app of LED's with dimmers as well.

I also have an 8 LED flashlight (forget the brand) that takes those darn expensive special batteries that works like a champ and is quite useful for blinding yourself or others if used appropriatly. Hands down far superior to any incandescent bulb i have ever tried.

I have two minimags with nite-eyez conversions, they work great and are the only reliable (for industrial use) mag made, the c and d cell lights will develop dead spots in the focus, most of the guys who use them just get used to wacking the light against something hard and turning the focus (head) to get a light back.
the mini mag with nite-eyez is too dim for me to use (I keep them in the car) at work. they do make a 1watt that can also come with a push button tail cap that dims the bulb and flashes it, it is pricey $25 on top of $10 for the light, I can get a good 3watt led 2AA light for $25 or so, so why bother.
I want to be able to clearly see the top of the rudder (25+ feet) from the ground at night so nite-eyez conversions don't work as they are area lights and don't focus well at a distance. I will never buy a light that requires batteries that my company doesn't stock.

 

[Hansson]

In my new kitchen i put up cree leds in the roof and i very satisfied whit them.
I can dimm them to

Sharp looking setup, but here in the states we're probably 5 years behind in consumer LED technology, as is true with everything else. Except for weapons and space exploration of course!

Thats strange.I think Cree is an American company ?

 

[Flatbedford]

I found these dimmable LED bulbs.
http://www.earthled.com/lumiselect-dimmable-led-light-bulbs.html?gclid=CLSm_bbMlpoCFQJ2xgodjU8AhQ
They are not cheap! Maybe in a few years. I think this is the way to go when they become a little more common and affordable.

 

[Chain]

I renovated my kitchen last year and considered LED recessed lights to replace the old track lighting that was previously the main lighting in the old kitchen. After a great deal or research I was able to locate a company that made a unit that you can screw into a regular recessed can that were also dimmable. Basically a conversion kit. My local company where I bought my new cabinets, counter top, and helped design the new space was able to purchase them if I desired. Turns out they were going to cost about $165 dollars apiece not counting the recessed light fixture. Given I needed to install ten lights, I found it to be too costly. I've see a few LED conversion bulbs for various applications but none yet that replace the R-30 incandescent bulbs currently in my new recessed cans. I'm sure they will be available soon, however. I'm really excited and intrigued with the progress we're making toward energy efficient lighting in this country. Soon LED will be the norm and even the sometimes unreliable CFL's will fall by the wayside.

 

[drizler]

For the outside floods on my deck I went to a pair of the CFL type. $6 at Sams Club and they do the job pretty well though they take 5-10 minutes to get full bright at -30F. Not as bright as the regular type though but only 25 W each. So far they have lasted 2 winters fine. The big thing to watch for with LEDS is that they can only shine directly one way. Mount one sideways in a taillight holder like on my snowmobile and they don't work well at all, very dim. Mount them straight back like on my other snowmobile and they are very bright. They do make side studded ones but the cost is way up there last time I looked. If you want a damned good little almost disposable led flashlight look on the counter by the cash registers at Advance Auto Stores. They used to be $5 but they dropped them to 2.50 last winter. They are a very nice little 2AA 7LED light with aluminum body for the $$$. I have at least 10 of them scattered in every remote location and car glove box, boat ect You can't beat them for the price if you can find any. They seem to dissappear fast and the reason is obvious.

 

[Jerry_NJ]

I think we all have experience with LED flash lights, the original post here was on the subject of the "new" LED packages that have a standard A/C screw-in base for operation on 115 VAC.

I've tried the Walmart bulbs, three of then now. The first two burned out in less than a week, I took them back and got replacements, the third (the last replacement) worked for about a month...so I didn't take it back even though its life was far-far below what was advertised. I also found the "45Watt" equivalent to be closer to a 15 Watt in terms of it light output. The compact florescent lights give far more light per watt, I believe.

My experience, the LED screw-in bulb for use in 115 VAC applications isn't ready yet, I'll wait for the next generation before I buy any more.

 

[jtp10181]

I saw the LED light bulbs at Wal Mart just today and took my time investigating. Since they did not advertise the lumen's output I came the same conclusion Jerry did after purchasing them. They don't put out as much light as they say (45w incandescent comparable). I bought a two pack of daylight color CLF bulbs instead (for the same price as one LED light).

As for the AA LED Mag lights. I bought one for myself at work a couple months ago, love it. Still on the same batteries. Would have gone through 3 sets of AA's by now on the normal mag light I had before. One of my techs was using some sorry old flashlight so I bought him one also, he likes it as well. They are much brighter then some of the older LED flashlights I have used. I have been disappointed by older LED flashlights with 6 or more LEDs in them, this single LED maglight beats all the others I have used.

 

[vandall]

I just bought the same bulbs from Sams. But, I get a flicker. What is a relay based motion detector? Where do I find one? Went to the local Ace hardware none of the motion lights mention anything about relay based motion detector circuit.