What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs? • Hacker News Board

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#121

Post by setquk » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

Steltek wrote: post #33

crispyambulance wrote: post #23

I also have been disappointed with LED "bulbs". They get too damn hot in recessed fixtures but NOT because of the LED's. It's all because of the shitty power converter embedded deep inside the bulb getting too hot and failing. The industry has necessarily had to retrofit to where incandescent bulbs are supposed to go. I think that we'll start to see improvements in this area as people move away from "screw-in bulb" a…

Every so often, I come back to the "I should have DC power on demand in my house!" until I'm reminded that DC power loss over a distance can hurt bad, even 48VDC telecom power. Perhaps USB-C PD might help? USB power adapters are compact and PD offers standard, useful high power DC. If the adapters become ubiquitous, you could see "USB-C lightbulbs".

Also to note that your 1KW appliances need 83 amps in a 12V DC system. This is a huge amount of current and requires special cabling (which has a not insignificant voltage drop due to the resistance of the wire) and special connectors.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#122

Post by dsfyu404ed » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

ip26 wrote: post #88

sevensor wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Certainly at the household scale this is true. I cringe at the inefficiency of rooftop solar panels, hooked up to inverters, powering transformers that supply phones, lights, and electronics. AC in the house is great for an electric oven, vacuum cleaner, or fridge compressor, but so many modern electronic devices would be happy to run off of 5V or 12V.

Look on the bright side- in terms of real power, the electric oven, vacuum cleaner, AC compressor, and fridge compressor totally swamp the entire load, waste and all, of those 5V devices. In a perfect world we'd have both AC & DC, and could use whichever was most appropriate. We could feed DC straight from the solar panels to the cell phone. But in terms of what consumes most of the power, in the typical home it's AC…

>Look on the bright side- in terms of real power, the electric oven, vacuum cleaner, AC compressor, and fridge compressor totally swamp the entire load, waste and all, of those 5V devices.

This isn't an appropriate comparison. Those appliances actually do useful things that need to get done so the energy isn't just wasted like it is with power supply inefficiency.

Sure a 12vdc circuit would be nice. It wouldn't be nice enough or efficient enough to be worth paying for.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#123

Post by lupire » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:51 PM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #66

CharlesColeman wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The relative cost of lighting on the monthly electricity bill is tiny so those savings are pretty small. Getting a more efficient fridge, washing machine, TV or (in our profession) computer typically has a much bigger effect on electricity expenses. And that is assuming your heating and cooking is done with gas. The switch from using tiny space heaters for light to using LEDs that consume a tenth of the power was a…

This is correct. I just thought that "everybody" has switched to CFLs 10 years ago, when they became decent.

They never became decent. They were always loaded with toxic mercury that became a hazard if the glass broke, and they had short life and though some good one existed, the market was overrun with bulbs with long warm up times, bad color, and buzzing.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#124

Post by dreamcompiler » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:51 PM UTC

baybal2 wrote: post #20

setquk wrote: post #12

I've taken every single LED bulb that has failed on me to pieces and it's always the same failure mode. The heatsink compound isn't applied properly to the back of the LED board. The LEDs immediately in the gaps smoke out. Alas this isn't a problem. If a lightbulb goes, Amazon send me a new one out now free of charge and tell me to throw the old one in the trash. This is one manufacturer, prevalent on Amazon, the Lon…

Do not buy "bulbs," they are hopeless. Just buy a whole fixture with a big aluminium PCB and directly bonded chips.

I've started doing this. Bought a large panel fixture and a separate high-quality LED current source and it has been absolutely great. Next time I build a house I'll probably run all the lighting circuits on a hefty 24VDC main power supply with small DC/DC regulators on every fixture. There's no reason nowadays why lighting circuits should be 120 or 240VAC.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#125

Post by lupire » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:52 PM UTC

FredFS456 wrote: post #58

CharlesColeman wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The relative cost of lighting on the monthly electricity bill is tiny so those savings are pretty small. Getting a more efficient fridge, washing machine, TV or (in our profession) computer typically has a much bigger effect on electricity expenses. And that is assuming your heating and cooking is done with gas. The switch from using tiny space heaters for light to using LEDs that consume a tenth of the power was a…

I don't know about you, but I had long switched to CFL's before LED bulbs came around. CFLs are definitely not as efficient as LEDs, but at least they're still a fraction of the power that incandescent bulbs use.

Not as true when you include replacement costs for expensive shoddy bulbs, and mercury toxicity.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#126

Post by ConceptJunkie » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:52 PM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #66

CharlesColeman wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The relative cost of lighting on the monthly electricity bill is tiny so those savings are pretty small. Getting a more efficient fridge, washing machine, TV or (in our profession) computer typically has a much bigger effect on electricity expenses. And that is assuming your heating and cooking is done with gas. The switch from using tiny space heaters for light to using LEDs that consume a tenth of the power was a…

This is correct. I just thought that "everybody" has switched to CFLs 10 years ago, when they became decent.

They were decent 20 years ago. In my experience, the quality dropped sharply around 10 years ago or so. I've seen at least one CFL fail within a few weeks of buying it.

LPT: Don't buy the globe ones that go over your bathroom mirror. They are practically pre-burned-out for your convenience.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#127

Post by izzydata » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:52 PM UTC

dchichkov wrote: post #108

izzydata wrote: post #10

This is pretty annoying as I replaced every bulb in my house with LED under the assumption that they would last at least a decade. I didn't even think to check a powered-on time rating. Not that using incandescent bulbs is a good option anymore anyway.

Curious, have you noticed any sleep issues, after you've switched to LED?

No, but all my LED bulbs give off a yellow light instead of a white light.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#128

Post by delecti » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:52 PM UTC

umvi wrote: post #37

This makes me wonder if we shouldn't have an AC and DC circuits in the house. I mean, it could be all AC coming in, but at the box it splits into (at least) two different circuits (an AC one and a DC one). AC circuit would still be used for things that have motors, but everything else uses DC. Imagine how simple LED lighting could be on a DC circuit. Just an LED and resistor. I only took a few electrical engineering…

The breadth of products like this [1] tells me you're far from the first person to think of that problem. Distributed circuits for DC is already a reality. Now we just need more light USB LED lighting solutions for around the home.

[1] https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01BYO79UE

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#129

Post by lupire » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:52 PM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #24

BurningFrog wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think people are always overly focused on things they personally touch and see. Thus environmental policy centers on shopping bags, straws, and light bulbs, rather than things that objectively have real environmental impact.

I don’t think anyone making such policies thinks that those things alone will save the planet. It’s about a mentality into the daily choices we make that makes the difference. That said, leds that are 13-15 watts instead of 60 watts does make a big dent into saving electricity at the country scale.

They don't make much of a difference. Like recycling, it's a way to feel like making a difference with Puritan work ethic, without regard for results.

Re: What Happened to the 100000 Hour LED Bulbs?

#130

Post by ip26 » Wed, Feb 06, 2019, 5:55 PM UTC

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #122

ip26 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look on the bright side- in terms of real power, the electric oven, vacuum cleaner, AC compressor, and fridge compressor totally swamp the entire load, waste and all, of those 5V devices. In a perfect world we'd have both AC & DC, and could use whichever was most appropriate. We could feed DC straight from the solar panels to the cell phone. But in terms of what consumes most of the power, in the typical home it's AC…

>Look on the bright side- in terms of real power, the electric oven, vacuum cleaner, AC compressor, and fridge compressor totally swamp the entire load, waste and all, of those 5V devices. This isn't an appropriate comparison. Those appliances actually do useful things that need to get done so the energy isn't just wasted like it is with power supply inefficiency. Sure a 12vdc circuit would be nice. It wouldn't be ni…

The point is the power delivery system we have does a good job for 99% of real power consumed (or whatever the number really is).

I hate waste; my mains-connected smoke detectors (1% efficient) and garage door opener (15W standby) gnaw at my soul. But that's scope for improvement, not an efficiency crisis.