171–180 of 519 posts
So, engineering lead of a (outdoor) led Luminaire manufacturer here. And our sales director used to work for one of the biggest Asian light bulb OEMs. Happy to answer specific technical questions out there that this article triggered.
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…
I bought a pile of cheap LED bulbs[0] when they first became available on Amazon Canada, and replaced every light in my home. They've run cheap and cold for years now, without a single failure. I suspect that there's some planned obsolescence in newer products. 0: https://www.amazon.ca/gp/aw/d/B01EN9L8YU?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_m...
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…
This is in contradiction with the article, which says that the driver is the cause in 90% of cases. EDIT: This was not entirely correct as the article says: > The US Department of Energy (DoE)’s solid-state lighting program supports research and development of LED technologies, and their website contains volumes of data on LED lighting systems. Their Lifetime and Reliability Fact Sheet contains data on the failure ra…
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.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I bought a pile of cheap LED bulbs[0] when they first became available on Amazon Canada, and replaced every light in my home. They've run cheap and cold for years now, without a single failure. I suspect that there's some planned obsolescence in newer products. 0: https://www.amazon.ca/gp/aw/d/B01EN9L8YU?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_m...
Nobody is going to deliberately sabotage their LED bulbs because nobody really has a monopoly on them. They probably use cheap components that are only rated for the warranty period, but that isn't "planned obsolescence".
As others have mentioned, it seems all backwards that each bulb is converting AC/DC internally, and does not appear to have much in the way of heat dissipation for the converter or the LED chip(s). I've built a lot of LED lighting setups, and even with the most efficient chips and converters, extremely underdriven, the footprint required to run efficiently and dissipate heat in a way that will let them last 10-20 yea…
I've thought about the idea of wiring my entire house with DC for the lighting parts, for exactly this reason. But the fact that I'd have to sell my house one day stops me.
I've only done this in the living room as an experiment, and have no intention of doing this anywhere else exactly because of the maintenance overhead and the breaking with convention.
> But the fact that I'd have to sell my house one day stops me.
“Here. It works now. Here is a manual that describes how it works, here is a box of spare parts. You are welcome to rip it all out and replace it with conventional gear. There is no warrantee on this thing, even though it's awesome.”
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…
This is in contradiction with the article, which says that the driver is the cause in 90% of cases. EDIT: This was not entirely correct as the article says: > The US Department of Energy (DoE)’s solid-state lighting program supports research and development of LED technologies, and their website contains volumes of data on LED lighting systems. Their Lifetime and Reliability Fact Sheet contains data on the failure ra…
Some don't even have a bridge rectifier - just a couple of capacitors and that's it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
yeah, darn those pesky laws around liability getting in the way of some good old-fashioned handiwork.
As long as you're just replacing the fixture and not running new line a handy man type person can do it legally.
That likely depends on local codes; not sure about light fixtures specifically, but I definitely have encountered variations in different cities in the same county when it comes to ceiling fans.
So, engineering lead of a (outdoor) led Luminaire manufacturer here. And our sales director used to work for one of the biggest Asian light bulb OEMs. Happy to answer specific technical questions out there that this article triggered.
So, engineering lead of a (outdoor) led Luminaire manufacturer here. And our sales director used to work for one of the biggest Asian light bulb OEMs. Happy to answer specific technical questions out there that this article triggered.