Led Lighting

[brum]

Hi

Can any member give advice or help.

I am currently trying to lowering power consumption on lighting.

At present my newly purchased nb has 24 x 10w g4 halogens for lighting,and i have read leds use far less power.

Any advice,information or comments would be greatly appreciated.

 

Regards

Brum

[Naughty Cal]

G4 Led replacement bulbs are easy enough and cheap enough to buy on ebay.

 

We have used them for the last three years with no problem at all. We recently changed from 10w equivalent bulbs to 20w equivalent led bulbs as we wanted the cabin to be brighter.

 

Some prefer warm light versions but we refer the starker bright light versions.

[nicknorman]

Our boat had lots of G4 halogens - very nice light but very thirsty on electricity! I replaced most of them with LED. We still have a few halogens, it didn't seem worth replacing halogens that are only turned on infrequently or for short duration.

 

It will depend on your light fittings but typically in a g4 downlighter fitting, you use the disc shaped LED bulbs with the leads coming out of the side. Companies like Bedazzled and Baddie the Pirate sell them. They come in different power ratings and sizes, so its important to check what size will fit in the fitting.

 

You can get warm white and cool white. All ours are warm white but some folk like cool white - personally I find them a bit harsh and, well, cold! Think blue-white for cold, and yellow-white for warm.

 

There is a difference in light quality between halogen and warm white LED. The former has light at a wide range of frequencies. The latter has light at relatively few frequencies. Even though both fool the eye into seeing white light, the latter can be less satisfactory for seeing colours correctly. Also there is a big difference in light quality between different makes. Unfortunately my experience is that the ones that put out the most light for the power rating tend to have a less pleasant light, the ones that out out the least light can look the best. I bought a selection of makes and some had a rather unpleasant slight greenish hue. In the end I settled on these as having a light quality closest to halogen.

http://www.boatlamps.co.uk/contents/en-uk/d9.html

 

Needless to say, they were the most expensive and least bright! So you will have to decide which criteria is important to you - cost, light output, or light quality. I used the above in the living area, and some cheaper ones in other areas.

 

There is a wide range of cost, ebay as NC has mentioned, at one end and my link above at the other end. Very cheap ones may be unregulated and might not like the range of voltages on your boats electrical system - eg a 12v LED being supplied with 14.4v when the engine is running. Most LED bulbs have an integral regulator circuit that means they run happily up to 30v. However this regulator circuit has been known to cause interference especially to DAB radio. If you use DAB radio I would check a sample with the radio on, before equipping the whole boat. As usual, the more expensive ones are more likely to not interfere with DAB.

Edited November 5, 2013 by nicknorman

[johnmck]

When our boat was built we specified LED.

 

Beacon Boats fitted lights sourced from here.

 

http://www.ideallights.co.uk/corporate/index.php

 

They have been marvellous. Not a cheap option, but after three years now they have performed very well and look great. None have failed and they do not have that cheap after fit look common with many.

Edited November 5, 2013 by johnmck

[LEO]

Hi,

 

Well worth searching the forum as there was a recent posting on sourcing these and the different costings.

 

I think they are excellent - if I had every light switched on in my boat power used would be 330 watts by fitting LEDs this is reduced to 33 watts.

 

Some suppliers have excellent displays so it's possible to see the light quality before you buy.

 

if you find the posting it will give you lots of information about availability, internet or UK based supplier ------ the choice is yours.

 

Hope that helps

 

L

[bizzard]

Google ''Bedazzled'' Well explained, well illustrated, good customer relations, for every LED fitting under the sun.

[Adrian Jones]

It is important to understand that there are two different types of LED lamps suitable for replacing halogen lamps. The first are resistor controlled lamps these are normally the cheap type sold on eBay by many Chinese vendors, many shipping directly to the UK from Hong Kong. These lamps are designed for use with a fixed voltage, many are rated for 13.8V for use in cars and are designed to give optimum light output at that voltage. Most narrow boat users will of course use the lights on board mostly when not charging batteries so the voltage will be nearer 12V than 13.8V. At the lower voltage 13.8V rated lamps will give out much less light than they would at 13.8 volts. There are other lamps sold, also resistor controlled lamps which are rated at 12V should these lamps be used when batteries are charging at 13.8V some chargers give an output of 14.8V then the current flowing through the lamp with be 50% more than it would be at 12V. The result is excess heat in the lamp and at best the working life of the lamp will be reduced very considerably.

 

How do you know what you are buying when purchasing from most eBay vendors? The fact is you dont!

 

Most of the very inexpensive lamps sold don't have any specification and vendors will simply say they are 12V. Most boat owners have no way of telling whether the lamps are designed for 13.8v or 12V, its a lottery what you get if you choose the inexpensive resistor controlled option. The lamps may work OK, if your lucky and get 13.8V versions. However satisfied users might not realise that they are getting sub optimal light output. If your unfortunate and you get lamps rated at 12V your lamps will simply overheat when batteries are being charged.

 

I think its pretty obvious that I'm no fan of resistor controlled lamps on boats!

 

The best alternative to resistor controlled lamps are constant-current controlled lamps often rated at 10-30V. These have built in electronic control circuits which ensure that the optimum level of current flows through the LED lamp independent of the voltage applied. In other words as the voltage goes up and down on your boat, as it will do, the current through the lamp remains the same as does the light output at the optimum level. So these lamps are the perfect choice for use on boats. They are more expensive but will have a much longer working life and above all will be safe.

 

If any members have any technical LED questions I will be happy to help explain this often misunderstood area of lighting

 

Regards

 

Adrian Jones

LED Lighting Engineer

Edited November 5, 2013 by Adrian Jones

[by'eck]

Absolutely the way to go with lighting since they consume approx 10% of the power of equivalent output halogen.

 

The only issue I found when replacing 20 watt halogen bulbs with identical fitting LED's is that its physically not possible to get quite the same light output. Many of the popular flush mounting ceiling fittings just haven't the available space diameter to take larger than 12 SMD LED replacements, which although suggested as replacement for 20 watt halogen, just aren't quite as bright.

 

I'm sitting in a large room of a recently converted house though lit by just four direct mains powered 26 SMD LEDS's and the lighting is excellent with just 16 watts consumption.

[nicknorman]

Adrian - yes I agree with all that, and would just add that with a SMPS regulated LED, whilst the current through the actual LED chips does indeed remain constant, the current drawn from the boat actually decreases at higher voltages since they draw constant power.

[Adrian Jones]

Adrian - yes I agree with all that, and would just add that with a SMPS regulated LED, whilst the current through the actual LED chips does indeed remain constant, the current drawn from the boat actually decreases at higher voltages since they draw constant power.

Indeed it does as the voltage goes up the overall current falls, the power consumption remaining constant.

 

Maybe I should have mentioned that the resistor controlled lamps are also less efficient as power is lost though heating the control resistors. Its true that the electronic control circuit in constant-current type also has some losses but less so than most resistor lamps.

 

Regards

 

Adrian Jones

LED Lighting Engineers

[Adrian Jones]

Absolutely the way to go with lighting since they consume approx 10% of the power of equivalent output halogen.

 

The only issue I found when replacing 20 watt halogen bulbs with identical fitting LED's is that its physically not possible to get quite the same light output. Many of the popular flush mounting ceiling fittings just haven't the available space diameter to take larger than 12 SMD LED replacements, which although suggested as replacement for 20 watt halogen, just aren't quite as bright.

 

I'm sitting in a large room of a recently converted house though lit by just four direct mains powered 26 SMD LEDS's and the lighting is excellent with just 16 watts consumption.

 

This is a most interesting thread and you raise a good point worthy of a reply.

 

In most things in life more is often regarded as being better. However in designing LED lamps the enemy that has to be kept at bay is heat. All LEDs have a maximum temperature above which they will be damaged. Therefore the lamp designer has to carefully consider how much heat is generated and how to conduct that heat away.

 

Lets take a common 30mm diameter, G4, 'Planar Disc' lamp, the round disc type with two pins which are commonly available and the type you are using. This size of lamp is made using different number of LEDs, some have six LEDs, some nine and others as you mention have twelve. The fact is the number of LEDs does not always reflect the light output. The wider the LEDs are spaced on the board the better is the heat conduction away from the each LED. The closer the LEDs are mounted, the more difficult it is to get the heat away. In practice, a 12 LED lamp designer will actually reduce the light output from each LED to keep within thermal limits. In other words each LED will be down rated and therefore run at less than full brightness.

 

I find that the most popular lamps and often the brightest lamps are 10SMD lamps. These can be driven quite hard but the LEDs are spaced wide enough to give maximum light and not overheat. The 10SMD lamp often outperform 12SMD lamps and to boot can be cheaper.

 

The thing to look for is lumen output of any lamp. If a vendor doesn't publish it, don't bother to buy the lamp. The vendor either doesn't know what it is or hes hiding something. Either way steer clear!

 

Regards

[Paul's Nulife4-2]

Hi ya gang,

I have put white LEDs in all my lights, & the fist thing we notice is WOW, there bright, Second thing we noticed is WOW look how little power they use. The Third thing we noticed was how difficult it was to read a book @ night ,it just didn't make sence.

But we got over it,,,we gave up reading @ night !.

[nicknorman]

Hi ya gang,

I have put white LEDs in all my lights, & the fist thing we notice is WOW, there bright, Second thing we noticed is WOW look how little power they use. The Third thing we noticed was how difficult it was to read a book @ night ,it just didn't make sence.

But we got over it,,,we gave up reading @ night !.

The reading thing is to do with the quality of the light (diversity of the spectrum) and why I would recommend trying a few different types/makes rather than just buying a load of the cheapest ones.

[Paul's Nulife4-2]

The reading thing is to do with the quality of the light (diversity of the spectrum) and why I would recommend trying a few different types/makes rather than just buying a load of the cheapest ones.

Aahh,thanks for that,,

I did get them from a well regarded supplier,,'Bedazzled' approx 3 or 4 yrs ago.

But good point,I will try changing 1 or 2 in the saloon area.

[nicknorman]

 

Aahh,thanks for that,,

I did get them from a well regarded supplier,,'Bedazzled' approx 3 or 4 yrs ago.

But good point,I will try changing 1 or 2 in the saloon area.

I recommend you try one of the ones I posted a link to in post #3. Not the brightest, definitely not the cheapest, but a good light quality IMO. I put one each of this LED, and a 10W halogen, adjacent to each other in the over-dinette lighting and was hard pressed to work out which was the LED and which the halogen, although the halogen is a little brighter.

 

That is of course presuming they are the right shape for your fittings!

Edited November 5, 2013 by nicknorman

[Top cat]

We got most of our led lamps from bedazzled and they work just fine but I did get tempted to by an unbranded cheapy from a chandlers, when we use that lamp it interferes with the radio, the others don't.

So I think it's worthwhile spending abit more to get good quality lamps from someone who specifies them for boat use.

 

TC

Edited November 5, 2013 by Top cat

[bizzard]

You shouldn't have trouble reading under the warm white LED bulbs.

[nicknorman]

You shouldn't have trouble reading under the warm white LED bulbs.

Ah, the answer to all illiteracy. Never mind support teaching / adult education, just buy them an LED lamp!

Edited November 5, 2013 by nicknorman

[bizzard]

Ah, the answer to all illiteracy. Never mind support teaching / adult education, just buy them an LED lamp!

T H E C A T S A T O N T H E M A T

[Paul's Nulife4-2]

T H E C A T S A T O N T H E M A T

 

Did you miss out the 'H' on purpose to test me !.

[mrsmelly]

Hi

 

My boat had all halogen lights when I bought it as the previous owner simply had no idea about boats and power. I changed them all to CHEAP leds from ebay. They have been giving perfect service now for 2 years and in this time I have changed none of one kind I purchased and about four of another kind. I paid less than £2 per lamp and considerably less on some of them. I have during that time run via gennie charging, towpath by engine charging and mostly as now via shoreline with the batts sitting at around 13.8 volts. Pay a billion pounds per item if you wish but realy truly take it from a liveaboard you simply do not have to pay over the odds.

 

Tim

[Detling]

My boat came with halogens everywhere, we changed the lot to warm white LED from bedazzled. The only problem was the cost but at £1 an hour to charge your batteries from diesel it soon pays for itself. The whole lot (24 lights) consume less than two of the old lights did.

[Magic Potion]

I've got fluorescent frame lights throughout. The 30cm 8 watt bulbs, 2 in each light. Are there any led equivalents out there?

[Graham Davis]

I've got fluorescent frame lights throughout. The 30cm 8 watt bulbs, 2 in each light. Are there any led equivalents out there?

http://www.bedazzled.uk.com/12v%20&%2024v%20LED%20TUBES.htm

[Magic Potion]

Thanks for that. But at £30 a pop that's £840 to replace the lot. Think I'll stick to what I've got.