Florescent to LED Conversion

[bunyip]

On a proper computer now, at work we have had many LED downlight failures and they were all name brands purchased from reputable electrical retailers, the units I had were ebay globes from China and I had 4 out of 10 explode in the socket, I dismantled the remaining units and found that the electrolytic caps were 100v, we run 220v so it was inevitable that something was going to let go, after the explosion there is nothing of the cap left to investigate.
Having said that once they explode it is all over and I think the risk of a fire is minimal but I simply do not want to take the chance.
I replaced some kitchen halogen spotlights with LED's and they have been up for 5 years now without any problems, the light output is the same as the halogen and no sunburnt neck.
The technology is improving and my car even has LED from front5 to rear and interior.
We have no fluoro's so I cannot comment on what they are like.

 

[Stimw]

I shopped for over a year for lights to put in my 40' X 60' building and found 4' LED's at Rural King for $24.95, sometimes on sale for less.
With 6 lights it's like daylight in there and only 240 watts total!

 

[ultrarunner]

^^^Amazing isn't it... just the thing to put a smile on your face... saving money and improved lighting... win/win

I changed out all the bulbs at Moms except for her 3-way lamps... she has two and told me she rarely uses them... OK

Recently she is using them all the time to save money?

The large kitchen fixture uses two 4' LED which combines use 34 Watts... the fixture I replaced had 3 ea. 100W bulbs... a huge savings and better light.

Anyway... she didn't want to use the big ceiling lamps (34W) and instead has been using 2 table lamps 150W ea with the 3-way on high.

Me trying to explain LED tech to her is like some on TBN trying to explain configuring routers/WiFi etc... to me...

 

[bunyip]

We have all LED now and other power saving devices, last bill was $53 in credit with our solar, apart from LED what else can we improve on.

 

[ultrarunner]

The largest utility in the USA is purportedly PGE my provider...

PGE filed for Bankruptcy due to the California Fires where many perished and estimate from 30 to 50 Billion on liabilities possible.

One things that came up is the contracts PGE has with solar and wind... saying in Bankruptcy these could very well all be on the table... the shockwave could devastate and have a ripple effect industry wide if providers with contracts priced at a fixed kW price loose them...

I'm still waiting for my first Electric Bill with Solar... I do know my meter 30 days later registers 230 kWh less than before...

It is winter and depending on the situation I may find it prudent to replace gas appliances with electric such as Water Heater or Range...

 

[Alan W.]

I swapped my basement and the churches basement and now am working on the fellowship hall with Jesled that I got off Amazon. No failures and everyone loves them and much brighter than the florescent they replaced. I got the ones that do away with the ballast. Its simple to wire one end for line and the other for neutral. They are 3000 lumen frosted, 5000k.

 

[drssg]

I didn’t realize they made LED bulbs to replace fluorescents. For some reason, I thought I would have to buy new fixtures.

I have a bunch of 8’ fluorescent fixtures in my barn, and each one has two 110 watt bulbs. My biggest issue is that they are finicky with the weather. On a cool damp day, I might get only 10% of the lights working.

Any thoughts on whether that issue would be likely to persist if I just switched to LED bulbs?

 

[ultrarunner]

In the shop in Olympia I too had 8' bulbs and never would work right in cold weather... and they were noisy on start up and flickered.

I know I can order cold weather rated ballasts and such...

One day I just got fed up and took all of them down... added duplex receptacles to the J-Boxes and installed 4' two bulb LED from Costco... $20 each fixture...

Never had such good light... instant on... not temp dependent and silent...

On the other hand in Oakland the existing 4' three bulb fixtures with T12 and starters were installed in 1960.

For these I just swapped the bulbs like for like with LED bulbs only... no wiring and it was two bright!

So instead of leaving all three bulbs in each of the 4 fixtures I pulled one out and left 2... perfecto!

 

[YanmarFever]

I just put up a 30x60 shop so I was shopping for lights when I saw Costco had led's for 19.00 a piece. I wound up buying 15 fixtures, and they really put out the light, I really like the instant on and no more flickering.
So far Im happy with them

 

[kco]

I swapped my basement and the churches basement and now am working on the fellowship hall with Jesled that I got off Amazon. No failures and everyone loves them and much brighter than the florescent they replaced. I got the ones that do away with the ballast. Its simple to wire one end for line and the other for neutral. They are 3000 lumen frosted, 5000k.

I also got the tubes from Amazon that allow removing the ballast. The tubes are the kind that have the hot and neutral at one end instead of the hot at one end and neutral at the other.

I imagine it wastes power to energize the ballast, some are noisy, and they are another point of failure. We had a ballast fail in a valance fixture above the kitchen cabinets a couple of years ago with a huge flash and explosion which produced a lot of smoke from the hole burned through the ballast's plastic case.

The new tubes are much brighter and quicker than the old fluorescents.