Lightbulbs?

[V]

I'm really curious what kind of lumen depreciation you're going to see if you put these bulbs in a boob light, or other light that doesn't offer ventilation. LEDs deteriorate very quickly if the heat sink isn't able to get the heat away from the LED.

[ken0042]

Originally Posted by Reaper

I am replacing my bulbs in my house with LED bulbs. I generally go one room at a time in order to maintain colour consitency. I buy my bulbs at Costco so I can return them if they fail (I've had one fail - return was no problem). While the cost of the bulbs can be pricey (~$13/bulb) I managed to drop my power bill by approximately $30/month by replacing the lighting in high traffic areas with LEDs.

I assume that means you are replacing incandecent bulbs with LED. In my house I have almost all CFL, and the price jump between CFL to LED doesn't really justify the energy savings.

For example CFLs are currently 4x the price of incandecent, but use 1/4 the power and last longer. The LEDs I have looked at are 4x the price of CFL, and use 20-30% less power.

[BloodFetish]

Here's an interesting chart comparing LEDs to incandescent to CFL...

http://www.designrecycleinc.com/led%20comp%20chart.html

[Josh]

I have CF bulbs on the interior of our house and LED's for the exterior lights. For the exterior of the house, I calculated the payback period to be around 6 months from the Incandescent bulbs that they replaced (considering they're on for at least 8 hours a night).

[V]

Originally Posted by Reaper

I am replacing my bulbs in my house with LED bulbs. I generally go one room at a time in order to maintain colour consitency. I buy my bulbs at Costco so I can return them if they fail (I've had one fail - return was no problem). While the cost of the bulbs can be pricey (~$13/bulb) I managed to drop my power bill by approximately $30/month by replacing the lighting in high traffic areas with LEDs.

That's insane, if true. Have you averaged that over a number of months? Or did you just have a true-up on your meter, and were overcharged a month or two previous?

$30/month is about equivalent to 375 kWh. To save 30 bucks in a monh you either changed out about 40 100W fixtures or you have your lights on over 12 hours a day.

[Jimmy Stang]

Originally Posted by Josh

I have CF bulbs on the interior of our house and LED's for the exterior lights. For the exterior of the house, I calculated the payback period to be around 6 months from the Incandescent bulbs that they replaced (considering they're on for at least 8 hours a night).

How do you find they did throughout the winter? I like to keep my back door and garage lights on at night as well as a crime deterrent, and I have been putting a small 5-watt CFL in there (I don't want blazing lights - just something to provide a little light near the doors) and they do fairly well, even though they are not recommended for outdoor use. They last a couple of years of dusk-dawn, and although that's below what you'd expect under ideal circumstances, the energy savings vs. incandescent still makes it worthwhile.

The only other slight downside is that they are probably about 25% dimmer than usual when the temperature gets really cold - around -15 and lower. But again, I don't want or need anything super-bright, so it isn't a big deal.

I'm just wondering whether LEDs would last longer and be more consistent than CFLs for outdoor use.

[V]

LEDs thrive in the cold weather. The colder they are the better they work.

[Josh]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Stang

How do you find they did throughout the winter? I like to keep my back door and garage lights on at night as well as a crime deterrent, and I have been putting a small 5-watt CFL in there (I don't want blazing lights - just something to provide a little light near the doors) and they do fairly well, even though they are not recommended for outdoor use. They last a couple of years of dusk-dawn, and although that's below what you'd expect under ideal circumstances, the energy savings vs. incandescent still makes it worthwhile.

The only other slight downside is that they are probably about 25% dimmer than usual when the temperature gets really cold - around -15 and lower. But again, I don't want or need anything super-bright, so it isn't a big deal.

I'm just wondering whether LEDs would last longer and be more consistent than CFLs for outdoor use.

The LED's work fine outside when its cold, always instant on unlike CFL's. Though winters in Oregon are more mild than winters in Calgary.

[Reaper]

Originally Posted by V

That's insane, if true. Have you averaged that over a number of months? Or did you just have a true-up on your meter, and were overcharged a month or two previous?

$30/month is about equivalent to 375 kWh. To save 30 bucks in a monh you either changed out about 40 100W fixtures or you have your lights on over 12 hours a day.

Changed out 18 bulbs IIRC. My wife is like a little kid when it comes to turning off lights when leaving a room though.

[photon]

New Cree bulb that has a super high colour rating (CRI of 93).

http://www.extremetech.com/electroni...ee-tw-led-bulb

[GP_Matt]

I moved into my new house three years ago with the plan to slowly replace all the bulbs with LED as they expire. Unfortunately in my kitchen I have a 6 pot light setup on one switch. Three of them burnt out so far so I threw in the Phillips LED bulbs. A fourth one burnt out yesterday so I pulled it out and realized that it was one of the LED bulbs which is now toast inside of two years and didn't outlast the incandescent bulbs on the same usage.

Does anyone know if it is a problem to have different bulbs on the same circuit?
If it isn't that then it will probably only take a second LED to burn out before I swear off them altogether and buy a bunch of heat producing incandescent bulbs.

[photon]

Home Depot's site isn't working properly for me right now, but check to see what the warranty is, I think I remember reading somewhere that the warranty for Philips LEDs is handled by the store itself. EDIT: Can't find anything about that, might have to call the store to confirm/deny.

[GP_Matt]

Originally Posted by photon

Home Depot's site isn't working properly for me right now, but check to see what the warranty is, I think I remember reading somewhere that the warranty for Philips LEDs is handled by the store itself. EDIT: Can't find anything about that, might have to call the store to confirm/deny.

I might try that, but I did not keep the receipt so they may give me grief about it.

On the plus side, going forward Home Depot has a bit of a scary database that links your credit card numbers to your email address and will email you your receipts when you shop there.

[Brannigans Law]

I was on the home depot website and people are raving about these phillips bulbs that are 17 dollars each. The 3 pack I got at costco is a much better deal @ 20 bucks a pack, can there really be such a justification for such an increase? I was thinking that maybe I could split the usage then... use the cheaper bulbs in the basement, outside lights, guest rooms etc.. and use the nicer bulbs elsewhere in high traffic areas. but then I thought jeez wouldn't that be weird to have different kinds of lights in the same house?

my inability to make a decision is crippling at times.

[bossy22]

Home depot has Cree LED's for $11.98 for 40w equivalent and $14.98 for 60w equivalent. I bought both for different parts of the house.

Those 60W bulbs are brighter than any 60w I've ever seen. I find the 40w to be pretty good.

[Brannigans Law]

are they warm or cool?

[Neeper]

Check out this site guys. This website has a ton of LED bulbs for sale with extremely good reviews on almost everything they sell: http://www.lightinthebox.com/c/led-light-bulbs_4657

[photon]

Originally Posted by Brannigans Law

I was on the home depot website and people are raving about these phillips bulbs that are 17 dollars each. The 3 pack I got at costco is a much better deal @ 20 bucks a pack, can there really be such a justification for such an increase?

There very well could be, LEDs are still new enough for there to be wild swings in quality with little regard to the price.

But I don't know what the 3pack is, is it the same as this one?

http://www.costco.ca/Luminus-LED-OMN...100055337.html

[photon]

Originally Posted by Brannigans Law

are they warm or cool?

The Cree ones are either warm, or you have a choice.

Though I don't know if they are going away from Home Depot, they didn't have any in the Marlborough location last time I went to get some from there, and they seem to have disappeared from the homedepot.ca website.

Here's a cached version:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.co...&hl=en&ct=clnk

[V]

Originally Posted by Brannigans Law

I was on the home depot website and people are raving about these phillips bulbs that are 17 dollars each. The 3 pack I got at costco is a much better deal @ 20 bucks a pack, can there really be such a justification for such an increase? I was thinking that maybe I could split the usage then... use the cheaper bulbs in the basement, outside lights, guest rooms etc.. and use the nicer bulbs elsewhere in high traffic areas. but then I thought jeez wouldn't that be weird to have different kinds of lights in the same house?

my inability to make a decision is crippling at times.

LED gives you a good opportunity to use different lights in different areas.

You don't want the same colour temperature in your kitchen as your bedroom. Does your basement need the same CRI (colour rendering index) as your kitchen or bedroom?

Some areas it matters that the colour of your lights are exactly the same, and other areas it doesn't. With LED you have way more flexibility to put the right lights in the right spaces.

I just don't think they're worth more than 10 dollars. The price point really needs to come down.