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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:11 am 
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I have seen LED beacons before (I think there's one installation in York somewhere), but I've never seen ones where the LEDs are on the OUTSIDE!

sotonsteve wrote:
The lighting is on a dimmer circuit, which means the LEDs always have a bit of a flicker. Dimming the dimmer switch doesn't do anything to the LEDs anyway, because the LED spotlights only need dimmed levels of power to operate at full power, so they stay at full power until the dimmer switch is almost at minimum, and extinguish at the same point as the halogens completely extinguish from dim.

Now that suprises me. The packaging for any LED lamp says "not to be used on dimmer circuits", so I always presumed it's damage the interior electrics. Having never looked at the electrics inside an LED package, I don't know if there's a driver in there or just some resistors and/or a bridge rectifier to stabilise the output from the LEDs... but I always presumed that dimming would cause damage - like it would do on CFLs.

Phosco152 wrote:
I have some GU10 LEDs ( 20x 5mm LEDs) bulbs in the 2 "corridor" bits of my hall. Those are really only supplementary lights and there is a main light. They are supposed to be equivalent to "8w" whatever that means as there isn't an 8w halogen rating nor CFL. They are dimmer than a 7w CFL GU10.


Yes I don't understand this either. You buy the LED lamps from B&Q and the package says "replaces your existing 8w" - I looked at that and thought to myself "well that's helpful, there isn't an 8w Halogen bulb" - the closest being a 10w capsule.

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A bar I was in last week was entirely lit with the Luxeon 3 LED GU10s and each LEDs is (I think) 3w each. I hadn't noticed until I looked up that they were LEDs and the colour temp was as good as a halogen (unlike a £2 example). Those however are at least £20 a pop ( it's a while since I looked at the prices) so again you get what you pay for.

The outlet of TGI Friday's inside the Trafford Centre (manchester) seems to be lit by these types of light (this type of LED downlighter is also sold on eBay, but they're mighty expensive)... While I was there I kept looking up to try and work out if the light was actually a cluster of 3 MR16 narrow beam halogen reflector bulbs, but the light output was far too white. They were far brighter than a 50w halogen.

In my garden I have GU10 LED lamps that are 2.8w Alpha branded (B&Q) ones. They're a bit dim in the kitchen but they make great garden lights. Being about £8 each they're not what I'd call "cheap", but they're not 3w luxeon "expensive" either. The light was great when the garden had snow on it. (The only thing I'm not overkeen on is the fact they have such a narrow beam)

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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:18 am 
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I made the mistake when in b&q and ended up with the blue ones!
Also I have the philips colour changing ones and one out of the three as already turned bad! the sequence has altered big time compared to the other two!


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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:37 am 
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Those B&Q blue ones aren't great... to start with there's only 18 LEDs in the package, and then they've glued on a frosted glass front piece, which further reduces the output. For coloured ones you're best going to Maplin or buying off eBay. My solid coloured LED lamps in my bedroom are from maplin - at £10 a piece they're not as cheap as the B&Q ones, but as Phosco's said: you get what you pay for. The light output is much more crisp, and with 21 LEDs in a package you get that little bit more light too.

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My colour changing LED lamps I have were bought off eBay, and I got those particular ones because the write-up said they had a sequencer inside so they'd all change to the same colour at the same time, even if switched differently. They work fine... they change colour very quickly (only spend about 1-2 seconds on a single colour) but they are all in sequence. And also because they're LED they run at a cooler temperature than Halogen and so you can do things with them for special lighting
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 12:52 am 
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Look's like i am not the only one to have a bedroom lit like blackpool!
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 1:05 am 
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Haha! yes, I like my lights. I think all-in-all I've spent about £200 getting my bedroom lit how I like it (and that includes the £60 ceiling fan - with a 40w G9 capsule bulb which I converted the light to operate - which is remote controlled and dimmable). The blue and green spots above the window are used the most, because they consume just over 2w of power and so I click them on before I go out anywhere, and so if it goes dark it still looks like I'm upstairs in my room without using too much power. The coke bottles above the wardrobe are filled 2/3 full with water so as to refract the light better (the wardrobe is bolted to the wall so everything stays perfectly still even if I slam the doors) and behind the coke bottles is a double GU10 spotlight bar with a blue and a green 50w halogen lamp in the fittings... when it's just the spotlight bar on, you get just blue light through one of the coke bottles and just green through another one, then various reds pinks and oranges through the other bottles and on the walls - it looks like a multicoloured sunrise!
The 2ft fluorescent battens above the window aren't used very much, but they have blue and green cover sleeves on.

You should have seen my other bedroom at the height of my lighting frenzy! 7 coloured fluorescent lamps (one was in the window and shone out into the street), three 10w downlighters (one with emergency backup), the central light which never got used, three 2x18w PL-T wall mounted uplighters, a 4w bobbled glass round emergency light (wired up to part-night photocell and switches so it'd come on when it got dark outside), and a ccfl exit light by the door (why not?!)... oh, and rope lights around the outer perimeter! And a twinspot emergency light hanging over the edge of the wardrobe!!

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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 1:28 am 
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lol!
Atm i have two 18w batterns with ge lamps (one 1990/80s philip sone with original tube! (Might get some 36w batterns and have red blue green and yellow tubes in!) on top of my wardrobe.
A 21w blue b&q tube
Two 8w batterns lighting the desk up! with help from another 18w battern!
A thorn beta 5
2 colour changing spot lights and blue led spotlight.
And two rope lights.


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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 3:20 am 
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mazeteam wrote:
I have seen LED beacons before (I think there's one installation in York somewhere), but I've never seen ones where the LEDs are on the OUTSIDE!

sotonsteve wrote:
The lighting is on a dimmer circuit, which means the LEDs always have a bit of a flicker. Dimming the dimmer switch doesn't do anything to the LEDs anyway, because the LED spotlights only need dimmed levels of power to operate at full power, so they stay at full power until the dimmer switch is almost at minimum, and extinguish at the same point as the halogens completely extinguish from dim.

Now that suprises me. The packaging for any LED lamp says "not to be used on dimmer circuits", so I always presumed it's damage the interior electrics. Having never looked at the electrics inside an LED package, I don't know if there's a driver in there or just some resistors and/or a bridge rectifier to stabilise the output from the LEDs... but I always presumed that dimming would cause damage - like it would do on CFLs.


Well this is the advantage of LEDs, you don't really need a bowl/globe any more since once they are encapsulated they don't need further weather proofing. Bit like the Stella which doesn't have a bowl in the conventional sense.

A dimmer switch works on what is called pulse width modulation - basically it feeds the load with square waves and "dims" it by making these narrower. Wide square waves more power, narrower less power. For a halogen lamp - purely resistive load, power is directly proportional to width of the square wave.

When the dimmer is almost off, the square wave becomes in effect a series of spikes. However LEDs only need a few milliamps of power to operate. The GU10 ones have what is called a capacitive mains dropper power supply, basically the reactance of a capacitor is used to dissipate power and it is a very high impedance load. The spikes are sufficient to feed the capacitive mains dropper enough power to light the LEDs as the power supply is of high impedance.

It is all to do with matched loads, think of the dimmer output when almost off as an analogue radio signal, there is enough power into a high impedance load (radio receiver input) to feed the LED power supply (radio to pick up a signal) but not to light a halogen directly (drive a speaker without an amplifier from an aerial).

In my previous house I had built some uplighters into the floor  (suspended wooden floor- old house)which were made from a glass brick, a lightbox underneath and lit by CFLs. I also had blue LEDs in them fed from a capacitive mains dropper PSU. Even when the switch was off, there was enough leakage current across the switch and from coupled power from adjacent cables to very dimly light the LEDs.

In this house, one of the hall GU10 LEDs does the same, you can only see it in the dark but it glows dimly even when switched off.


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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 9:46 am 
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Phosco152 wrote:

A bar is was in last week was entirely lit with the Luxeon 3 LED GU10s and each LEDs is (I think) 3w each. I hadn't noticed until I looked up that they were LEDs and the colour temp was as good as a halogen (unlike a £2 example). Those however are at least £20 a pop ( it's a while since I looked at the prices) so again you get what you pay for.


These are what I saw in that bar - look at the price!  :shock:


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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 8:22 pm 
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Phosco152 wrote:
A bar is was in last week was entirely lit with the Luxeon 3 LED GU10s and each LEDs is (I think) 3w each. I hadn't noticed until I looked up that they were LEDs and the colour temp was as good as a halogen (unlike a £2 example). Those however are at least £20 a pop ( it's a while since I looked at the prices) so again you get what you pay for. These are what I saw in that bar - look at the price!  :shock:


The reason for the price its because they're from Hong Wong ;) .

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PostPosted: Wed Dec 30, 2009 8:57 pm 
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Looking again, that price is actually for 12 lamps so actually a fairly good deal. UK prices are far higher, £20 each so near enough what I originally thought.


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