Burn Down Your House With LED's!

will last ten years sounds like a pretty good deal.

White LEDs are quite expensive at the moment, and they don't last as long as regular LEDs in the "white" colour spectrum. They are made with blue LEDs and a yellow phosphor. They are also not as efficient at the moment as fluorescent lamps as far as output goes (lm/W).

I also have an outdoor light fixture, and I chose a "warm" white colour spectrum fluorescent lamp (screw base) and it works great. I installed it about 4 years ago, and it is on almost every night for about 4-5 hours. It takes a while to warm up when it is cold outside, but otherwise, it is great. I used tungsten lamps before, and they constantly were burning out.

I'd try the UL approved approach first, and actually, you can already buy screw base LED illuminated lamps at a decent price.

--
Myron Samila
Toronto, ON Canada
Samila Racing
http://204.101.251.229/myronx19

as regular LEDs

phosphor. They

output goes (lm/W).

spectrum

years ago, and

up when it is

and they

screw base LED

Yeah, flourescents last a long time, but if you live anywhere along the Gulf Coast like I do they attract termites like crazy when they swarm in the spring.

Dave snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com

And lotsa luck getting them to "fire up" below about 40 degrees if you're anywhere it gets that cold.

--
Don Bruder - dakidd@sonic.net - New Email policy in effect as of Feb. 21, 2004.
For info on this, see  Short
form: I'm trashing EVERYTHING that doesn't contain a specific, rotating phrase
in the subject line. Sorry, but spammers have forced me to take this action.

Plenty of electronic-ballasted compact fluorescents fire up at zero or colder, and "outdoor" types (and most other with outer bulbs over the tubing) work down to about zero, give or take somewhat depending on wind (they take cold better in enclosed fixtures). They may need several minutes to warm up. My favorite so far is the Philips 18 watt "Outdoor". In severe enough cold it starts off-color (pinkish red, apparently from neon or a neon-argon mixture, fair chance not requiring presence of mercury vapor to start) but warms up amazingly after several minutes.

- Don Klipstein ( snipped-for-privacy@misty.com,

Does the bulb fail when it's switched on or after it's been on for a while?

If the latter then perhaps it'overheating? That could also be a problem for

60+ LEDs.

My vote would be to try a flourescent as they run cooler.

if its an order light, maybe you should start watching your neighbors. ;)

DougC wrote:

any

8 40-50+

likely

the

standing,

what

that

A compact fluorescent light will last many times longer, and will cost less than ten dollars. And it's a simple matter of screwing it into the socket.

You can get white LEDs from

and the price is only a dollar each. I've never had any problems with the more than

100 I've bought from him (just a satisfied customer). I bought a hundred on ebay, and the 20 LED lamp I made and have had running for a few months is now so dim that it has become useless. Two of the ten LEDs have failed completely. They were only a quarter apiece, but I see now that I got what I paid for, a _whole_lot_less quality.

If you order from the URL above, you can use the 50 degree for a wider beam, or like you said, spread them out for a wider beam and use the 20 degree LEDs. White LEDs are not any more efficient than incandescent lights, but last longer. You will need a circuit to limit the current, and you can use 25 in series for about 85 to 90 volts drop, and connect two strings anti-parallel so each lights up on each half of the AC cycle. The dropping circuit can be a 100 ohm resistor, and a .47 uF X2 rated capacitor, both in series with the LEDs.

Also, you must leave space between the LEDs, or they will get too hot and overheat, and fail soon after. Heat is their enemy!

But believe me, I'm speaking from experience, your best bet is to use a regular compact fluorescent lamp instead. They're dirt cheap compared to LEDs.

the Gulf

the

Heh, well, that's _your_ problem. Maybe if you check out these facts, you'll see why:

"The average number of insects in one square mile is more than all of the people on earth. The total weight of arthropods in the world is several times the total weight of all other land animals combined."