Are you interested in LED light?

[SY]

Originally Posted by Pano

Them darn LEDs are everywhere! Was wondering around the house this morning at 3AM and noticed LEDs everywhere, some actually lighting my way.

• The bedside clock
• The cordless phone
• A riot of LEDs on the cable modem, router and VoIP device.
• Clock on the stove
• Clock on the microwave oven
• Water dispenser on the fridge
• Lighting inside the fridge when opened.
• Amplifier in living room
• Another telephone
• Faux votive candles my wife had left on
• Computer mouse
• Now the back light of my computer monitor

All glowing their little hearts out.

I've heard that they also make great voltage references and can even be used for biasing. Whoulda thought?

[djQUAN]

We have a separate 12V solar powered system at home. Rooms have two switches for lighting, one for normal AC mains powered lighting and the other for the 12V LED lighting.

in one room, I used a 30 LED strip with extruded aluminum case. In the other rooms, used a length of cheap flexible light strip (using those 5050 LEDs) with double sided adhesive.

After a while, the cheap LED strips deteriorated and dimmed to almost nothing after being used daily. The more expensive aluminum cased LED strip still works at full brightness.

These days, I pay extra for better quality LEDs and stay away from cheap ones if I know that they will be used regularly for a while. Bought 2000pcs of Osram long life PLCC LEDs and had boards made. Now I make my own LED strips so I'm sure they won't dim after a while.

[rsavas]

Speaking of lighting, my UV water sterilizer ballasts is beeping this morning, now I have to tear it apart and figure it out, damn,

Guess what, took the UV ballast apart, bulk ecap (47uF/250V) exploded, 10 years old, not too bad. The sterilized runs 24/7/365, so 90Khrs MTBF. The UV lamp has 9Khr life, last one cost me $100.00.
Take a look at the cost of what it would cost to make a equiv. sterilizer out of LED's, I'd did & I was amazed at the cost.

[jackinnj]

I happened to glance a bulletin on the returns desk at Home Depot a while back -- it seems that some folks have been returning the Phillips LED spotlights but inserting a regular incandescent in the packaging -- about a $24 difference. Who knows what would happen if these folks turned their ingenuity into bona fide economic activity.

[Wavebourn]

Originally Posted by Pano

[*]Faux votive candles my wife had left on

Our candles are with timers. They switch off after 4 hours, and switch on the next day at exactly the same time. Very convenient.

[Pano]

Originally Posted by jackinnj

Who knows what would happen if these folks turned their ingenuity into bona fide economic activity.

It's certainly economic for them.

[Pano]

Originally Posted by SY

I've heard that they also make great voltage references and can even be used for biasing. Whoulda thought?

Ha! I couldn't see those, as they are buried deep in the amp guts. Need to get them out where they show.

I hope they don't turn off after 4 hours.

[jitter]

Originally Posted by rsavas

Reading a lamp spec, the lamp half life is the # that they are stating, it is a statistical method to fool the user. They ain't going to say in 50K hrs, half are not working!!

I don't agree. This kind of info is given to those who know what it means, i.e. the pro users, not us consumers.
Pro users will replace light sources on a group basis, before most of them have failed, as this is the most economical solution.
Average spent hours at failure rates of (e.g.) 5%, 20% and 50% are a basis in the decision on when to replace a group of lamps.

[tvrgeek]

#181 Yes, LED's are very good references. They have wide use as the reference in a constant current source. Red LED's even have some thermal tracking advantages and I have been told green are more stable. To go off the deep end, look up Red Light District tube amp and you will see what a few hundred can do. I did see a DYI amp once that mounted the IPS CCS LEDs in the front panel as power indicators. I have never run that much current through them.

#187, 188 I am pretty sure, for an LED lamp half life is not MBTF.(mean time between failure) Just like a florescent bulb, It is the average time until the light emitted has degraded to some specific level. Florescent are spec to 80% I think.

[freax]

Originally Posted by djQUAN

We have a separate 12V solar powered system at home. Rooms have two switches for lighting, one for normal AC mains powered lighting and the other for the 12V LED lighting.

in one room, I used a 30 LED strip with extruded aluminum case. In the other rooms, used a length of cheap flexible light strip (using those 5050 LEDs) with double sided adhesive.

dx.com has some nice LED strips that I've been meaning to try out, they also have some great WF-501B knockoffs, charging the required batteries can be a bit tricky/explosive though, haha.

TK Monster Explosion

As you say, buying quality is of the upmost importance to me too, same goes with rechargeable Li-ion batteries.

Shortly after (maybe 3-5 seconds) being on high, I heard something in the light begin to sizzle. I felt a shock like a small explosion within the light. I dropped the light and as soon it fell on the floor it sounded like loud firecrackers popping. I jumped onto the bench to cover myself. There was one loud boom. When the smoke cleared, I was in shock with so much glass around me. I inspected myself and found blood dripping on my left leg above the front side of my ankle, 1 inch cut on my left arm, 1 inch cut on my right side chest all caused by the shrapnel from the explosion.
Inspecting site where the explosion happened. The rocks on my balcony (where the light was dropped) parted from the explosion leaving an imprint. A few parts of the light were barely distinguishable.

In summary, if a battery can do this:

In the pictures you can see that the explosion was very powerful to dent the railings of the sliding door. Crack 3 panels of glass ¾ inch thick. Send glass shrapnel flying to get imbedded in a cement wall.

If you wanna get into LED flashlights and their associated batteries, you'd be best to buy good quality.