Energy Efficient Light Bulbs

rogerblack

harryhound wrote: »

All clear replacement bulbs must have a minimum B class energy efficiency rating from 1 September 2016. Replacement conventional halogen bulbs with a C class energy efficiency rating will be banned.

You can now get LED lamps that put out as much light as a 50W halogen bulb, in the same package.
They are at the moment very expensive.
4 years will drop the price significantly, but I'd be surprised to find them as cheap as a fiver, before any 'green' rebates or discounting.

harryhound

.........and I doubt they will ever fit inside the new light fitting some shyster has just sold my wife.

The shade sort of looks like a bunch of lilies and it requires a tool to change the car headlight type energy rating E halogen bulbs.

mostevens

I found a website called lowenergysupermarket.com which has a range of energy saving products, including lights which may be suitable.

mrdigger

thenudeone wrote: »

I have used various GU10 CFLs which started well but faded quite badly after a couple of years.
LEDs don't fade but sometimes the "50w equivalent" tag is not deserved.

I bought 6 x 60 LED GU10 for £33.49 on ebay a few months ago from a seller called onlybulbz. They are not selling anything now but their ebay page points to www wesellbulbs.co.uk. The bulbs really were as bright as the stated replacement wattage.

Unfortunately LEDs do fade over time, if a claim is made that they last 50,000 hours this is technically correct, but at 50000 hours they will be far less bright than they were at new. The decay rates (loss of light output) on good lamps are about 5% for the 1st 1000 hours then about 2% every 1000 hours after that. See this Irish company for more info on LEDs, Future LEDs, www. futureled.ie

whasup

LEDs are the future but you must be careful about which you buy and from where. Cheap LEDs from ebay are not the same as expensive ones from more mainstream sources and will most likely either not last long or will use a lot more energy than it says on the tin. A really cheap unit could use as much energy as an average incandescent bulb and will last half as long. Good quality LEDs will use about 5% or 10% of standard bulbs - including halogens - and would give very significant savings on electricity costs. For the most efficient savings you would fit LED luminaries from new. (I mean from new build) The payback can still work for replacement units but it is a lot longer. Colour temperature is also imprtant. Most good manufacturers now offer two options - warm white or cool white. To replicate a standard halogen you would need a temperature of about 2700k which would be warm white. A 2.5W warm white LED is about the same as a 20W halogen - the LED is perhaps a shade brighter. That's a bit more than 90% less energy.

mrdigger

whasup wrote: »

LEDs are the future but you must be careful about which you buy and from where. Cheap LEDs from ebay are not the same as expensive ones from more mainstream sources and will most likely either not last long or will use a lot more energy than it says on the tin. A really cheap unit could use as much energy as an average incandescent bulb and will last half as long. Good quality LEDs will use about 5% or 10% of standard bulbs - including halogens - and would give very significant savings on electricity costs. For the most efficient savings you would fit LED luminaries from new. (I mean from new build) The payback can still work for replacement units but it is a lot longer. Colour temperature is also imprtant. Most good manufacturers now offer two options - warm white or cool white. To replicate a standard halogen you would need a temperature of about 2700k which would be warm white. A 2.5W warm white LED is about the same as a 20W halogen - the LED is perhaps a shade brighter. That's a bit more than 90% less energy.

+1
Agree, LEDs are the future, colour temperature 2700-3500k is warm, buy from somewhere that gives you a years guarantee, there are some very good ones out there and x10 bad ones, look for around the 3-5w versions from a reputable seller. Beware fleabay. Payback for your average LED bulb is ~6 months. (based on 4hrs daily use). Wear sunscreen. end of rant

rogerblack

mrdigger wrote: »

Unfortunately LEDs do fade over time, if a claim is made that they last 50,000 hours this is technically correct, but at 50000 hours they will be far less bright than they were at new. The decay rates (loss of light output) on good lamps are about 5% for the 1st 1000 hours then about 2% every 1000 hours after that. See this Irish company for more info on LEDs, Future LEDs, www. futureled.ie

Cree (one of the market leaders) is now stating 80% of the initial output after 50000 hours at 75C.

This is the LED itself at 75C though, many LED lamps will overheat in enclosed fixtures.

mrdigger

Hmm, it would take almost 6 years to be 100% on those figures, I'm not convinced. On the heat issue, you are quite correct, thats why the heatsinks are weird and wonderful fans and fins. At the end of the day if you have to replace the lamp after 2 years with a 90% reduction on its leccy bill, you are still quids in.

peteduk

Interesting thread and thanks to all for contributing. Will consider replacing our GU10S in the bathroom now.
Question:
We fitted 6 15w megaman R80 spotlights in our kitchen - and have replaced several.
The lighting is good but the initial cost prohibitive especially as I believe the bulb life is poor.
Discussion on other sites suggests MTBF (Mean time between failure) rates can be (initially) misleading and do not necessarily reflect what you might expect.
Does anyone know of low energy R80 60W incandescent equivalent bulbs that are known to be reliable?
Thank you

harryhound

My living room is lit by 4 Megaman E27s (?) replacements for 80Watt PAR38s (They look a bit like old fashioned round car headlights). Obviously they were about 10 times the price to buy about 4 years ago and after about a year one bulb went faulty. (I thought "here we go again") because I too had unsatisfactory longevity from "cheap" R80 miniature fluorescents in the bathroom and hall. However the big PAR38s are seemingly reliable as the initial failure has (touch wood) been a one off.
I bought the Megamann ones because they are "dimmable" (in reality they step down and if you get the setting wrong the brightness flickers, they also take appreciable time to warm up, but as they stay on most evenings from dusk until midnight, that is not a problem.).

If you find a reliable R80 let us know, I've still got two tungsten spares.

I am wondering if the R80 might jump directly to LED technology, as promoted in the above postings. So far I have managed to replace a few GU10s with LEDs where the brightness is not critical.