LED kitchen/dining lighting

themacster

The Litewave light is not a GU10, its a complete light fitting with integral bulb so you can't just swap it over for current GU10s. The GU10 replacements myself and other posters are referring to are the same size as halogens and simply replace your current bulbs using the existing fitting.

LED technology has been improving over time - it has only fairly recently been getting to the state where leds have been developed that can output enouigh light to be able to be used as general lighting - its an evolving technology - energy saving cfl lamps are just derivatives of flourescent tubes that are already an established technology.

LED prices are slowly coming down, so your builder is right to advise you to research it in advance.

I find the warm white leds slightly less warm than halogens, certainly better than the cfls.

dollydolittle_2

Aha! Thanks themacster!

So what is the advantage of the Litewave integral fitting? Presumably you'd have to replace all of them in about 10 years time which would be the same huge outlay again. Why wouldn't everyone just install fittings that could take halogen and LED bulbs instead?

sunshinetours

Have you considered wall lights with a reduced number of "spotlights" maybe

Wall lights give a nicer ambience than overhead lighting IMO. IF you still want the brightness you still have the halogen/LED's above you if required

Some good info above on teh reality of LED technology. I don't doubt it will get there but it isn't yet as far as I can see cost or "lumens" wise

Also what a bout a nice feature light fitting above where your table will be for instance?

themacster

These are really for more commercial applications where they are going to be left on for long periods as they're robust and have good heatsinking - at 650/550 lumens (cool white/warm white) they are brighter than any led GU10 you can get at the moment and they use 12W each, the best gu10s are around 475/355 lumens and 7W, so you are paying for a much more powerful light. It also runs on 24V so each comes comes with its own driver module. And it looks like you would have to replace the whole fitting if it packed up.

In 10 years time who knows where led technology will be? Stick with GU10 fittings and reap the benefits as bulb specs go up and prices down.

dollydolittle_2

sunshinetours - Sensible suggestions but I need to be able to move my table (for example expanding it for when the whole family are round which would mean moving it away from where it normally sits) so I specifically want to avoid a feature light hanging from the ceiling. We had one in the last house and it really irritated me that it was always off centre as regards the table.

Also the ceiling is pretty low which reduces the choice of pendant anyway. As for wall lights, I agree that they light a room well, but there'll only be one wall that they could realistically be on and there isn't that much choice out there as we are going for modern, but not ultra modern if you know what I mean. (Fussy? Me? Just a tad perhaps )

themacster - I was wondering how a halogen fitting would cope with LEDs without having the heatsink (almost sounds like I know what I'm talking about now!) Thanks again.

sunshinetours

How low is low Dolly? We have a 1970/80's type house with standard approx 8 foot ceilngs and Halogen spots are fine for that. If any less than that I would personally avoid too many ceiling lights i.e if an old cottage type building

Also consider how many hours a day on average the lights are on in that area. Some people will never ever recover the cost saved on electricity when fitting LED's in a low use area!

themacster

Halogens put out a lot of heat - 98% of the 50W/35W/20W they use goes into heat. So a 50W halogen produces 49W of heat. The leds give off very little heat but they do need to be kept cool as they don't like to get hot - the heatsinking is there to improve the leds life. There's a bit of electrical circuitry that powers the leds themselves, this generates a small amount of heat.

GU10 bulbs are very small and its difficult to cram the leds and circuitry in, hence you see a lot of them with finned bodies to act as heatsinks. The GU10 is designed as a reflector for the halogen bulb, but leds tend to use a lens in front of them to give the required beam so designers are having to change the bulb design to accommodate the led technology. There are some more powerful led GU10s on the market, but these tend to have much longer bodies and can't be fitted into recessed fittings - there's a limit to how much you can squeeze in to a standard size GU10, so their light output is limited at the moment until more efficient higher light output leds are developed.

dollydolittle_2

Sunshinetours: 1960's house with 8 ft ceilings, but I'm 6 ft 2" in my stocking feet so it doesn't leave me much room for dramatic pendant fittings, much as I love some of the groovy retro ones around. Thinking of sticking to standard lamps for that sort of decorative element.

Themacster: this is fascinating stuff and really useful to know the ins and outs of it all. I am shocked at the percentages you quite for halogen though, I knew they were hot (in my old house I used to soften butter by putting it on the worktop under a light) but I am surprised it's quite that bad.

I do love the internet (and this site in particular) . Yesterday morning I knew nothing about LED technology, now I think I have everything I need to make a decision, and more importantly to discuss it with electricians and builders without sounding like an idiot. And I have just stunned my plumber with info I got from elsewhere on here.

Scoobs72

themacster wrote: »

the best gu10s are around 475/355 lumens and 7W

Actually you can get GU10s outputing 720 lumens for cool white, 520 lumens warm white if you're prepared to pay £30 + per GU10. But the cool white is really icey blue....not nice. Another year and we should be seeing 620 lumens in warm white, which gives you a genuine 35w equivalent. I've been tracking this for a few years now and the progress is steady and consistent. The main problem right now is the amount of false advertising that's giving LEDs a bad press - 95% of GU10s out there are being mis-sold as "Equivalent to 35w" when most barely scrape 20W or less.

themacster

Scoobs72 wrote: »

The main problem right now is the amount of false advertising that's giving LEDs a bad press - 95% of GU10s out there are being mis-sold as "Equivalent to 35w" when most barely scrape 20W or less.

That's my gripe from post #7 above - never mind 35W, so many are stating 50W equivalent (or more!) when they're nowhere near this. Really should be outlawed as its totally misleading. I think there's a guideline for giving incandescent equivalent values, but most don't seem to be applying it!