LED bulbs for interior lighting? Worth it or big rip off?

getmore4less

If replacing incandescent or halogen you will have a reasonable payback time.

if replacing compact fluorescent it will be years even if you get the LED cheap( I paid £1 for Osrams).

remember a lot of CF were dirt cheap or free from energy companies and often cheap in supermarkets.

best to let your current CF ones die unless looking for a better quality light.

thescouselander

I started changing all our bulbs to LEDs about a year ago and so far so good. The light quality is way better than the old energy savers so I'd say the cost is worth it for that alone but they seem to last ok too.

Maybe the Lumilife LEDs are just no good; I've been using a mix of Osram and Philips and they've worked well.

Crinkmeister

cyclonebri1 is right about Chinese quality. I was having to replace some "cheap" LED candle bulbs on a regular basis until the supplier said that he wouldn't replace any more as they were out of warranty. Point is, none of them lasted anywhere near warranty and all were replaced (some more than once) before the warranty expired, so he was on a loser. I asked for a refund of the total. It was refused. I mentioned that Trading Standards might be interested in the claimed lifetime - to which none of these bulbs got remotely near: I got my refund. Bought some branded bulbs and have been fine ever since - about a year now - no problem and they were no more expensive than the cheap Chinese crap.

Cornucopia

My LED GU10s came from Ikea. No problems so far over a period of around 2 years.

JustAnotherSaver

Aside from the Osram & Philips mentioned...

For those of you who have had your LED bulbs for x-years problem free, what brands are you buying & where from?


On the topic of dimmers - nope, the bulbs & switches aren't dimmers.

One of the reasons i picked up LED bulbs was because i was sick of the waiting on the 'normal' bulbs warming up.

cyclonebri1

Crinkmeister wrote: »

cyclonebri1 is right about Chinese quality. I was having to replace some "cheap" LED candle bulbs on a regular basis until the supplier said that he wouldn't replace any more as they were out of warranty. Point is, none of them lasted anywhere near warranty and all were replaced (some more than once) before the warranty expired, so he was on a loser. I asked for a refund of the total. It was refused. I mentioned that Trading Standards might be interested in the claimed lifetime - to which none of these bulbs got remotely near: I got my refund. Bought some branded bulbs and have been fine ever since - about a year now - no problem and they were no more expensive than the cheap Chinese crap.

Whilst I share your sentiment there was another point I hoped I'd made and that is that you can't simply say they a re crap because they are Chinese some are and some aren't and I'm guessing the better ones were probably sourced from china even if brand labelled.

The other point is about payback times. In pure monetary terms they pobably won't return your investment before you move on from the property, even if you do find the best option.
The point is that the light quality and instant start at the same "colour" is worth the entry price. Add to that they they come in warm and cool white, can be dimmed if the correct bulb is bought, then I think they are a massive improvement.

There is a safety aspect too, they run so much cooler that especially with down lighters there is less risk of fire.
Given that some rooms may need 20 or so downlighters to achive spread they can go in the same circuit that would be impossible for 20 x 50watt halogens.
(I use those figures as I did a room, 2 rooms infact with doors between. there were 20 in 1 side and 16 the other. Try doing that with "conventional" lighting)

Keep_pedalling

I have had the whole house running on LED bulbs for around 18 months now and so far not one bulb has failed. The vast majority of these are B&Qs own brand (Diall).

Unfortunately I've got to go out and buy 5 more as the new ceiling light I have on order takes small Eddison screws and the existing fitting are bayonet.

spud

I too have had the house running on mainly led lighting (everything else cfl's) for the past four years. It's contributed to electricity bills averaging around £30 per month for a large 5 bed house (was a new build four years ago).
Over that time I've replaced around a dozen of the 80 or so LEDs, all due to flickering and what I put down to problems with the driver circuitry overheating. The design of the ventilation and cooling find is probably the most critical part. All of those lamps were replaced by the manufacturer under warranty which has now just expired. What I did note in the last batch of replacement lamps is that the cooling fins have been redesigned so fingers crossed they will prove more reliable.
My advise would be to get lamps that have a lengthy warranty as possible. The LEDs may well have a 10000 hour life. Unfortunately the electronics obviously doesn't. So try and cover that with a warranty.
hope that helps with your decision making.

[Deleted User]

I use a 4' fluorescent striplight in the kitchen, which has been replaced once in 30 years. The lounge is a CFL which has been replaced about 5 times in 20 years. The rest of the house is tungsten, and I haven't replaced more than about 3-4 of those in 20 years.

Like condensing boilers, the lifetime cost depends on reliability, not just fuel consumption. The other point to bear in mind is that you won't save anything by putting low energy bulbs in places where they are rarely used. That's why most of my house is still tungsten: the kitchen and lounge are the only lights that are on for any protracted periods of time. When the two spare tungsten bulbs in the cupboard are used up I might buy something else, but at the present rate they'll probably last me out.

albert_s

LEDs,
do NOT use 12v lamps, its more often than not bad drivers, rather than bad lamps,
you did replace the transformers for proper LED drivers, didnt you?
personally, I only ever use 'mains' voltage lamps,
have had 10 GU10s in my own kitchen for nearly 8 years now, no failures yet, and my wife doesn't understand what an off switch is,,,,,,
brands, ? Kosnic are good, as are Philips, or Viveda,
you really do get what you pay for, although, there are some tat lamps that are overpriced, but you certainly wont get good quality LED lamps cheaply.