Any recommendations for outside floodlights that meet the following criteria?

[Stephen H]

basically they are to be controlled via PIRs for a deterrent against night time intruders and for being outside in the garden to get logs in etc on all four sides of the house.

Also I have a CCTV system that is colour during the day and B&W during the night. It only records when it detects motion or a change of image picture.

So having a light come on will serve two purposes, as a deterrent and to assist with the CCTV recording as it will definitely sense the change of picture and record in colour instead of B&W

[Stephen H]

Must not be CFL... crap in the cold Must not be Halogen... too power hungry

That leaves me with LEDs provided

it does not cost an arm and a leg Gives similar light levels to a 500 watt halogen Has good colour rendering close to that of a halogen

I have accounts with Denman, Lyco, Screwfix, TLC direct and toolstation....

Recommend me a make and model of a floodlight that fulfils the above criteria.....

Thanks,

Stephen

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

Rough calc suggests that a 100W LED will knock out around 7000lumens, around half what I think a 500W halogen does. 150W LEDs are available, but still around 80usd and that's cheap from China, diy styleee. Advantage is, a 100W LED is cheap as chips now, but you'd need two of them, plus drivers. Even diying it, it would still cost ~80usd plus the housings and reflectors. If it were me, I'd look at getting a couple of the lower powered ones with an eye to simply equipping them with the higher powered blocks (paying attention to heatsinking, of course).

Have a look on ebay for 100W LED dies and drivers.

[Peter Parry]

Why? If you assume halogen are too power hungry that implies the lamps will be running for some time in which case low pressure mercury (if you don't mind the colour) is the clear leader but high pressure mercury or metal halide, depending upon you preference for colour quality, should also be contenders.

If the light will only be on for short times halogen still beat LED quite comfortably in any cost benefit assessment for similar light levels.

[harry]

SON?

[alan]

Unless attempting to illuminate a football ground the average householder would not need a 500W halogen, even a 150W halogen would probably be too much.

A cheap 20W (£20) LED flood from Ebay may be worth a punt to see if it meets the needs. A cool white rather than a warm white for a flood light seems to give a better illumination.

With the cheap Chinese floodlights the LED is mounted to a large heatsink (the metal body of the light) and therefore will not suffer so much from overheating as can be seen on many replacement LED 'bulbs'

[Dave Plowman (News)]

No harm in dreaming. ;-)

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

True dat; for most domestic situations. I assume the OP has a clear idea what he really needs to light up.

Definitely worth a try for smaller areas.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Do you need instant-on at near-full output?

Why is that important outside? Are you broadcasting colour TV images?

[Andrew Gabriel]

LED isn't there yet in the price/performance area for this size. I would buy the cheapest halogens you can find (no more than £5/fitting), with a view to replacing them when LED price/performance becomes competitive, probably in a couple of years time. If you buy equivalent power LEDs today, you will not recover the price premium you paid by not waiting for them to become cheaper.

Stick to 100W max, and use more fittings where that's not enough, not higher power ones. Mount them high up on the building and angled to cut-off the light no further than your property boundary. If you want to spill light outside your property, get permission of that property owner. The filaments must not be visible to road users as they will cause dazzle.