Outdoor Lighting

[Charles Bishop]

I need to light some of my outdoor areas, for appearance and security.

The areas are mostly the driveway leading to the house, and a small patio/deck area for nighttime activities.

For the driveway, I'd like the sides of it to be lighted as a car drives on it, to remain on for about 5-10 minutes and then go off. So a motion detector to turn on the lights, and then a timer to turn them off.

The deck/patio area would be lit for appearance mostly, not needing enough light to be able to see as if it were daylight.

Any ideas or recommendations? Use 120 V or 24 V?

WIth low voltage, the transformers have total watts. Is it necessary to remain below this by a percentage? That is, for a 120 watt transformer, can I use the full 120 watts, or do I need to use less.

With low voltage, are motion detectors possible? Presumably, use a motion detector to power the transformer's outlet, but are there other ways?

Any familiarity with the solar powered lights? They are cheap, but how long do they last? How long do they stay on after coming on at dusk? Any difficulty with them not having enough sunlight during the day to power the lights at night?

[Ed Pawlowski]

No timer needed. Motion detector will turn them on and can be set to stay on for the time you choose, usually about 2 to 10 minutes. Photo cell prevents them from going on in daylight.

I have no experience with the 24V. You should stay below the 120W for safety though.

Junk. Don't waste your money.

[gfretwell]

I agree with Ed. Solar may be ready some day but if you can get a wire out there, go with 120v. Motion detectors have a selection of timeouts. Mine are 1, 3 and 20 minutes. You can hook them up to any lights that are within the wattage rating. If they are relay operated, you can use LED or CFLs too. If they are solid state, be sure you have at least one incandescent for a resistive load to shut off the SSR.

[slate_leeper]

I've used the rechargeable lights for outdoor illumination. Our experience was that low (below about 20 degree) temperatures kill rechargeable batteries pretty quickly.

[83LowRider]

After trying multiple low voltage setups around the house and pool... I trashed them all and went with 120.

Brief reasoning? Most fixtures were inferior... overpriced bulbs... bulbs were short-lived... base of bulbs often broke when removing...

Went 120 and never looked back. Best decision ever. Sold fixtures. Makes use of led or compact fluorescent.

I have found nothing solar that is worth a damn.

[Stormin' Norman]

You are the guy who posted about a 120 gal/day water leak. Lot's of us replied, what did you discover about the leak?

[trader_4]

No real opinions of the rest, but I've had experience with a couple solar ones over the years and they were crap. Maybe there are better ones that cost more and last, but these were the typical HD stuff and they lasted maybe a year.

[trader_4]

Given that LEDs are widely available now, what's wrong with 24V or whatever low voltage would power LEDs? I would think with LEDs that low voltage would be better than ever. Or is the issue that LEDs don't last in that application and you need incandescent?

[Stormin' Norman]

I have several solar, LED motion sensor lights with lithium-ion batteries. They are very bright and provide hours of light, even on a winter's day charge.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

I have some low-voltage lighting. No broken bulbs, but I did have the other problems. Then I got some LED replacements that have lasted several years. The transformer is too noisy. I have put it on a timer so it makes noise only at night.

The solar lights I've had are always too dim. Anyway, I would prefer to avoid batteries, which need frequent replacement. I'm not going to be using any more of those things.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

NiMH batteries (instead of the NiCd they come with) helped some, but they're still crap. Most use standard AA or AAA cells, but I had some that used 2/3AA, and replacements cost more than new lights.

I use wired lights with LED bulb replacements. These give a lot more light than the solar crap, and no batteries to replace often.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

My lights run on 12VAC and use LEDs. Those LEDs have lasted a lot longer than the incandescents did.

[FrozenNorth]

I didn't think you can substitute NiMH for NiCD, or vice versa, as they used different charging circuits and voltages.

[DerbyDad03]

Well, there is that thing called The Sun. ;-)

[Muggles]

We started off using 120v wired yard lighting. It worked OK for a few years, but we wanted to stop spending money to power them. So, we went solar.

With solar we didn't have to worry about no lights in the yard if the power went out, plus we could bring the solar lights in the house if the power DID go out.

[Muggles]

I have a nice string of solar LED'S in my back yard. Nothing like powering lights for free!.

[83LowRider]

Yeah, but as I sit here around 20 degrees, even the sun seems to be doing a poor job lately.

[Don Wiss]

Low voltage DC has a power loss when run over a distance. You need a heavy gauge wire to minimize this. This is not an issue with 120v AC.

Don.

(e-mail link at home page bottom).

[DerbyDad03]

Just imagine if it wasn't there.

[Stormin' Norman]

My low voltage landscape lighting supply is AC, not DC. My lights are all LED's, so the conversion, regulation, rectification etc. is built into each fixture.