LED v CFL bulbs

I have seen some 11W ones that claim to match a 100W tungsten...

replying to alan_m, Iggy wrote: Yep, it's shame. CFL's started out at 20,000-hours and LED's boasted

I recall 6,000 hrs for electronic ones, 5,000 hours for the earliest Philips SL iron ballast ones.

indicator LEDs did, but never lighting LEDs.

maybe, but not relevant to LEDs.

NT

But probably not at 2700K.

You need to be looking at 15W for that.

Also some do not like the suddencut off in lighting area of leds, but they are , apparently getting better in this respect now.

My one concern has been that some LEDs have some kind of switch mode psu in them and kick out rfi at an alarming rate, but I'm sure these are mostly the el cheapo ones. Obvioulsly myself I hardly use lights these days, but as long as you get the right colour temp for what you need then I think LEDs are more efficient, and come on faster. Brian

I went nearly all LED a few years ago (I cannot find an LED light that would be a good replacement for my outside floodlight). Swapped the gf's lamps about a year later.

Not one failure.

However I have fitted thousands of them and I do see failures - usually in the the first week or so. But not that many.

I have found even the pound shop jobs to be quiet on HF ...........

You can get wide-beam (120deg) LED GU10 here:

and I would assume from other sources. We bought such from these people in 2012.

Prior to that we had CFL GU10s, but they took an age to brighten up.

It's interesting to use one in a common situation - say a central pendant fitting in a white or light coloured room, and compare the ambient light between them. My guess is they have a very special tungsten 100w they used for comparison.

If you can live with the light quality that CFLs provide then phase them out as they fail by replacing with new LED. No point in junking a working lamp you may as well wait until it fails.

There is a marginal 5-10% advantage in power consumption now with LED over CFL but nothing like the factor of 3-4 improvement that you get moving from incandescents.

My house is still lit with a mix of incandescents, CFLs and LED. All the most used lights are LED and as they fail the old ones will be replaces with LED but infrequently used lights in the loft, spare bedroom and broomcupboard will be used to finish off my collection of old lamps.

No cons.

LEDS are in every way superior to CFLs.

It was my higher power CFL that went bang, with smoke.

Getting rid of the heat may be the killer for LED bulbs in a small package that's why its worth considering changing the light fitting to something like a round panel light which commonly come in 12W, 18W or

Ive have on that doesn't. It has a short delay.

There are no reasons why LEDS have to emit RF or flicker or have an annoying spectrum. It is child's play to use a series cap to limit current, and put a diode and reservoir to feed them off DC and eliminate ripple. Even their beam patterns are not a part of 'being an LED' but down to reflector design,.

In other words none of the drawbacks mentioned by people here are intrinsic to LEDS, but just to specific (badly?) designed examples.

I bought some LED SES candle bulbs, to replace halogens which have a comparatively short life. 4w LEDs are a little brighter than the 35w halogen and a very similar colour temperature (as far as I can see)

judging by the illumination in our village hall, I'd say they are brighter.

I have found LEDS to be far better lifetime wise.

AS I replace every CFL

Most certainly true of G9 bulbs, which are much dimmer than the halogens they replace. The fittings for G9s are usually pretty small, and heat build-up is a real problem.

I have found that these:

Seem to compare well to a 60W GLS - similar pattern of light production, colour temperature, and brightness. CRI is not far off.

Note tried this, but:

Claims 1440 lumens which is in the ball park for a 100W (perhaps closer to a 90W)

The trouble is that they are sold as low-power replacements for halogen bulbs, to be used in the same fitting. Halogens have a pretty-much 360 degree beam, and it doesn't matter too much how the reflector is designed. But put an LED in the same reflector, and you usually have a problem.

Replacing the lamp fitting with a reflector designed for LEDs will work, but will affect the cost-saving when using LEDs instead of halogens for some time.

But they are intrinsic to LEDs because they have a narrow beam. If LED bulbs can be manufactured in a "corn cob" design, surely it can't be so difficult to come up with a spherical design to improve beam coverage.