Switch to L E D

[wanderso]

I like LEDs and have previously installed them in my RV and also a fan in my home's bathroom but be aware that they aren't not necessarily the panacea that eliminates risk of overheating or fires. The photos below are from a dome light LED I installed in our dinghy. The bulb was left on for about 2 hours and the result was it fried the dome light housing. I shudder at the thought that it easily could have been a fire and this was parked in my attached garage. This wasn't a cheap bulb either; purchased on Amazon and "highly recommended". The first picture is what was left of the bulb that malfunctioned.

[SarahW]

Originally Posted by Dutch Star Don

SarahW......Buy one or two lights at first and see if you like them. We replaced all our bayonet style (flat end) bulbs under our cabinets with warm white colored lights. They most closely matched the color of the halogen, which we like. Anything I buy in LED, I buy in "warm white" (temperature).

Some LED's will say right in their description that they're dimmable. They often will dim, just not as low as the halogens.

Something else to remember when buying LED's. Often, the light fixture has a chrome reflector and the round OEM bulb reflects off of the reflector for added light. Some of the LED's are flat and face outward, which does not bounce light off of the reflector and you lose some brightness.

Since they can be expensive, order one or two style/brightness, try them and then buy more if you like them.

Thanks, Don. Sounds like a plan.

Originally Posted by DavisK

Here are a couple of sites that may help
Bulbs Specs - J.W. Speaker Corporation
Miniature / Automotive Light Bulb Search at eLightBulbs.com

Thank you!

Originally Posted by PDR John

SarahW, I used this chart for comparing.

http://www.rvledbulbs.com/v/vspfiles...scentbulbs.pdf

The other thing I did, was make a map of all the lights on the coach.

That way if 1 burned out I didn't have to guess what type is was. Along with the head light and tail light housing manufacture.

Attachment 59443

Good info, thanks!

[courtjester]

Originally Posted by catonine

Changing over is a good idea. I am thinking of doing it as well. Who is a good, cost effect supplier of the LED bulbs?

You can get just about any LED bulb you want off Ebay. Many are chinese imports. I"ve used several different types. they work fine. Warm light is better than bright white in most instances. Dr. LED is another source. They have most bulbs but are a bit more expensive. I've used their bulbs for lots of boat stuff.

[gruelens]

Originally Posted by SarahW

George--is there an easy way to determine lumen rating of the originals? We have 10W G4 LEDs currently but I don't know what brand they are. I'm "assuming" they are ~130 lumens from a few internet searches.

Yes the smaller 10w G4 halogens have a low LED replacement lumen rating due to physical size. I only had 4 of those onboard. But the heat they produced scared me. Two of those hockey puck lights were below a cabinet. The bottom liner in the cabinet had turned black from the heat of the halogen light below it.

Thanks to those that posted internet sites that supply the lumen data.

[Tucker1956]

We replaced many of our 'tube' lights with LED at the Perry, Ga FMCA Rally a couple weeks ago. Bought them from this company. They were great people, and very nice to deal with. The new lights make a big difference in our coach.

welcome to jirahled.com!

[MSGulfCoast]

Originally Posted by spritz

I was thinking about changing over to LEDs on The Clearance lights and marker lights. Won't that help on the Alternator @ night time driving?. I think they will be a lot brighter too.
Tim

Tim - I replaced all my Bargman clearance lights with these:
Bargman 47-59-402 Clearance/Side Marker Light LED For 59 Series Amber w/White Base. As you can see they are cheap and are made by Bargman. If you can find just the module that's all you really need as the base, wire plug and cover are identical to the old Bargman parts were - that is if yours are Bargman and the 58/59 series. The module is an epoxy sealed unit which just pops right into the lens cover. You do have to plug it in with correct polarity or it won't work. DAMHIKT!

[SarahW]

Originally Posted by Smitty77

I'm in the camp that 'seeing is knowing' and 'quality of components = quality of lighting'.

I recommend making contact with a single vendor and buy one or two of each bulb you think will work. CW, WW, NW all may look very different between different suppliers. And I also feel some of the lower quality component bulbs have rather 'generous' ratings as far as lumens and kelvin.

I sampled bulbs from M4 and GreenLongLife, this allowed me to pick the bulbs that I felt worked best for us. We had 15 puck lights, that have an inside adjustable cone and up/back pin (vs side pin of many pucks) G4 bulbs. The reflector cone was very small diameter towards the top, so finding bulbs that would fit and put out enough lighting was difficult.

The majority of our lights are M4, if your bulbs are available in the Elite series, that is the way to go. (And yes, they are not inexpensive. But they have superior build and component quality.). We ended up with a mix of CW and WW in these pucks, based upon the lighting need. We also used M4's in our bathroom mirror lighting and, our sconces. We used the GreenLongLife bulbs in two lighting fixtures that M4 did not have a product for, and for pucks where task lighting was not the objective.

Once you sample the, at least with M4, you can send back the bulbs that are not right for you. 30 day period to do this.

Boondocking reduced power consumption, and heat gain, were our two primary reasons for changing over to LED's.

One last comment. If you are keeping the rig for several years, don't go cheap on the LED's. As mentioned by other posters, most LED's should never need replacement. So for us, with a 10+ years of usage ahead of us, we figure we spread that cost out over years of usage.

Best to all,
Smitty

Thanks so much! I'm trying 4 types from M4 to see if they fit and how much light they put out. I'm thinking the Elite series will be the way to go.

[spritz]

Originally Posted by MSGulfCoast

Tim - I replaced all my Bargman clearance lights with these:
Bargman 47-59-402 Clearance/Side Marker Light LED For 59 Series Amber w/White Base. As you can see they are cheap and are made by Bargman. If you can find just the module that's all you really need as the base, wire plug and cover are identical to the old Bargman parts were - that is if yours are Bargman and the 58/59 series. The module is an epoxy sealed unit which just pops right into the lens cover. You do have to plug it in with correct polarity or it won't work. DAMHIKT!

Thanks those look like mine, I found these that are alot brighter they have 10 leds ea.unit Wow they will be brite for sure. I need to replace them they are 32 years old and have seen there better day some cracked some Lenses don't stay on ect ect.
What do you think of these? They are a darker amber also. It will be around $100 to do all of them. Red/Amber Thanks, Tim

[SarahW]

Originally Posted by spritz

Thanks those look like mine, I found these that are alot brighter they have 10 leds ea.unit Wow they will be brite for sure. I need to replace them they are 32 years old and have seen there better day some cracked some Lenses don't stay on ect ect.
What do you think of these? They are a darker amber also. It will be around $100 to do all of them. Red/Amber Thanks, Tim

Those look pretty cool, Tim. Be sure to post pics if you decide to install 'em.

[donandmax]

Originally Posted by SarahW

Don--are your LEDs too bright or not bright enough? I want to find LEDs that produce at least 300 lumens and have the "natural light" glow. I don't want those bright white ones, except maybe under the cabinets and in the bath area. I'd like to find the LEDs somewhere locally so I could "try on" a couple before I invest in the whole coach replacement.

Not bright enough

[PDR John]

Here are the G4 puck lights I bought a year ago.



I ordered 20 of each. To test longevity of each as well as the remaining halogens. Both of these sellers were the most recommended on here at the time of order, Jan. 2013.

The left one was ordered from:Amazon.com: Disc Type G4 Base Side Pin 10 SMD Led, 10 Watt Halogen 140 Lumen Bulb Replacement for Rv Camper Trailer Boat Marine Warm White By Ledwholesalers, 1109ww: Home Improvement

The right: Warm Pure White G4 1W 1 8W 2 2W 1 2W 5050 3528 LED Light Bulb Lamp AC DC 12V New | eBay

As to what the difference is that justifies the cost difference. One needs to look at the back.



Note all the capacitors and voltage regulators difference. So far none have burnt out, except for some halogens.

Here's how they look lit up.



I tried to get a photo of the ceiling with all the lights on, but you can't tell any difference in the photo. However when it's fully dark out, the ones from amazon put out a little more light.

I randomly check heat output to see if anything changes. We'll see how long the all last.

I still need 14 more G4 bulbs to finish off all the fixtures, I just changed the most common used bulbs.

[SarahW]

Originally Posted by donandmax

Not bright enough

Ugh, that's what I'm afraid of. I want MORE light in there, not less. May I ask where you got your LEDs and what type they are?

[SarahW]

Originally Posted by PDR John

Here are the G4 puck lights I bought a year ago.

Attachment 59747

I ordered 20 of each. To test longevity of each as well as the remaining halogens. Both of these sellers were the most recommended on here at the time of order, Jan. 2013.

The left one was ordered from:Amazon.com: Disc Type G4 Base Side Pin 10 SMD Led, 10 Watt Halogen 140 Lumen Bulb Replacement for Rv Camper Trailer Boat Marine Warm White By Ledwholesalers, 1109ww: Home Improvement

The right: Warm Pure White G4 1W 1 8W 2 2W 1 2W 5050 3528 LED Light Bulb Lamp AC DC 12V New | eBay

As to what the difference is that justifies the cost difference. One needs to look at the back.

Attachment 59748

Note all the capacitors and voltage regulators difference. So far none have burnt out, except for some halogens.

Here's how they look lit up.

Attachment 59749

I tried to get a photo of the ceiling with all the lights on, but you can't tell any difference in the photo. However when it's fully dark out, the ones from amazon put out a little more light.

I randomly check heat output to see if anything changes. We'll see how long the all last.

I still need 14 more G4 bulbs to finish off all the fixtures, I just changed the most common used bulbs.

Wow, thanks for that! I ordered 4 types/colors of LEDs from the M4 website to test for fit and brightness. I'm thinking that these will be my best bet... Elite Series Retrofit LED to replace Small 10w G4 / T3 Halogen

They claim 315 lumens from the "5630" type LEDs. One concern I have was mentioned earlier in this thread; the "reflector" in the light fixture becomes useless with these flat replacements. I hope that doesn't make any significant difference in the light output.

[PDR John]

Those will be bright at 315 lumen.

The reflector is just made of aluminum, if it's in the way you can just pop it out. I took one of mine out just to see what it took. None of my replacements interfered with it.

With the LEDs all available light is directed down out of the fixture, unlike the halogen bulb. Halogens need the reflector to get all the light out the lens.