# Forum Home Renovation Lighting  Source of Commercial LED lighting?

## chalkyt

Hi All
There has been plenty of discussion about LED lighting recently. I was approached by a local shop owner having a moan about their $800 summer quarter electricity bill. A quick check of current on different circuits shows that most of this is lighting, with computers, cups of coffee etc only accounting for about 10%. Most of the lighting load is ceiling mounted floodlights of about 250W+ each. 
As with most retail places they want bright display lighting, so the simple answer of "turn off lights" isn't acceptable. 
Anyone got any thoughts on sources of reasonably bright spots/floods suitable for a shop? My limited knowledge of the current state of play with LED lighting is that there are some units that are 30 - 40W which can generate 3 - 4K lumens (i.e. roughly the same as a 250W incandescent unit), otherwise you have to muck around with say, 6 x 9W units at around 500 lumens each to maybe get a similar effect. 
And that is about as far as my knowledge goes. Does any of it make sense or am I off the planet? Any advice, comments, sources, etc will be welcome.

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## Bloss

These guys have good gear and focus mainly on commercial market RDE Lighting . Their LED lamps range from 110-140 lumens/Watt so a 6W = from 660 to 840 lm. I understand they mostly recommend customers buy the higher output lamps, but look at the intended use.

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## Godzilla73

G'day, 
My brother uses this mob for all his projects... Specialised Lighting Solutions

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## greenhj

go and stick your head in the produce or liquor department of any new woolw0rths, mostly LED, a few different types and plenty bright enough. 
SLS in the post above would be well versed in whats required.

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## Ozcar

> SLS in the post above would be well versed in whats required.

  Well versed in watts required too, I presume.

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## Bloss

> Well versed in watts required too, I presume.

   Groan, but . . .  :Laughing1:

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## chalkyt

Thanks... it has been an education  :Biggrin:

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## Electron

We dont have a lot of experiencewith commercial LED, Chalky, but the following may be of interest to you andothers.We were fortunate enough to havesomeone within the business who, about 18 months ago, came to the conclusionthat LED lighting had the potential to displace "traditional"lighting at a furious pace - and it has. We jumped on the band wagon early butbecause the bulk of our commercial/domestic lighting work was the standard 90mmcut out down light, that's what we concentrated on and have been using LED downlights exclusively on all installations for the past year. 
LED lighting just has too many advantages to ignore, and the first one is powerconsumption.  The lamp we finally settledon (after a lot of experimenting!) is a dimmable GU10, 6w, giving 700 lumens innatural daylight colour with a 120 degree beam spread.  Were using that in place of the standardMR16 50w halogen giving about 650 lumens in the traditional urine light colour;to get marginally more light, the LED uses about 86% less power.  Unfortunately, though, the lighting load especially in a domestic premises  isnt a significant proportion of the totalelectricity usage, and the savings in terms of dollars on a power bill isntanything like what that 86% figure might suggest.  Why GU10? Because even though the vast majority of MR16 LEDs will run successfullyon the standard 50w electronic transformer that powers a traditional halogen,the GU16 has the correct driver for that LED built in; there can be no mismatchbetween lamp and driver and if theres a failure, all you do is replace thelamp; theres no replacing the lamp and then finding it was a transformerfault.LEDs dont produce any significantheat; if one of the lamps we use has been running for a couple of hours ormore, you can remove it from the fitting at any time.  Sure, itll be noticeably warm, but try doingthe same thing with a halogen and youll soon see the difference.  Virtually all the heat produced by a GU10 LEDgoes into the roof space, whereas with a halogen a lot of it is reflected downinto the room.  We all got free haircutsfrom a hairdressing salon that had 2 X 50w halogens over each chair, and thegirls could feel the heat from them on their heads as they worked; once we putLEDs in the girls were couldnt thank us enough.  Here in Darwin, a/c units are constantlybattling a tropical environment anyway and pumping additional heat into a roomvia a pile of halogens doesnt help their cause at all; with LEDs, thatadditional heat is no longer a consideration. Finally, of course, how many of you have seen what a halogen can do toroofing timber if its been (illegally) placed too close?  Or the TPS was too close to the fitting, or thefitting was subsequently covered with thermal insulation?  Halogens are a fire hazard, and AS3000 recognizesthat.LEDs have a typical rated life of20,000 hours; for a bog standard halogen or incandescent, its 2000 hours.  Those figures do vary, but the bottom line isthat LEDs last significantly longer and its this, combined with a small energysaving contribution that makes them a more economical form of lighting overtime  despite the higher initial cost of the LED lamp.Are there things to watch out forwith LEDs?  Of course, and ones alreadybeen covered  GU10 vs MR16.  ForgetMR16.  Are all LEDs dimmable?  No; the ones that are, generally work well ona reasonable quality leading edge dimmer (eg Clipsal) but most of these dimmersrequire a minimum load of around 35VA. One 50w halogen crosses that threshold but 4 X 6w LEDs dont and theLEDs will probably flicker when dimmed. Most wholesalers now stock a dimmer thats specifically designed for LEDsand fits into a standard Clipsal or HPM switch plate; these are the ones toget.  There can be a big difference inthe lumens per watt ratio on different makes of LED so you cant select onebased on wattage alone; you do need to look at lumens, and the light colourspectrum that that lumen output applies to. The majority of LEDs will show a voltage range of 90  240vac, and somewill show 90 - 265vac.  Keep away fromthe 90  240vac ones.On the commercial side, Chalky, therange of fittings is still limited because manufacturers are yet to design and/orproduce fittings that accept an LED chip  but its happening.  Our only experience was with 250w halogen shopfitters, which we replaced with an LED equivalent; I dont have the details onhand right now but can dig them out of youd like more information.  All I can say about them is that the LEDs performedevery bit as well, in all the same areas, as the GU10s I described above; ifanything our customer was more impressed with them than we were, and we werepretty impressed ourselves.

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## chalkyt

Thanks Electron... that has just about quadrupled (plus) my knowledge, especially the bit about flickering due to not enough load.

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## METRIX

> We dont have a lot of experiencewith commercial LED, Chalky, but the following may be of interest to you andothers.We were fortunate enough to havesomeone within the business who, about 18 months ago, came to the conclusionthat LED lighting had the potential to displace "traditional"lighting at a furious pace - and it has. We jumped on the band wagon early butbecause the bulk of our commercial/domestic lighting work was the standard 90mmcut out down light, that's what we concentrated on and have been using LED downlights exclusively on all installations for the past year. 
> LED lighting just has too many advantages to ignore, and the first one is powerconsumption.  The lamp we finally settledon (after a lot of experimenting!) is a dimmable GU10, 6w, giving 700 lumens innatural daylight colour with a 120 degree beam spread.  Were using that in place of the standardMR16 50w halogen giving about 650 lumens in the traditional urine light colour;to get marginally more light, the LED uses about 86% less power.  Unfortunately, though, the lighting load especially in a domestic premises  isnt a significant proportion of the totalelectricity usage, and the savings in terms of dollars on a power bill isntanything like what that 86% figure might suggest.  Why GU10? Because even though the vast majority of MR16 LEDs will run successfullyon the standard 50w electronic transformer that powers a traditional halogen,the GU16 has the correct driver for that LED built in; there can be no mismatchbetween lamp and driver and if theres a failure, all you do is replace thelamp; theres no replacing the lamp and then finding it was a transformerfault.LEDs dont produce any significantheat; if one of the lamps we use has been running for a couple of hours ormore, you can remove it from the fitting at any time.  Sure, itll be noticeably warm, but try doingthe same thing with a halogen and youll soon see the difference.  Virtually all the heat produced by a GU10 LEDgoes into the roof space, whereas with a halogen a lot of it is reflected downinto the room.  We all got free haircutsfrom a hairdressing salon that had 2 X 50w halogens over each chair, and thegirls could feel the heat from them on their heads as they worked; once we putLEDs in the girls were couldnt thank us enough.  Here in Darwin, a/c units are constantlybattling a tropical environment anyway and pumping additional heat into a roomvia a pile of halogens doesnt help their cause at all; with LEDs, thatadditional heat is no longer a consideration. Finally, of course, how many of you have seen what a halogen can do toroofing timber if its been (illegally) placed too close?  Or the TPS was too close to the fitting, or thefitting was subsequently covered with thermal insulation?  Halogens are a fire hazard, and AS3000 recognizesthat.LEDs have a typical rated life of20,000 hours; for a bog standard halogen or incandescent, its 2000 hours.  Those figures do vary, but the bottom line isthat LEDs last significantly longer and its this, combined with a small energysaving contribution that makes them a more economical form of lighting overtime  despite the higher initial cost of the LED lamp.Are there things to watch out forwith LEDs?  Of course, and ones alreadybeen covered  GU10 vs MR16.  ForgetMR16.  Are all LEDs dimmable?  No; the ones that are, generally work well ona reasonable quality leading edge dimmer (eg Clipsal) but most of these dimmersrequire a minimum load of around 35VA. One 50w halogen crosses that threshold but 4 X 6w LEDs dont and theLEDs will probably flicker when dimmed. Most wholesalers now stock a dimmer thats specifically designed for LEDsand fits into a standard Clipsal or HPM switch plate; these are the ones toget.  There can be a big difference inthe lumens per watt ratio on different makes of LED so you cant select onebased on wattage alone; you do need to look at lumens, and the light colourspectrum that that lumen output applies to. The majority of LEDs will show a voltage range of 90  240vac, and somewill show 90 - 265vac.  Keep away fromthe 90  240vac ones.On the commercial side, Chalky, therange of fittings is still limited because manufacturers are yet to design and/orproduce fittings that accept an LED chip  but its happening.  Our only experience was with 250w halogen shopfitters, which we replaced with an LED equivalent; I dont have the details onhand right now but can dig them out of youd like more information.  All I can say about them is that the LEDs performedevery bit as well, in all the same areas, as the GU10s I described above; ifanything our customer was more impressed with them than we were, and we werepretty impressed ourselves.

  Great information, but boy that is ONE BIG sentence.

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## Electron

> Great information, but boy that is ONE BIG sentence.

  Yeah, I seem to have a major problem with posts.  Whenever I do one  and that one is a typical example  when I come to submit it I just get a message saying that renovate forum is not responding, and the page closes. So, I tried typing it into Word first, then copy and paste to the forum.  That does work, but the formatting in Word is lost in the transfer.  The spaces between many words is lost, and two words just come together without a space; and paragraph spacing is lost too. Now, to do a post, I have to type in Word first, then paste and copy,THEN edit.  And I can only edit 4 lines max at a time before submitting or I just get the not responding message again.  Each and every post takes me ages!

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## GraemeCook

Hi Chalcyt 
Why are you so focussed on LED's.    
Old style long fluoros are far more efficient than any LED's, and the capital costs are also far lower. 
Just wander around your local Coles, Woollies or Bunnies - all lit with traditional fluoros.   And they really do their costing homework. 
Fair Winds 
Graeme

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## chalkyt

Hi Graeme
As I said in the opening post this is a request from a customer who wants to reduce the cost of shop lighting. We have been down the cost vs benefits path, but as usual "the customer is always right". Meanwhile I have quite happily soaked up all of the wisdom thrown my way.

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## Electron

> Hi Chalcyt 
> Why are you so focussed on LED's.    
> Old style long fluoros are far more efficient than any LED's, and the capital costs are also far lower. 
> Just wander around your local Coles, Woollies or Bunnies - all lit with traditional fluoros.   And they really do their costing homework. 
> Fair Winds 
> Graeme

  Sorry, Graeme, but linear fluoros aren't far more efficient than LEDs although, at the moment, the capital cost is definitely lower.  The "energy efficiency" of lighting is called luminous efficacy and is measured in lumens per watt; in other words, how much light, overall, comes out for the amount of power, overall, that goes in.  With linear fluoros that figure ranges from 50 - 100 l/w, and LEDs are in the order of 80 - 100 l/w, given that both are in the "cool white" colour spectrum.  With technology standing where it currently does, a high quality linear fluoro is - at best - as efficient as an LED but a cheap fluoro does fall behind when compared to a cheap LED.  There are no revolutions about to take place in regard to discharge lighting so the linear fluoro as we now know it won't really get any better than it already is; LED, however, is still in its infancy and improvements in both efficiency and initial cost are going on all the time.  Since we started using LED - and it's mostly been GU10 style down lights - we've seen the cost come down dramatically, and the efficiency continue to improve. 
I'd have to agree with you insofar as the call on using linear LED as opposed to a traditional fluoro is, currently, a marginal one from a purely cost point of view over the rated life of the fitting.  LEDs are edging ahead though and it's not all due to improvements in LED technology; manufacturers are now fitting a highly polished refector within the linear LED envelope to more effectively reflect the light down - with a fluoro, the light emerges all the way around and the (usually dirty) fitting or external reflector doesn't allow all the light produced to be as effectively used where it's most needed.  LEDs are DC, too, so they don't generate stroboscopic effects like fluoros can.  There's no starter to fail in an LED, failing LEDs don't start blinking like failing fluoros do, and LEDs last longer than a fluoro tube does; these maintenance costs do need to be taken into account when making any comparison.  Woolies, etc, are riddled with linear fluoros but that's mainly because it was the obvious way to go at the time they were installed; on new installations, LEDs are challenging that thinking and will continue to do so.  Retro fitting linear LED in place of linear fluoros will probably be a marginal call, in terms of overall cost, for some time yet. 
This discussion has concentrated on a direct comparison of linear fluoresent with its equivalent LED but what's above isn't the end of the story.  LEDs don't contain mercury or phosphor, and in low temperature applications (down to about minus 25C) don't suffer the same striking problems, or the same reduction in light output that a fluoro does.  If, however, LED is compared to the likes of halogen, then LEDs are already a long way ahead and will only continue to increase their lead; LEDs will continue to displace other forms of traditional lighting because, in general terms, there's nothing they can't do, more efficiently, that a traditional light can.

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## Bros

> Yeah, I seem to have a major problem with posts.  Whenever I do one  and that one is a typical example  when I come to submit it I just get a message saying that renovate forum is not responding, and the page closes. So, I tried typing it into Word first, then copy and paste to the forum.  That does work, but the formatting in Word is lost in the transfer.  The spaces between many words is lost, and two words just come together without a space; and paragraph spacing is lost too. Now, to do a post, I have to type in Word first, then paste and copy,THEN edit.  And I can only edit 4 lines max at a time before submitting or I just get the not responding message again.  Each and every post takes me ages!

  Do it in notepad as it has no formatting that forums won't accept so you do the whole post  once only copy and paste then use the forum spell checker but wait until you see the post on the forum before you delete to one you did in notepad.

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## Smurf

> Since we started using LED - and it's mostly been GU10 style down lights - we've seen the cost come down dramatically, and the efficiency continue to improve.

   It wasn't long ago that the very idea of lighting even a small room with LED's was something that only an electronics fanatic would even think of. 
LED's have come a long way in a very short space of time.

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## SilentButDeadly

This mob have some really cool stuff...not cheap but very cool  LED Lighting - LED Lights, Downlights, Lamps & Bulbs Melbourne, Sydney - Lighting Matters 
and this company in Sydney has even more...really like the ceiling tiles, trying to get a look at one soon  LED Downlights, LED Lights | LED Lighting Australia

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## Electron

> It wasn't long ago that the very idea of lighting even a small room with LED's was something that only an electronics fanatic would even think of. 
> LED's have come a long way in a very short space of time.

  You've certainly got that right, Smurf.  I was perhaps a little hesitant about LED when it first came onto the market because I was still smarting a little over the CFL revolution - they certainly work but didn't take over lighting in the way that many thought they would.  LED, however, WILL displace traditional lighting, and is already doing so at a mind boggling pace.

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## GraemeCook

> Sorry, Graeme, but linear fluoros aren't far more efficient than LEDs although, at the moment, the capital cost is definitely lower.  The "energy efficiency" of lighting is called luminous efficacy and is measured in lumens per watt; in other words, how much light, overall, comes out for the amount of power, overall, that goes in.  With linear fluoros that figure ranges from 50 - 100 l/w, and LEDs are in the order of 80 - 100 l/w, given that both are in the "cool white" colour spectrum.

  Good Morning Electron 
Fully agree with your comments about the environmental issues of fluoros - the mercury element is a sleeping tiger. 
Not sure why you keep referring to "daylight" lights which most women hate because of the effect on their makeup.  We have been using "warm white" lights for many years  (c.3500K). 
Do not know where you got the above figures - they vary markedly from others available.   the Osram Lumilux T5 (thin long fluoro) has an efficacy of 104 lumens per watt.  T8's are around 90 l/w and T12's are marginally less efficient.    commercially available 220volt LED globes producing white light (as opposed to more efficient coloured lights) from reputable manufacturers seem to have an efficacy of between 50 and 70 lumens per watt.  For example, the 8 watt Osram Parathom Classic A produces 345 lumens of "warm white" or 450 lumens in the "daylight" version - efficacies of 43 and 56 lumens per watt respectively.   For their 6 watt globes the figures are 48 and 61 l/w.  
Much higher efficacies than these have been achieved in laboratories for LED's - but these are not yet commercially available.   Or they are not suitable for room lighting.    
But the rate of progress is spectacular and LED's appear to be the way of the future.  
Fair Winds 
Graeme

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## Smurf

> You've certainly got that right, Smurf.  I was perhaps a little hesitant about LED when it first came onto the market because I was still smarting a little over the CFL revolution - they certainly work but didn't take over lighting in the way that many thought they would.  LED, however, WILL displace traditional lighting, and is already doing so at a mind boggling pace.

   LED's are very rapidly coming to the point where they tick all the boxes, thus meaning that they will effectively kill all other forms of electric lighting. Long life - tick. Low energy - tick. Good quality light - tick. Aesthetic / consumer appeal - tick. Instant turn on - tick. There are really no downsides to them beyond present limits on output and the cost, both of which are rapidly becoming less of an issue. 
I did notice something significant recently at, of all places, Bunnings. There it was, a 350 or thereabouts lumen LED replacement for incandescent which uses just 6 watts. A CFL equivalent would be 8W, halogen 28W and incandescent 40W. So this is the first time I've seen a situation where LED is more energy efficient than fluoro, and I suspect that it won't be too long before there's a full range of LED's available to replace every incandescent, non-linear halogen and CFL in use. 
Let's face it, the only advantage of CFL's is energy saving unless you specifically want the daylight version (which most people don't). On every other measure they are worse than incandescent, energy saving being their redeeming factor. Once there's something else more efficient, then there ceases to be any reason why you'd want CFL with it's poorer quality light, unpredictable lifespan, slow warm up, mercury and so on. 
One point this does raise is that for the average household, lighting will no longer be a significant use of energy. Add in the move away from electric water heaters, and the move away from resistive space heaters, and I can see electricity companies getting somewhat worried. You don't need to be a green to have a low energy house these days, simply installing modern technology gives you that automatically. LED lights, solar HWS, gas cooktop, reverse cycle heating, LED LCD TV etc. The end result is an awful lot less electricity needed than was the case just a few years ago.

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## Bloss

> Hi Chalcyt 
> Old style long fluoros are far more efficient than any LED's, and the capital costs are also far lower. 
> Graeme

  This is simply not so. LED technology has been moving extremely fast and in the last two years especially the lumens/watt performance at commercial scale and pricing means businesses should be taking a serious look - as should anyone who has lighting which runs for long periods. Payback is usually measured in months. 
The main factors which stops a Bunnings or others seeing and acting on this is that a) as a proportion of overall costs energy is really really low (we have the absurd situation where we still offer volume discounts for large users ie: the more energy you use the less it costs you! Large commercial users in Australia generally pay around half to 2/3rds what residential users pay) and b) the common issue of the 'principal/agent problem' - the people who should make the change are not the recipient of thew benefits of that change. 
For example a landlord is responsible for the light fittings and their maintenance, but not for the energy costs of running them - the tenants pay for the energy used. So there is no incentive for the landlord to incur a capital cost that will save them little (although with LERD strips replacing fluoros a huge saving is made through massively reduced labor costs as tubes in large installations are constantly being replaced on a maintenance rotation - LEDs run 25-30000 hours before needing to be replaced and then because their output has dropped too much, they rarely stop emitting light altogether). 
The key is to make sure that you assess what light you need (in lumens ie: output) and use that measure not Watts or some purported Watts equivalent and compare all costs of the lights you have - with fluoros as I said there is the cost of the tubes, but also the cost of the replacement regime. 
Even with sites having T5 efficient lamps (an most would still be using T8 lamps) the numbers on savings add up pretty quickly. 
But - and it is a big but, making sure taht the LEDs are current technology and of suitable quality remains a problem as the market is flooded with a great range from rubbish to superb - and few ways for consumers to tell the difference (not even price!). 
There are some brands eg: GE & Phillips which are technology leaders, but there are Eu, Chinese, Taiwanese, Japanese, Korean and other manufacturers also producing good quality lamps (with outputs from 95-140 lumens/W and consistent colour output). 
This is a mob I have seen in action (in large hospitals) www.rdeenergy.com.au and there are others. RDE has a useful calculator too - but note it is based on energy use too - SMEs often do not remember to count the labor costs of lamp replacements.

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## Electron

> Good Morning Electron 
> Fully agree with your comments about the environmental issues of fluoros - the mercury element is a sleeping tiger. 
> Not sure why you keep referring to "daylight" lights which most women hate because of the effect on their makeup.  We have been using "warm white" lights for many years  (c.3500K). 
> Do not know where you got the above figures - they vary markedly from others available.   the Osram Lumilux T5 (thin long fluoro) has an efficacy of 104 lumens per watt.  T8's are around 90 l/w and T12's are marginally less efficient.    commercially available 220volt LED globes producing white light (as opposed to more efficient coloured lights) from reputable manufacturers seem to have an efficacy of between 50 and 70 lumens per watt.  For example, the 8 watt Osram Parathom Classic A produces 345 lumens of "warm white" or 450 lumens in the "daylight" version - efficacies of 43 and 56 lumens per watt respectively.   For their 6 watt globes the figures are 48 and 61 l/w.  
> Much higher efficacies than these have been achieved in laboratories for LED's - but these are not yet commercially available.   Or they are not suitable for room lighting.    
> But the rate of progress is spectacular and LED's appear to be the way of the future.  
> Fair Winds 
> Graeme

  Yes, I was guilty of using a generalisation, Graeme, and that's always dangerous!  The GU10 LED we're currently using is a model F6K-GU10-D, made by FYT (yes, in China!).  It produces 700 lumens at 6w, or 116 l/w, in daylight colour using Cree LEDs.  The rule of thumb with current LEDs is simple; the higher up the light spectrum you go (meaning toward the blue end), the more l/w you'll get - the 6w warm white version of the lamp we use produces just under 600 lumens.  We use far more "daylight" colour lamps up here than warm white ones, by a ratio of about 95 to 5.  Daylight colour, in the accepted measuring terms, is 5000 - 5500K and it simulates, as closely as possible, natural daylight as produced by the sun at around mid day.  The sun's colour spectrum does change during the course of a day, and partly because it's influenced by weather conditions and atmospheric pollution.  I can certainly relate to your gender comment because in ALL instances I can recall, the request for warm white has come from the lady of the house; most, though, are more impressed by the fact that furnishings, etc, look exactly the same colour under a daylight lamp as they do in sunlight. 
When we first started using this particular daylight lamp (as a downlight) we used exactly the same lighting layout that we would have used for 50w halogens and ended up, in the lounge especially, with a noticeably "brighter" room.  The owner, though, was hugely impressed; he loved the idea of being able to really flood the room with light if it was required, but asked us to fit a dimmer to suit other situations as well.  The dimmer did take away a lot the "harshness" that comes with an undimmed daylight lamp, and that's the formula we've continued to use.  It used to be relatively uncommon to fit dimmers to halogens in a new house; now, for us, it's relatively uncommon not to in selected areas. 
Part of what I was trying to say in previous posts - and this does relate to a subsequent comment the Smurf has made - is that nowadays, like almost anything else you buy, an LED lamp is NOT simply an LED lamp.  You cannot directly compare one lamp with another just because both happen to be LED, although you could (with some degree of accuracy) do that with the old incandescent lamp.  It's the way of the world.  If you purchase a sound system based entirely on the lowest price, there's a good chance you'll be disappointed with the sound it produces.  If you buy an LED lamp based entirely on the lowest price, there's a good chance you'll be disappointed with the light it produces.  You can't even use watts as an accurate guideline with LED; Smurf quotes a 6w LED at around 350 lumens (which isn't uncommon); we use a 6w one that produces 700 lumens. 
I think that LEDs deserve a thread on here that's dedicated to them alone and I'm in the process of composing one.  I don't claim to be the world's leading authority on them; just a sparky who's installed more than 2000 of them over the past 18 odd months and has gained some valuable experience and knowledge in the process.  I hope others will add to that pool; to me it's epitomises the value and purpose of this forum when it comes to electrical, anyway.

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## Moondog55

*I personally would really like to see a "Sticky" on LED lighting.*
If we ever build new it will be what we install, at the moment we would like to see affordable 240V globes that use the existing batten holders

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## Bros

> I think that LEDs deserve a thread on here that's dedicated to them alone and I'm in the process of composing one.  I don't claim to be the world's leading authority on them; just a sparky who's installed more than 2000 of them over the past 18 odd months and has gained some valuable experience and knowledge in the process.  I hope others will add to that pool; to me it's epitomises the value and purpose of this forum when it comes to electrical, anyway.

  Good idea as I know nothing about LED's but with the changing technology you will set yourself a challenge keeping it up to date

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## chalkyt

Since I started the thread, can I second the above comments. I am amazed by the knowledge and information that has appeared. It needs to be kept and maintained. Great stuff everyone.  :2thumbsup:  :2thumbsup:  :2thumbsup:  :2thumbsup:

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## Smurf

LED's are certainly moving quickly in a technical sense. Consider this. 
I bought this house late in 2007. All the lights were incandescent when I moved in apart from a fluoro tube above the bathroom mirror.  
We have since banned the sale of incandescent bulbs. There has been the introduction of the halogen replacements (eg 28W replacing 40W) and there has also been the introduction of consumer LED's. Neither halogen bulbs with a BC base or consumer LED's even existed 5 years ago. 
At the time of the light bulb ban, which wasn't long ago, there were exemptions for (amongst other things) stage lighting etc. You can't really have a CFL flashing on and off at a concert, nightclub, theater stage  or whatever so incandescent had to stay for those uses. 
The stage etc lighting industry has since substantially replaced incandescent with LED for coloured lighting with no need to wait for government to legislate. LED's have gone from being not really an option, to being simply better in terms of visual performance (which is the whole point of stage etc lighting) in a very short space of time. 
Now we have "drop in" consumer LED's to replace the CFL's and halogens currently in use. What was mandated just a few years ago, CFL's and halogen, are already obsolete. It was only about 4 years ago that the BC halogen bulbs first appeared for sale (unless you count the old Philips ones (now discontinued) which a few places sold for about $10 each for many years and which were about as reliable as a candle used outdoors in a cyclone). 
When I bought this house, I also bought a new TV. I went for plasma since whilst LCD uses less energy, I sure don't watch enough TV to justify the extra $1000 LCD would have cost at the time. LCD manufacturers have since replaced their back lighting with LED and price has declined to the point that it is somewhat irrelevant. As for plasma, well there aren't too many manufacturers actually making those these days. 10 years ago, CRT was still common for new TV's.  
This has all happened in the space of a few years, a somewhat incredible pace of development when you think about it. It does raise one valid point however - whatever LED lighting you buy today, there will soon be something better on the market. It will take a few more years for the technology to reach its' best. So for me personally, I won't be rushing to replace all my existing lights but sure, if I need to buy lights anyway then LED is the way to go.

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