How to convert to LED lighting

Golden_HVAC on 9-25-12 wrote:

NetBoy wrote:

Golden_HVAC wrote:

After that, I might change my 26W florescent from 18" tube to a bunch of 12 or 24 LED panels, and see how that works out.

Here is a florescent to LED conversion I did:


This is my main ceiling light, and it works GREAT! I added a push-on push-off switch for the light's main power, and am using the original rocker switch to select the brightness level (rocker selects 3 panels, or all 6 panels).

The blue goop you see in the photo is silicone adhesive - I found that the double sided foam tape that comes on the LED panels often fails in warm conditions, so I have just been forcing a little silicone under the sides or corners of the panels and that solved the problem (the original double sided foam tape is still under there). The silicone is fairly easy to remove if needed. Others have talked about adding screws to the sides of the panels, but the silicone has been working great for me - fast and easy.

I also have a boat which has about a half dozen florescent lights fixtures, several of which are flickering and dim.... so I have begun converting them too. I am starting to use LED panels with 24 each 5050 SMDs (each 5050 SMD actually is a package containing 3 individual LEDs).

Have fun.....

This conversion does look great, and looks much like what I did to my much smaller bathroom fixture with installing 4 plug in wires using tiny blue wire nuts to the #18 wire at the factory switch and ground wire.

The only exceptions is this picture shows 36 SMD that looks like 3528 SMD's (3.5 X 2.8 mm) and I used 5050 SMD's in 24 LEDS per panel, so mine are a little brighter, because each LED is 5mm square. And I can unplug my LED panel in a year or two, upgrade to a larger panel, or downgrade to save power, or replace a worn out one in a few years (perhaps 25 years before I get 5,000 hours on the bathroom fixture) (unless I die of very old age first).

And my pack of 10 each 24 SMD 5050 panels was only $26.50 with free shipping. This will work well with a florescent fixture, but I have no plans on converting them at this point. I guess the light is a little to blue for my reading enjoyment. A mixture of blue/white LED's and a couple of small red LED's would change the color to less blue I guess? To bad they don't make a 24 LED with 5050's and then have 4 tiny red LED's down the center, to add some red to the lineup, without adding to much electric demand.

Fred.

This picture shows some of the smaller 3528 LED SMD bulbs, they are 3.5 mm X 2.8 mm, or about 9.8 mm square, while the brighter 5050 LED SMD is 5.0 mm X 5.0 mm, or 25 mm square surface area, or about 2.5 times larger.

You can see each of these LED panels has 2 wires, a +12 volt and black ground. In my light fixtures, I cut the wires going to the old base, and using tiny grey or blue wire nuts attached two new adapters to each fixture (or each side of a twin fixture).

Now I can install any of the panel lights in any of the modified fixtures. So my bathroom has a total of 2 each 24 SMD 5050 panels on each side of the twin fixture, or 96 LED's total. It is more than the light output of the twin bulbs it replaced, and only about 0.4 amps at 12 VDC. Yet it is a bunch more blue in color than the factory fixture. Fine for the bathroom, front porch, and over the stove, in the hallway, places I expect to run the lights a long time each day. I did not try to change my refrigerator bulb, or lights I rarely turn on.

My porch light has 4 each of the 24 LED SMD panels, and is very bright, basically only consumes 5 watts, so it is not worth it to shut it off durning the day, power consumption is less than 120 watts per day, or about what one of my solar panels can make up in one hour around noon. I have a total of400 solar rated watts, so I always fill up before noon each day.

Another way to look at the cost of conversion is what can also be offset by solar panels. Say you install a 120 watt solar panel for $185, and buy a $64 controller, mounting hardware, #10 gauge direct burieal wire, and spend a total of $350. You can therefor run about 8 of the old lights for 5 hours a night with your newfound solar supplied power. So if you planned on changing every light in the RV for over $150, consider installing a solar panel instead, you get more watts for the $100 than you might save in the LED conversion.

Just change the lights that might be running 2 + hours per night. Not the basement lights, or anything that is run less than 1/4 hour per day.


I did change my pump on indicator light to 12 SMD 5050 panel, only because I was not sure if the pump light bulb was bad, or a bad wiring connection, and I had the extra $1 SMD panels sitting in the RV, within arms reach at the time I needed a replacement bulb for the pump switch. So I wired in a adapter where the old bulb was, and plugged in a 12 SMD panel. I could change this to a 6 SMD panel, but at night it is handy to have all that light to see by. Because I have one in the bathroom, 1 in the kitchen, the whole place is lit up bright enough you can walk around without need for other lights being on.

Good luck on your conversion.

Fred.