LED Bulbs

tpi wrote:

ron.dittmer wrote:
My motor home has florescent light bulbs throughout. I had looked into LED replacement bulbs for them, but I lost interest because of cost and wiring changes.

Thats my feeling on the fluorescent also. As long as the fixtures work properly there is not much point in changing them. The F15T8 lamps are far more efficient than incandescents. I did switch out the lamps to tri phosphor lamps which have more pleasing color rendering than the standard thin lite lamps.

I highly recommend RV LEDs though when replacing incandescent. I've used garden variety LEDs from ledtrailerlights.com and all have performed reliably and at brightness near or beyond the incandescents. Those high lumen Samsung lamps look interesting, but all of mine are working properly.

Well I will be testing the waters converting my florescent fixtures to LED. My goal is to do it right and do it cheap. After much research, I ordered a 5 meter reel of adhesive-backed LED lighting that can be cut to length. Here is the reel, I selected the lower soft-white color.


Our rig has 9 two-bulb florescent fixtures. I determined the reel will supply enough for all. I hope to achieve the following.
- reduce power consumption from 16 watts to 5.4 watts per fixture
- change from the florescent blue color to a soft warm white tone
- offer the same light intensity of 800 lumens per fixture
- utilizing the original fixtures means all mountings and screw holes are unchanged with no scars in the ceiling or elsewhere
- total investment for all 9 fixtures will be only $12.05

I removed one of my fixtures and examined it closely. The conversion will involve significant modification but our fixtures are constructed to handle the modification well. Everything florescent including sockets, unclip out making it clean to install the LED light strips and wire them up. The new LED strips are 12v so it will be a simple soldering of 2 red and 2 black wires to the switch, and then from there to the rig's wire tail with wire nuts. I will need to experiment to determine the best surface within the fixture to stick on the 2 LED strips (one per florescent bulb position). Our fixtures provide 3 surface options, straight down, 45 degree outward, and 45 degree inward.

My LED selection HERE was based on THIS information which I summerized below.
- the LED number is the physical size of the LED ex: 5050 = 5mm x 5mm
- older LED technology (5050 and 3528) consume more power
- older LED 5050 chips have 3 leds inside it, 3528 has only one
- newer technology LEDs 3020 and 3014 offer more lumens with less power

After I get the reel and convert one fixture, I'll supply a few pics of the process and the results.