Forum Discussion

otrfun's avatar
otrfun
Explorer II
Sep 10, 2013

How Much Power Savings using LED's?

Just purchased 4 warm white LED panels with 20 5050 LED's. Wanted to experiment with these on my TT before purchasing more.

Anyhow, one 20 5050 LED panel wasn't nearly as bright as the original 921 bulb in my TT. Tried two panels and it was as bright, or maybe slightly brighter than the 921. Noticed there was pretty significant heat being produced by the two LED panels, so I became very curious about the amount of current these puppies were drawing. The two 20 5050 LED panels (total 40 5050 LED's) were drawing .59 amps total. For comparison sake, I also measured the current draw for one 921 bulb--1.3 amps. Wow, unless my eyes are misreading the light output of the 2 panels, using LED's only cut my current draw in half vs. using the original 921 bulb! A 50% reduction is still fairly significant, but not nearly the savings I expected.

Curious what other have experienced. How many 5050 LED's have you needed to replicate the same light output as one 921 bulb?

43 Replies

  • Mine draw 190 milliamps and give 120 lumens. vs 1300 milliamps for the 921. Less light than a 921 but more than adequate for us. I just turn on more lights as needed.
  • I can't speak to the particular bulb you are replacing, but my overall experience has been that a factor of 5 reduction in current draw provides roughly equivalent lighting. You can now buy a number of screw-in LEDs for home use and the 60 watt equivalents typically draw ~9 watts. In our RV we are currently using ~6 watts of LED to replace 16 watts of fluorescent in one fixture, in addition to the incandescent replacements.

    I think it is very difficult to make brightness judgments by eye without any type of measuring device. Your eye has an enormous "dynamic range" and it is difficult to make direct comparisons.
  • RoyB's avatar
    RoyB
    Explorer II
    They claim to give you 80% power savings over the automotive type incandescent bulbs. They also do not emit a bunch of heat as well...