Fluorescent to LED conversion

[BurbMan]

I have 2 of these fluorescent fixtures in the Lance, they work great and give off lots of light but not really very energy efficient when boondocking. I looked at swapping in LED bulbs in place of the T15s but the bulbs were pretty expensive.

After doing some reading and research I decided to re-make the fixtures with LED strip lights. I found this 5 meter light strip for $12 on Amazon, and got a bag of solderless connectors. This light strip has defined cut points at every 3rd LED so you can make any custom length. The strip is also backed 3M adhesive tape so it's peel-n-stick.

I drilled out the pop rivets holding in the bulb holders and ballast and got down to the bare fixture frame. I cut the LED strip into approx 15" sections and used 4 strips per fixture.



The LEDs are covered in a rubbery plastic to make them waterproof, so you just need to clean off one end of each strip and clip on a connector. Wire to 12v and done.



Lights are slightly brighter than the fluorescents and not as affected by the cold weather. All in all was a very easy and inexpensive upgrade!

[wa8yxm]

I still have a couple coils (5 meters) of LED's Cool White (Nice bright and White) those suckers are NICE... I may find a use for 'em too.

But that's what I put in my RV when I got tired of replacing tubes as well. Man did they work nice.

[C_Schomer]

I installed these yesterday and they're exactly what I wanted... very bright and very white. 5K color temp, 5300 lumens. NO yellow OR blue. Now, I need a dimmer. I ordered one but it didn't come with a diagram. 10' was perfect for 3 lights.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00PUY74TG/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[wopachop]

You guys are smart with this stuff. Is there a way to keep the WFCO from going into 14.4v mode?

I have my batteries disconnected, but the darn thing still goes into 14.4v mode every few days for 2-3 hours. I havnt tracked it exactly. Maybe not having a battery hooked up is causing it to happen more often?

I notice it more in the summer time because I will hear a computer fan up the revs.

[wa8yxm]

I will say againg
Some cheep LED assemblies are nothing more than a resistor and led in series.
They are easily dimmed by varying the resistor (or by putting a variable in series) but are also sensitive to battery, battery float, battery equalize or bulk charge. and tend to be damaged by the last two.

Others have a constant current regulator in series with the LED now these do vary a bit but for the most part are not affected by any of the different voltages mentioned above to dim them you use a PWM dimmer...

Some of them are not dimmable even with PWM

Some of them can handle 20 or 30 volts since the current regulator handles it. However the constant current regulator may fail at higher voltages.
The idiots who designed the Handle light on my RV used a 5 volt design.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Just a short note...

People are tossing around extremely high voltage values like common sense does not exist.

When is it *ever* appropriate to have 14.4 volts as the norm in an RV? Try never except when bulk charging. I suggest keeping things down to a subtle roar in the low to mid thirteens as a predominant value for LEDs to operate at.

Lots of DMSO and heat for my fingers this morning.

[wopachop]

deltabravo wrote:

wopachop wrote:
Also note this style of LED does not like getting a voltage over 12.5v. Let alone the normal 13v float charge. Does your converter do a weekly 14v charge? If you notice it happen i would turn off your LED dealio.

You haven't seen the sepcs of the LEDs he bought, so your post about getting hot with voltages too high, etc. and "Amazon LEDs being bad" and the like is unfounded.

Problem is LEDs are very sensitive to voltage changes. It's not like a regular bulb that can get 12v or 16v and not explode.

I bought a bunch of LED strips and made RV lights out of them. Used a variable voltage regular and watt meters to play around and take measurements. 14v is really hard on the LED strips and causes them to burn out. You might not notice because the individual LED is actually made of several different emitters. Put on a welding mask and look closely at your 2 or 5 year old LED strips that see 14v occasionally. In my experience many burnt out.

Went a different route and starting building Cree LEDs and a small mean well driver. They came out awesome. Constant current regardless of voltage change.

For the LED strips I would recommend a cheap dimmer that reduces voltage. If you are in your trailer and notice the converter is putting out 14.4v you could dim the lights to increase their lifespan.

The pwm does not work as well for this. It's still getting hammered with 14v. Just in pulses. It's one of the few times I would choose a voltage dimmer over pwm.

[MrWizard]

The Safari dp previous MH
Has a 120v fixture over the dining table that uses 4 candlelabra bulbs the type used with chandeliers, I found led replacements at home depot and installed them reduced load from 60w to 10w

[D_E_Bishop]

I'm a little late in chiming in on this topic but I went on the path of using strips to make my own cabinet lights in our home. They worked out so well I decided to try somehow to convert my 1990 incandescent fixtures with the early square panels which failed due to excessive heat. Then I found some strps mounted on aluminum sheets. To be honest, I forget exactly how I converted the fixtures but I think I made new backs for each of the fixtures out of metal and threw away the curved reflectors. They did and still are working well.

In our Winnie, we had flourescent fixtures and like mentioned earlier, stripped out the insides and glued the aluminum strips to the backplates. They were way to bright so I rewired two of the strips to a switch mounted in the fixture. Using the aluminum strips probably necessary as a heat sink but I liked having them.

In the archives is my post including several photos of the conversion of flourescent to LED.

Because we go to Q every year for the gems, rv show and swapmeets, I shopped around and founf inexpensive LED bulbs for the other fixtures that needed bulbs and so there are only 8 small decorated bulbs in the vanity fixtures that are filement bulbs. Those spherical frosted bulbs are very expensive and so seldom on that I didn't replace them.

[C_Schomer]

Ive seen 5k temp, 5k lumen total, 5 meter strips on Amazon... WOW. I hope i can find them again. I really like 5k temp.

[deltabravo]

DrewE wrote:
Most LED dimmers are PWM chopper circuits, I believe; they rapidly switch the LEDs on and off with a varying duty cycle.

Yes, that's exactly what a PWM device does, is switch something on and off very rapidly.

PWM = Pulse Width Modulation.

Bright means a very short "off" time (pulse) and long "on" time.
Dimmer is the opposite: Longer "off" time comparative to "on" time.

[deltabravo]

wopachop wrote:
Also note this style of LED does not like getting a voltage over 12.5v. Let alone the normal 13v float charge. Does your converter do a weekly 14v charge? If you notice it happen i would turn off your LED dealio.

You haven't seen the sepcs of the LEDs he bought, so your post about getting hot with voltages too high, etc. and "Amazon LEDs being bad" and the like is unfounded.

[deltabravo]

I removed my Fluorescent fixture entirely and installed this flat panel LED light

[MrWizard]

I put LED strips in all the Fl fixtures in the Safari dp, they never did burn out, and are still working for the current owner, 6 years of use maybe more
And yes I got them from Amazon, 5 meter roll of 5050 SMD LEDs was $12 when I did it those are warm white, these led fixtures I'm using now, are daylight bright and I really like them, the trouble with the waterproof covered one's is they do run hotter, because of being sealed up, they are supposed to be outside in the weather,
So closed up in a light fixture inside the RV, they will be hotter, I experimented with some, then gave the roll to somebody to use outside
The clear covering also does a little bit of diffusing, but I prefer the bare stripe with OEM fixture diffuser cover,
For outside expose weather conditions, the waterproof encapsulated strip should last longer, but we are discussing inside use here
To the OP nice job looks good, good luck,
I would not worry about converter charging village,
My experience is it will not have much If any effect on the leds,
Heat is really the determining factor in deterioration and failure

[DrewE]

wa8yxm wrote:
Ever measure the output of a "Wall wart" almost always hotter than labeled.

Traditionally, this was very much true, especially when measured open circuit. Wall warts were usually unregulated with little more (maybe nothing more) than a transformer and a rectifier.

These days, practically all new wall warts are tiny switching power supplies and are quite well regulated. They will generally be spot-on
their voltage specification (well, within a few percent/tenths of a volt). They're also a good bit more efficient and hence run cooler than the old ones.