Ground Breaking 100 watt Eqvt 120 vac Light Bulb

mena661 wrote:
What do you think about Philips and CREE LED's? Interested to know.

mena661, I have never played with any CREE products but it looks like they make high end consumer and industrial lighting. My guess is the quality is good if you afford them.

I've not used any 120vac LED'S yet, as I mostly live on 12.xx vDC and inverter is a naughty word.

I've gone through a lot of corncob style SMD t10/194 LED's. None have actually burned out but were replaced for more light or just less bluish light.

There have been great strides in brightness, but the color and incandescent reflectors are the issue for me. I've ordered a 4 pack and had 4 different bulb colors, and I like the pure white. Not cool white, not warm white, just white white.

Of interest to me most as of late is the single Cree emitters housed in an aluminum heatsink, behind a convex lens. I've gotten 1156/ba-15s base bulbs/ t-10 base, and various 3.7v 14500 Li-ion or 1.5v alkaline AA flashlights

My favorite ones were a mistaken order, a t20 wedge base, With LED's excelling in directional light, I wanted a light which was super bright, and I could easily point where needed. I put these t20 Crees into a 99 cent store gooseneck lamp and wired it to 12vDC


These are bright, white and do not get very hot and are by far my favorite light source, and they have seen 6 hours use each night for the last 7 weeks. All my other lighting is much less pleasing both color and output wise and now rarely used.

The 1156 cree's I bought do get real hot, and do not seem any brighter though they did pull more current. I believe I damaged these as once they warm up they start flashing on and off

My most recent 12v aquisition were t10 wedge base R5 Cree, a pair delivered for 14$. These are just as bright and had a warmer light tone than all the other cree bulbs I've tried. These ran/run extremely hot, too hot to touch, and the smaller diameter aluminum heatsink (compared to 1156 or t-20), did not seem very substantial, and after about 6 hours use, I heard one start crackling, saw it flickering and it failed. The two bulbs were slightly different colors.

I dissected the failed one. When I went to straighten out the pins to disassemble the light, one pulled off the circuit board with very little pressure. I do not know if is was part of the issue or a result of it getting so freaking hot, but I suspect it was just a cold solder joint that had little to do with the failure.


Its twin has another 6 hours on it and is still going, though I have little faith in it. I hope it does last.

Here is the other side of the one which failed, note the cracked on the chip:


I have had a few CREE flashlights too. The one in the background above is a Hausbell Cree. It can use a single AA battery, or a 3.7v Li-ion 14500 battery. Very impressive amount of light on the 14500, and about 60% as bright with an AA. This one was acquired through an American seller.

I also purchased one of nearly exactly the same design, shipped from China for 1/3 the price($3.88). This china shipped version would not focus to as bright/small a square as the USA supplied one. It also got much hotter, much quicker for emitting the same amount of light.

I am interested to see how this technology evolves. I am not sure how the CREE drivers operate but some certainly get a lot hotter than others, whether this is due to how they are driven, or the physical mating of emitter to heatsink, I cannot say.

Mex, I've been tempted to try these Cree 1156's that have two emitters behind the lens:
Jtech 2x 1156 BA15S 10W Cree R5 LED Pure White Car Light Bulb

But, I've got to stop spending money on LED's to assuage my curiosity. The t-20 Cree homemade goosenecks meet all my current needs and render most of my other lights unused.

ken white wrote:
I do have CFL's in my house, but they will be replaced there too once quality 120 VAC LED's are developed.

What do you think about Philips and CREE LED's? Interested to know.

bob_b wrote:
LED bulbs just don't seem ready for prime time. I'll wait for the technology to mature.

The one's in my home and my rig are plenty mature and quite ready for use. Like I mentioned before, NONE have burned out with the oldest being 3.5 years old.

bob_b wrote:
On EBay, I bought 5 LED candelabra bulbs for the kitchen lamp. Every one of them burnt our before the 2-week mark. I complained and the seller sent me 5 more. Two weeks, same thing. LED bulbs just don't seem ready for prime time. I'll wait for the technology to mature.

two bits says these had a simple dropping resistor to set LED current. A definite NO NO for long life. LED's need a true constant current source that is capable of holding the current constant even as the LED changes temp and junction voltage. otherwise thermal run away and very short life.

Common on many ebay or offshore LED 12V arrays. I had some in the trailer than when the battery was low (12V) they were dim, and when converter hit 13.6 they got so hot the unsoldered themselves and fell on the table.

One with constant current source are very bright and last a long time. But it isn't free, they do cost much more.

Unfortunetly there is lots of poorly designed 12V LED's out there and there aren't any 3rd party safety certifications required (CSA,UL, ETL etc).

For 120V applications, first check if they are UL and CSA listed for safety. If so, there is a decent chance they are of decent design. No guarantee, but a decent chance.

On EBay, I bought 5 LED candelabra bulbs for the kitchen lamp. Every one of them burnt our before the 2-week mark. I complained and the seller sent me 5 more. Two weeks, same thing. LED bulbs just don't seem ready for prime time. I'll wait for the technology to mature.

Well, I worked for GE Lighting for a few years as a CFL Ballast Engineer and I can tell you from my experience that GE CFL's are not what they used to be...

LED lighting is the future, though non-power factor corrected drivers will create issues for the power grid, just like CFL's do...

When comparing lighting, the specification that you need to look at, besides life, is efficacy which is a measure of Lumens/Watt and LED's are continually improving in this area.

I have replaced all of my camper lighting, in every camper I have owned, with LED's. I do have CFL's in my house, but they will be replaced there too once quality 120 VAC LED's are developed.

Haven't tried LEDs except for a few in the coach. Too costly and too varied results as exhibited by posts on the forums for a few years.
We have somewhat over 100 CFLs in the house. Some are instant on but most take too long for me to come to brightness. They are not the same as incandesents in performance.
We had a few burn out, at first. At 11.00 a pop for GE CFL Floods I won't try them again.
We bought a bunch, of less expensive of 13 watt and 15 watt and 28 watt CFL Floods and little twirly bulbs at Cosco.
So far the rest are still working after a year.

MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
We are trying to judge stuff as it changes almost daily. A pretty tough job.

My personal gripe with CFL's is how slow they are to warm up. And until they warm up, CFL's are watt-hoggs. Gad, there is a lot of junk out there! Years ago I threw a temper tantrum and trashed all the CFL's and replaced them with "G.E." brand lamps. The others like "Feit" claimed 26 watts 100 watt eqvt, but they were dim as hell as compared to the same model in the GE lamp. There are no federal trade agencies to protect the consumer any more. It's pure E CAVEAT EMPTOR.

As far as LED 120 volt lighting is concerned, I have ditched ideas of purchasing a CFL lighting quality replacement. For overall room lighting. I go with LED spotlights. But where to buy a 100 watt equivalent 120 volt LED lamp? These guys are expensive as hell.

And I have searched and searched for a 12 volt white LED flood bulb (not a corncob type) with around 5,000K color temperature and 7 watts or greater power in a tail light bulb 1156 configuration. Good luck. Wouldn't it be nice to find such a bulb say a 5 watt CREE flood?

I did do some research and found that a lead crystal glass lamp lens offers by far the best LED light transmission and dispersion. But once again reality rears its ugly head and screams "Where ya gonna find lead crystal lens'?" They're also heavy and can shatter if dropped.

Then comes the final insult: As I age I find I need more light to see. I CAN'T WIN!

I think 12V LED high output is taking a back seat to 120VAC applications. Why?? well part of it is the design requirements. For the very high brightness LED's they need to be driven by a quality temperature compensated current source. Otherwise you get into thermal runaway and poof! And you need a decent heat sink. LED's are NOT that efficient yet. Junction temps for long life need too be held below 100C. That cost $ in a market looking for an inexpensive bulb.

And for AC (120V/240/480) applications, price point is slightly higher, and potential volume is orders of magnitude higher. So they are starting to design the LED and regulation into one die focused on 120VAC input. Or low cost 120VAC regulators for these applications.

After looking at the add.> There is nothing ground breaking about a 3-way lamp. (Low-Med-High) it is just two lamps in one assembly.. One is the "LOW" the other is the "MEDIUM" and when you light 'em both you get "HIGH"

Think of the common 1156 Tail/turn lamp and it's LED equivlent. Exactly the same thing.. Low (Tail) Medium (Stop/Turn) High (Both).

The only thing new about this lamp is that nobody has built a 3-way for 120 volt use.. before it.. But this is not groundbreaking, It is a logical extension of existing designs.. I seriously doubt it can even get a patent.

We are trying to judge stuff as it changes almost daily. A pretty tough job.

My personal gripe with CFL's is how slow they are to warm up. And until they warm up, CFL's are watt-hoggs. Gad, there is a lot of junk out there! Years ago I threw a temper tantrum and trashed all the CFL's and replaced them with "G.E." brand lamps. The others like "Feit" claimed 26 watts 100 watt eqvt, but they were dim as hell as compared to the same model in the GE lamp. There are no federal trade agencies to protect the consumer any more. It's pure E CAVEAT EMPTOR.

As far as LED 120 volt lighting is concerned, I have ditched ideas of purchasing a CFL lighting quality replacement. For overall room lighting. I go with LED spotlights. But where to buy a 100 watt equivalent 120 volt LED lamp? These guys are expensive as hell.

And I have searched and searched for a 12 volt white LED flood bulb (not a corncob type) with around 5,000K color temperature and 7 watts or greater power in a tail light bulb 1156 configuration. Good luck. Wouldn't it be nice to find such a bulb say a 5 watt CREE flood?

I did do some research and found that a lead crystal glass lamp lens offers by far the best LED light transmission and dispersion. But once again reality rears its ugly head and screams "Where ya gonna find lead crystal lens'?" They're also heavy and can shatter if dropped.

Then comes the final insult: As I age I find I need more light to see. I CAN'T WIN!