LED Light Strips

We just redid our whole house with LED.
Lowe's had some great deals on lights but we ordered the shop lights for the garage on Amazon.

They are super bright and so far we have seen our bill dropping.

Nicholsfamily05 wrote:
We just redid our whole house with LED.
Lowe's had some great deals on lights but we ordered the shop lights for the garage on Amazon.

They are super bright and so far we have seen our bill dropping.

Can you tell me specifcally what you ordered for the shop?

Haven't gotten any yet, but I like the LED works lights that are replacing the old two tube florescent work lights. Available at most big box stores. We are replacind all the old lights in our MH, a few at a time.

I ordered a couple of meter long LED strips at low cost on eBay, thinking of replacing the bulbs and ballast in a 4 foot fluorescent light fixture. They were nowhere near bright enough.

Next I bought Cree brand LED plastic tubes which take the place of fluorescent tubes while leaving the ballast in place. These were five times the cost of fluorescent tubes and the expected lifetime is about five times that of the fluorescent and rated at about a third of the power. Not bad. These LED tubes have a lumin rating a little lower but appear significantly brighter because all the light is directed downward. I'm thinking the lifetime and power consumption have been compromised by having to work with the ballast. I understand a new kind of LED tube where you have to remove the ballast and change the wiring a bit will soon be available. I bought a case of fluorescent tubes and am waiting for the new kind of LED tube. Note that it will be a hard sell to people who are unable to do the wiring changes without hiring an electrician at $100 per hour. I think LED fixtures are beginning to come down in price so I Look forward to seeing which way it all goes.

I'm a big fan of LED lighting in RVs where the replacements are inexpensive, draw 1/7 th as much power, have a nicer warm white colour and appear to have longer life than incandescent bulbs. The only downside is shore power users with newer converters providing higher charging voltage may require more expensive LEDs with voltage regulation.

What I like best about LED in the RV, and LEDs in general is that they do not get as hot as old incandesents do. Most of the 12v bulbs in the RV would burn you if touched while they were on, where the LEDs stay cool to the touch. Always worried about going our and leaving lights on because they got so hot, Now we can leave some of the LEDs on with no worry about heat r power draw. Same applies at home. I do have one higher-power LED spotlight that does get very warm when in use, but nowhere as how as the old bulbs.

We purchased these for the garage

https://www.amazon.com/Lights-America-4-foot-LED-Shoplight/dp/B01CCVV5MQ/ref=sr_1_6?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1478227422&sr=1-6&keywords=led+shop+light

And then this for our flag pole

https://www.amazon.com/Equivalent-Waterproof-Daylight-Security-Floodlight/dp/B00JB12E1C/ref=sr_1_5?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1478227628&sr=1-5&keywords=led+flood+light

In the livingroom and our bedrooms we put in dimmable LED fixtures and over the diningroom table too.
Our porch also has dimmable bulbs.
Most of our lights we can control through our phones. We use the Nexia program. We love it. Let's us keep an eye on lights doors windows. Great for making sure things aren't left on.

Brightest I know are Quad row LED strips. But, then again, you can make your own quad row. Just takes a little more with the connections.

If cost is a factor, I suspect the least expensive route is to not use light strips at all, but to install a bunch of utility light bulb sockets and put LED bulbs in them. Granted, these aren't strips, but it's still possible to get quite good lighting if you don't space the sockets too far apart.

Be careful of the "direct replacement" LED tubes that retain the ballast. You will find they draw almost as much as the fluorescent it replaced. Imreturned mine to Home Depot with that complaint and they said they were getting allot of them returned. Lowe's is clearing them out also.

LED is next generation of lighting, enjoy it.