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Old 06-11-2010, 04:08 PM   #1
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Converting the Flourescents to LED

Hopefully this is a pretty self explanatory LED light install. I bought these strips on clearance from suberbrightleds.com. I bought 16 to do 4 lights, but the main light in the last photo got 5 (3 towards the cabin) and the light over the fridge got 3 in front, none in back. The rear upper light got 4 evenly spaced, and the one over the sink got 3 in front and one next to the wall (there are Xantrex panels under it).


9471


9470


9469


9468


9467


9466


9465


9464


9463


9462

They are plenty bright at night, although these particular lights have quite the greenish cast. This was so simple, a pair of wire cutters and some crimp on connections and you're there. The lights plug end to end, but the +/- are weird so you just string them together and flip the connector before any that don't work, and move down the line.

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Old 06-11-2010, 05:24 PM   #2
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

Jage:

Thanks for posting this, I've been eying the same project. You mentioned that the light had a greenish cast to it. Do you know what color temperature is for the lights you purchased? It looks like superbrightleds.com has a ton of color temperatures for those bars. Have you noticed a difference in the draw between the florescents and the LEDs?

Thanks,

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Old 06-11-2010, 06:44 PM   #3
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

Thanks for the post & pictures Jage, looks great. Specifically which lights did you buy? Also, are you happy with the performance of the lights and would you do anything differently? How did you mount the light strips to the housing? Finally, have you determined the difference in the power draw?

Phew, at least I don't have a lot of questions.
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Old 06-11-2010, 09:53 PM   #4
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

awesome... on my list of to do's. Just replaced all other lights in the SMB with LED's and wanted to do the flourescents too.
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Old 06-13-2010, 08:37 PM   #5
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

How many amps/watts were the old ones drawing vs the new LED's ?
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Old 06-16-2010, 11:19 PM   #6
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

I replaced one floresent with leds and my wife hates it so all the others are on long term hold. I like the white type light versus the yellow light but the DW does not really care about the draw on the battery.

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Old 07-18-2010, 08:01 PM   #7
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

You can change the color temp to anything you want by buying some colored filters/gels from a theater supply house or good photography store. They will reduce the light output some but may be the trick for you. Tape them on the inside of the plastic cover. I think you can buy a 3 foot square for $10.00. I use them everyday in my photo business and they work great.
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Old 12-16-2010, 03:37 PM   #8
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

Finally got around to changing over my interior and porch lights to LED. Ths is a bit of a copy of what Jage explained above, but here's what I did.
I bought the exterior light here: http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/ ... _bulbs.htm

Here’s the exterior with the cover removed.


I just removed the old bulb and plugged in the LED light. I used a little silicone seal to hold the board in place. This is a pretty bright and white light, but we don’t use them very often. Probably a waste of time and money to convert the outside ones for us just for the power savings.

Next I did all the interior fluorescents. Here’s the LED replacement I used.


I got them from here: http://rvspecialthings.com/LEDlights.html
They come with the bayonet plug on the end, but seeing as how the lights are supposed to last 10,000 hours I cut off the plug and hard wired them. These are the warmest color I could find as we don’t like the really white ones. The change over is pretty simple and you could do it without removing the fixture, but seeing as how it’s only four screws I pulled ‘em off. Here’s the stock fixtures with the diffuser removed.


The center cover just pops off to get to the ballast below.


The ballast is held in with two pop rivets and I drilled them out with a 1/8” drill.


The LED comes with peel off stickum on the back and on the 12” fixture I put one in the center.


On the 18” fixtures I put in two of the LEDs.

Here’s a shot of the light with LED.


And here’s the stock light on florescent.


Here’s two of the lights side by side. The one on the left is LED with stock on the right. Photo taken with the flash on the camera.


Here’s the same shot without the flash.


I wasn't sure how it would look with one light in the center of a long fixture, but it's hardly noticable. We like the warmer light, and it’s actually brighter but not as harsh.
Anyway, easy project and the new lights draw less than ½ amp.
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Old 12-16-2010, 04:49 PM   #9
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

That is good color and light.

Keith
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Old 12-17-2010, 03:28 AM   #10
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Re: Converting the Flourescents to LED

very nice improvement
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