From a website the locals here would despise if they knew about it:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/2014/01/no_author/the-great-led-lightbulb-scam/
I wonder how many of the failures were the emitter and how many were in the driver electronics. I’ve had to repair a ridiculous amount of consumer electronics due to failure of cheap electrolytic capacitors. Computers, laptops, cameras, electronic picture frames, TVs, etc. I suspect a lot of the failures were in the driver rather than the emitter.
Here is a pic of an MR16 I recently purchased. Note that the LED’s don’t even touch the star. This bulb as is, wouldn’t last 15 seconds.
There are many, many causes of premature failure. In the case of cheap Chinese lights, workmanship would have to be right up there.
I remember when transistors first found their way into consumer electronics, they were replacing vacuum tubes. Vacuum tubes are analogous to incandecents, not energy efficient and run hot. Periodically they would burn out and had to be replaced. So much so that most every drug store had tube testers for DIY’ers to test their own tubes, and if found to be bad, could buy replacements at the drug store. Imagine that.
Transistors on the other hand were supposed to last forever, but it was quickly discovered that they do not, especially high powered ones. One reason for that is “Thermal Fatigue”. The repeated swings in operating temperature can actually cause fatigue to set in to the materials of a semiconductor through the minute expansion and contraction.
does the optic push them down when assembled?
It’s supposed to, but you gotta least have contact before they do. Also there is supposed to be some thermal compound applied between, in this case there is none.
Additionally, the optic is made of plastic, can’t you see some deformation in the plastic over long periods of time at the temperatures involved?
I get at best, about 6 months out this type of light, AFTER, I make the required repairs.
Every single LED bulb failure that I have seen (4 out of 300+ bulbs in my house) has been driver failures… one was a blown picofuse on the driver). No emitters have died.
All the dead bulbs except one were name brand bulbs and replaced under warranty. The other was a Chinese candelabra bulb used to light the front porch gates. It lasted nearly 3 years… and paid for itself within a few months.
I did have around 100 PAR20 bulbs replaced due to a manufacturer’s recall.
yikes, almost bought a few similar for some track lighting at my last place. glad i didn’t.
I must be old. I remember doing that with my dad. Even had to wait in line if it was a Saturday. :weary:
Why link to Lew Rockwell when the actual story is at the Daily Mail, which is the full article with all the photos?
These multi-5mm-led lights are crap, they all die. But this is years known fact. Since they don’t have driver and all LEDs run in serial and one dead means end. Unless the cheap electronic fails sooner setting your house on fire.
I have good experience with single or 3-emitter bulbs or multi-SMD bulbs with driver.
Simple guide:
FLICKER = NO DRIVER = DIES, dangerous, possible fire hazard
NO FLICKER = DRIVER, OK
You do realise that you linked to a conservative tabloid/ hack paper article? That would be like expecting impartial accurate reporting from libertarianordie.com or unionmembershaveabetterlovelife.com.
Cheap electronics fail quicker than expensive electronics wouldn’t have made for such an attention grabbing headline now would it?
I've had a few cheap LED bulb failures:
Keeping in mind, all I have is cheap DX-grade bulbs, no high-end retail-available US-sold bulbs:
First; obligitory cheap corn-bulbs. When a single 5mm or 5050 LED begins to fail, bulb is shot. I have a cheap 5050 style bulb that put out a decent amount of light, but when it would warm up, half the bulb would begin to flicker and die from a defective emitter. No way to tell which emitter it was. Similar issues with the other 5mm-style corn bulbs I've purchased (and since discarded since they were so pathetically dim).
Second; the typical 3-4x 1W emitter bulbs that use the cheap Fried-Egg emitters with TIR-style optics. These have been fairly reliable with no driver failures, but as pointed out above, heat sinking can be poor and has resulted in a few emitter failures. In those cases, it is easy to id the defective emitter by using a couple of AA-cells to check the emitters individually. Once the defective emitter is identified, it's easy enough to remove and replace, and in the process, properly Fujik the new emitter in place with good pressure to ensure a reasonable thermal path. Replacement emitters are very cheap, I bought a pack of 10 off eBay, and I think I've only had to replace 3-4 emitters on all the bulbs I have...
I've never had issues with heat damaging the optics either... These 1W emitters don't put out enough heat to melt anything, or haven't yet for me anyway...
All this is going to change soon though... I have a parcel coming with a few driver circuits and 3W emitters and I plan to abuse those cheap generics to see just how far I can push them before they poof... >)
I just had to replace my first CFL light in the lampstand I sit next to. I put it in there in early 2007 and it died just the other day. I remember switching to them because those cheap incan bulbs kept popping almost bi-weekly, so while I’m the first to shoot down an alarmist or extravagant claim, I don’t see one here. There appears to be a legit improvement.
When I was a pup, there was one of these tube checkers in Corner Drug...in Perryton Tx I remember us going there with a pocket of tubes to check... and yep, you opened a door on the bottom of the cabinet, found your replacement number and off you went. If I recall the tubes were about .75 each. My Grandmother gave me my first transistor radio. It is a little red Motorola. I thought I had gone to heaven! Made a little wooden holder and taped it to my bike handlebars! I had the only bike in town with a radio!! I still have the radio 58 years later. I don't know if it would work now...but I have it! Thanks for dusting off a few good memories!! Dan.
not when they soldered to the pcb hanging.
i have seen it many times, those 1\3\5w leds are too common in china products, they are not that bad, if they were soldered properly.
i have never seen such leds soldered to pcb in a right way, with heatpad soldered too. they all either just sit and soldered by legs manualy.
sometimes they put paste under heatpad.
at first i thought, i could not solder, it did look like plastic led housing might get damaged during soldering, but one day i desided to try and to reflow them correctly. and it worked just fine, housing didn’t melt, and leds work just fine, i soldered few dozens of them, white, and uv.
all of those bulbs with leds hanging in the air will die pretty soon, however if they were mounted correctly their life span would be increased dramaticly. it s a shame really, it would not take much more to do it right, yet lapms would last a LOT longer.
I just got 4 of these from DX http://dx.com/p/gx5-3-4w-450lm-3500k-mr16-led-warm-white-light-spotlight-silver-golden-12v-194141#.UuqVlK6YZhE .
1 DOA, and onother one died after about 30 minutes…
Do not buy these…
While I am a proponent of LED technology, government mandates and government meddling are a large part of the problem. When they banned the high wattage incans, a bunch of players rush into the LED business in order to try to capitalize on the phase out of incans. The free market has been impaired, and with the sudden change consumers are unfamiliar with the new types and brands available. The new LED choices don’t have to compete against incans, so quality takes a back seat to getting some product to market. I’ve been tempted to buy some LED bulbs for my home, but so far have stuck with just a few Ecosmart and Cree bulbs when they have gone on sale. So far I have not seen any good deals on quality BR30’s or PAR38’s. Seems like those form factors should be easier to build heat sinks for, but prices are still high. I’ve got a lot of canned light fixtures in my home.
In the flashlight market there was not the wave of regulations, so the sheer superiority of LEDs has driven the flashlight innovations, and I think the result has arguably been a lot better.
I have found the Ecosmart bulbs to be pretty good. They are made by Lighting Science Group who has made bulbs for Sylvania, Westinghouse, and others.
As far as PAR30/PAR38 deals go, try:
I bought most of the 300+ LED bulbs in my house from them… many for less than what incandescents would have cost.
figured as much.no reputable mfr makes 5mm based units anymore.the cheap junk mfrs went series low power smd to make them easier to assemble thus even cheaper.that is the cheap “corn” bulb.
reporting about 6 year old obsolete tech problems makes the reporter look like an idiot.