Found: $1 LED light bulbs at Dollar Tree

I bought some on sale here. I got them 7.50 each dollars each cheapest i could find. These LEDs are really energy efficient per watt better then cheaper brands.

Meanwhile, here, I can never catch (or seldom catch) the CR2032, 2025, or LR44’s… not that I have much that uses those still — just some dog lights, and since we fenced in the back yard, I’m not as concerned about dogs in the dark. Except for our 2-y.o. german shepphard mix - who seems to be afraid of the dark, and will only wander out of the porch light if he’s wearing a little white LED clip light facing the ground. Go figure.

Anyway… I picked up 5 more and will see how brave I get. In my casual testing, I was surprised at how cool the bulb stayed, but I also am running it base down in a ventilated can, for limited periods of time. I will replace the overhead ceiling fixture CFL bulbs with these, to get warmer, faster, and brighter lighting.

I revisited my calculations and adding both sides of the circuit make the numbers balance nicely ( :person_facepalming: ). Strange markings… the base gives “120v @ 135mA” (16.2W), the package reads 9W, and LEDs seem to use 3.5W. Apparantly, all of them may be correct. CAN the bridge rectifier & filtering be comsuming another 5 watts? I don’t remember THAT much electronics theory.
Disclaimer… I did NOT measure the current used at the AC side… Un-natural fear of shocking myself, I guess. You’d think I’d be used to it by now, I’ve done it so often.

I plan on sacrificing 2 or 3 bulbs to a jury-rigged series setup to see exactly how far I can push things (like, my luck)…

  1. desolder the light disks, clipper the V+ out to the light disk through my DVM, complete the circuit, measure the current in use
  2. solder a take-off point to “the other side” of the LED string on the second light disk (LS2), clipper the near side of LS2 and insert it in series with the first string (LS1). Wear sunglasses. Measure current in use.
  3. solder a take-off point just aft of the 8th diode on LS3, insert that 1/2 of LS3 in series with the first two. Add SPF50 just in case. Raise the window blinds to let excess photons pass in a less impeded fashion. Measure the current.
  4. take the whole thing apart and consider my blessings at not having electrocuted anything (or one), pray for better sense. Probably sit in the dark quivering with adrenaline for 30 minutes, thinking of ways to use my new found knowledge to conquer the world — or lament that I now have to solder everything back together so I can at least get some working bulbs out if it again.

Re: the 4 y.o. bulbs from China… possibly over-designed because they weren’t sure how well things would go… versus the newer bulbs, which were probably also made in China, but after the accountants worked out exactly how many would expire due to cheaper design, through cost shaving, factory-floor components, and the like. With LEDs, I wouldn’t worry about tearing things down… CFLs? Heck, even when I was younger and immortal, I didn’t want mercury and glass shards near my hands and eyes… I disassembled a base of a CFL once. Nothing usable in it, by the time I got there.

I stopped by DT today to get some chips. That would be potato chips, NOT computer chips.
(anybody old enough to know who said that?)

Anyway, I looked to see if DT still had LED bulbs for $1 and they do. Here is their newest stock, FEIT Electric. Some here say they are pretty good. I bought one and will do a tear down and have a look see.

Very attractive package!

In the background is a whole pallets worth of them.

Darn, was out shopping today and forgot the Dolla Tree.

I woulda forgot too, but I have a sore throat.
The doctor told me salt will sooth it. Seems to me the BEST way to get salt is on a chip!

Whoa! That IS a great package… FEIT is supposed to be good. IIRC, FIET and CREE just tried to sue each other, and wound up trading patents or intellectual property or something like that.

I just stopped by DT today to return a faulty bulb and pick up a new one… so, I’ve got 6 of the earlier packaging - none of the nicer, newer FEIT bulbs here. I’ve popped the tops off two so far, and the board designs are “similar”, but different.

Both use current limiting chips, but different chips (BP5131D and RM9003T). I can find English spec sheets for the BP5131D, and can calc the current to 60 mA. I can only guess at the specs for the RM device and guess 110mA. Both have about 150v delivered to the LED boards. The constant current circuits are only dropping 11.3v and 12.5v. The voltage across the 16 SMD chips is 141v and 138v, so these are NOT 3.6v chips like I thought. I haven’t picked the voltage directly off the SMDs, but they calc out to about 8.8v and 8.6 volts each.

Efficiency from the DC-side of the circuit should be 92%, which makes me pretty happy.

I wish DT would carry the flood / spot lights in LED. That would make me even more happy.

I like your way of thinking my friend. :+1:

:wink:

How bout 3 LED light bulbs for a Dolla?

Actually remembered to go today. Local Dolla Tree has 3pk of the Feit Electric 60W equivalent WW, Actually NW to my eye or not yellow WW. From the outside the look the same as previous Feit bulbs. Measure out to 8.1W on my P3 Kill-A-Watt meter. Some pics…






WOW!!!
That’s 33 cents a piece. That beats even the HD deal of $10.03 for a pack of 24. But 8 - 3 packs for a buck a piece and you only have to spend $8 to get the 24. AND the FEIT bulbs are probably better than the EcoSmart bulbs that Home Depot sells.
Bravo.

I just did a quick comparison. From your picture, the FEIT bulb in the 3 pack looks the same as the 1 pack I got. Some numbers are different, perhaps just run numbers.

Here is a comparison side by side with the 24 for 10 bucks HD EcoSmart.

and then a comparison side by side with another $1 bulb from Lowes, the Utilitech and another $1 bulb from Dollar Tree, a Greenlite

I screwed all 4 bulbs into 1 fixture to compare the output. The FEIT was the brightest and whitest of the bunch. Not so much brighter or whiter that you would notice by itself. I think it would only be noticeable side by side. And of course that subtle difference wouldn’t show up in a picture shot with my iPhone.

Does anyone know reasons behind, why CREE-bulbs are not sold outside US?

OTOH: pretty OK LED-bulbs can already be gotten from here also with reasonable prices so…

I don’t know, but I do know that I read that CREE was going to stop using CREE emitters in their own bulbs. Sounds crazy, I know, and I can’t seem to find that article.
In the future they will be going for the high end market.

LED bulbs have already become a commodity, and there is not much money to made by the manufacturers. Low margins.
That fact that they are sold 3, 6 and 24 to the package is proof. It wasn’t too long ago they were sold individually and packaged like a high end piece of electronics. It wan’t that long ago an LED bulb was $20 or more around here.

Yes, this probably is the case…

Brand bulbs still cost crazy amounts in here without any reason. Good budget bulbs are also good if you know what to get.

Im still hoping to see higher CRI bulbs…

Must … resist… DollarTree… must…

Who am I kidding… I’ll stop by after work. I wonder if I would appear ungrateful if I took back three of the $1 bulbs and asked to exchange them for 3-packs?

I and several of my co-workers went to the DT to grab some of the 3 packs. End cap display was 1/3rd sold since yesterday. Tray or flat is 6 packs of 3, we all took a flat. $6.36 out the door for 18 bulbs. After 4 guys in a row were holding the packs in the check out line several others took interest and bought some. Funny how that works…

Yesterday’s after work deal was one co-worker stopping @ HD to get a Few packs of the Xmas leftover, Husky folding utility knives. 2pk for $7 or $3.50 a knife.
I think 2 others gave him $10 each to stop on his way home from work. So, in the end his pack was about $2. I initiated that buy spree too but I don’t use those knives at work.

Stopped at a DT on the way home today and picked up 6 of the 40W equivalents. They’re much cooler than the 2700K CFL bulbs I replaced. I honestly can’t see how they’re anywhere near 3000K as rated. They look closer to 5000K to my eye but I’m no expert. Still a killer value for LED bulbs if they are even half decent which they certainly appear to be. I didn’t know what was being referred to about the 3 packs until after I bought them. I’ll have to stop on my way home tomorrow to see if I can find those. Great thread by the way. :+1:

I would say the WW 60W equivalents 3pks are also about 5000K. No real yellow to be seen. But certainly not the Daylight white of the Cree I have from a couple years back. Its a good inbetween, a good bright light. No shadows as the daylight make yet my work area is very well lit. Too early to tell if they will dim out a bit but with 3 of them in the ceiling fan together, it would not matter in my use for now. Hope they last.

Years ago Harbor Freight carried the Feit Electric incandescent bulbs. They had very long life and slightly higher Voltage rating I think was 125 or 130V. They really did last longer than ordinary bulbs of the time. I hope the reputation still holds in the LED line.

went back again today. grabbed a flat of 6x 3pks. Lady at the counter took out one box to scan and then counted how many there were… proceeded to scan the box in hand five times. I saved her the embarrassment of her error. $5.30 please.

Today was more curiosity than to get more lights. The endcap was restocked fully. There are 2 other DT stores within 15 miles of my town. A friend stopped by another and there were no 3pks of lights there.

well the influx of dollar store crap rears its ugly head again!
dayton oh store got in these home luminaire 60w led bulbs.
super light weight meaning no heatsinking.
ul listed.
or not?
the ul file number e486088 is not valid!
ul search
will test and teardown shortly.
edit.
very thin aluminum sleeve into the plastic base.base gets hot in free air.so it does transfer heat.expect these to have a short life as the led plate hits 200f in about 5 minutes with the dome off.expect very quick failure if installed in a closed fixture.

I just want to point out that the FEIT bulbs that I posted about are of the same product line as the ones sold by Home Depot.
Today I was in a shopping center that had a Home Depot and a Dollar Tree just a couple of hundred feet from each other.
Home Depot had these FEIT’s on clearance at 25% off at $7.56. Of course the ones at Dollar Tree were $1
Both of these bulbs were made to sell for $10 or so.
Home Depot

Dollar Tree