Anyone Else Switching To LED Lighting?

[wa_dave]

We changed our GU10 Spots and dining area globes to LED over a year ago for a cost of $350, We recovered the cost in reduced power bills in about 4 months. The light is bright and the globes cool to touch. Was going to change over the flouros but the advice was there would be minimal cost difference. As they fail we will replace them with LED as the price per tube is down to around $10 -15 vs $70 last year
Dave

 

[Rockstar_pizza]

Tom what bulbs did you use? I was watching on youtube the T8 replacements and it seemed that there was not much savings when he ran a test on voltage used. That was very surprising.

 

[Tom_Lehmann]

I’ll need to check the papers and get back to you, but when I was checking the specs I was amazed that all eight of the bulbs that I was installing had a lower draw than just one of the bulbs I was replacing.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

 

[Piper]

Tom what bulbs did you use? I was watching on youtube the T8 replacements and it seemed that there was not much savings when he ran a test on voltage used. That was very surprising.

I haven’t seen the video, but if he was actually measuring voltage that doesn’t tell you how much power is consumed. You pay for wattage (which is consumed) not voltage (which is just a potential).

Two different circuits at the same voltage can draw wildly different current due to differences in resistance. That’s why LED’s draw so much less power - they have much more resistance than an incandescent (once it lights) and puts much more of the energy consumed into creating light… where an incandescent burns 90% of it’s power consumption giving off heat.

Think about it this way… a light bulb receptacle will show 120V AC across it’s terminals, but you can put in a 40W bulb or a 150W bulb. The 150W will draw much more current (and cost much more) despite both of the circuits being 120V.