A range of Philips LED downlights are on sale at Woolworths, these deals listed here are MR16 / GU5.3 type base.
Philips MASTER LED Warm White 3000K 5.5W 425lumen 60degree 4pk $25.90
Regular price $36.95 @ Bunnings
Also available Philips ESSENTIAL LED Warm White 5.5W 415lumen 24degree 4pk $24.46 and Philips MASTER LED Cool White 4000K 5.5W (not found on Woolworths website). Pricematch for these also available at Bunnings.
In most cases yes.
I changed mine in a 10 year old house, no problem at all!
5.5W is not going to be anywhere near as bright, assuming they are 50W halogens.
what's the closest to 50W?
11-13w or so.
49.99W :P
what's the closest to 50W?
LEDs are measured in lumens, your 50 watt halogens are around 600-700 lumens, so something around there.
You can't really use watts with LEDs, they'll give you a general idea but lumens can vary between different brand bulbs with the same wattage.
Then you have colour temperature to worry about, and dimming can be a nightmare.
From the numbers I expected these to be noticeably dimmer than my 50W halogens but when testing them I could not see any difference in brightness.
Depends what transformer you have. Should work ok with iron core transformers.
Electronic transformers, it's hard to say. Some shut down if the load is less than 10w. Some will flicker. Some will work just fine.
If you have electronic transformers that work you'll be better off though. The power loss on 50w iron core transformers with these low wattage lamps is more than the lamp itself.
I had some 6w lamps, tested with a couple of transformers. Electronic total draw was about 7w, iron core total was up around 18w.
Each iron core transformer can run multiple LEDs which reduces the penalty associated with it. And, allows you to redeploy some existing transformers. Electronic transformers still offer the cheaper running option.
jv you're in vic, get the vic gov free ones, choice of 6 different types, one sure to suit your situation. And, get your standard BC and ES light bulbs changed over for free at the same time.
I've heard the free ones are crap quality and cause RF interference
Some are some are not. Get the consultant out and get him to try them all before installer arrives. And don't sign off the installers paperwork unless you are 100% happy.
Should be able to test all of these https://www.ledsaves.org/ and probably a few more. Wattage is not the best light measure because later ones are more efficient. SYD520 are the brightest for me (kitchen, bathrooms, outdoor spotlights). Put some less bright Primsal branded ones in the bedrooms.
They should work with most existing transformers but maybe buy a single unit pack to test.
I use the 5.5w 60d units and they work really well.
Apparently you should have a LED transformer, I swapped mine out after using cheap ones and found the light comparable to halogen (maybe not as bright but close enough) but noticed they flicker every so often. Friend said you would not notice with a halogen globe but as LED turn off instantly the flickering is noticed..
Thanks OP for the post, might try bunnings for some spare globes and throw away the cheap (spare) ones finally…
Apparently you should have a LED transformer,
WRONG
These retrofit lamps are specifically designed for use with Halogen transformers. That's the whole point of them… if you have to change the transformer, you should change it to a LED Driver and use an infinitely better "NOT-Retrofit" lamp.
but noticed they flicker every so often.
Sounds like they are rubbish. Or the so called "LED transformers" are crap.
Friend said you would not notice with a halogen globe but as LED turn off instantly the flickering is noticed..
Sounds like "friend" hasn't got a clue. Lights are not supposed to flicker or flash.
If they are flickering (as in flashing on and off very quickly) then you have a compatibility issue, and or dimmers and/or C-Bus or other control system. Or the lamps are crap.
Normal lights switch on and off at 100Hz. Everyone gets excited about 100Hz flicker-free TV…
You will get flicker with LEDs if they don't ave a proper driver, and are using what is termed a "half wave rectified cap[acitive dropper". Butonly the cheapest and nastiest 240V lamps have that.
LOL at people who are Negging me. The question is why, precisely?
I have been a lighting engineer for 35 years, and my current role is product development and compliance of LED lamps.
I'm sorry if I am telling you the truth that you don't want to hear.
Anyone know if these are dimmable? I have dimmers set up on our existing halogen set up and always wanted to change to LED but I have over 60 change so not something I want to change in a hurry.
nvm. Just checked bunnings link, they're not dimmable.
I believe there are two types, the normal 5.5w Phillips warm white LED, then there is a Phillips LED "master" version, which is in a darker box.
The normal ones aren't dimmable, and are normally about 10 bucks each give or take.
The Master version are dimmable though, but when I saw them, they were 25 bucks each(!?). The woolies link goes to the non dimmable ones, and I don't think they carry the Master ones.
Check the boxes anyway, if they say dimmable you would be able to return them as not fit for intended use if they dont dim to your satisfaction.
The Master version are dimmable though,
They are "sort-of dimmable… but nowhere as low as Halogens can be dimmed.
When LED suppliers say something like "dims to 10%", they means 10% of power or 10% of Lumens. Due to the human eye having a logarithmic response to illumination, the dimming to 10% only looks about 1/2 as bright.
It's virtually impossible to get LED retrofit lamps that dim all the way down, due to numerous technical reasons.
Also, when you dim LEDs they don't go more orange/yellow (warm toned) light like Halogens. They just get duller, and that means they can tend to look drab and grey rather than dim and intimate.
Great info, thanks for that. I guess the closest we can get are the smart RGB led bulbs, which can change colour temperature, and can dim quite well.
They are obviously not MR16 compatible retrofits, so probably not relevent to the conversation.
As a lighting engineer, could you recommend a strip lighting or other LED product that is 95 CRI or higher that I could use to build my own videography lights?
As a lighting engineer, could you recommend a strip lighting or other LED product that is 95 CRI or higher
No, sorry - I doubt that such a thing exists.
that I could use to build my own videography lights?
CRI and Ra are completely flawed ways to measure colour accuracy. The fact that a light could score "80: or "90" or even "95" has absolutely no relevance on whether the lighting is going to be any good or not.
LED manufacturers are extremely clever at blending the phosphors to achieve high scores in CRI calculation.
Consider that a reasonable CRT or LCD monitor can display what, 16 Million colours? CRI is the average score of the light source at displaying JUST THESE EIGHT COLOURS, of which none are saturated. Are all objects in your videos using those 8 tones? If not, CRI is not the correct metric to judge by.
Worse - standard white LEDs have "spikes" of blue and yellow that oversaturate the corresponding colours that they illuminate, whilst under-illuminating the Reds and other tones. That's because "White" LEDs are actually only 2 colours, Blue and Yellow. This gives the appearance of RGB because Yellow is made by mixing Red + Green… however there is often not much of either in the light that LEDs emit.
Furthermore there may be significant shifts away from the normal Planckian locus that cause the LEDs to cast a green or pink hue, even though they might have a certain nominal CCT (Colour Temperature) and CRI.
The bottom line is that most LEDs are terrible for illumination of the full spectrum of colours. There are certainly ways to do it using colour mixing, however it will still be "emulating" white light in a way that tricks the human eye, rather than actually producing and illuminating all the colours correctly.
Your camera will have a spectral sensitivity curve, and various ways of correcting that. You need to match the lighting to what the camera needs, which may have absolutely nothing to do with how human eyes see colours.
Traditionally, videography and film cameras use Halogen lamps and a corresponding filter (or post-processing) to tone down the red end. They use halogen because it is continuous spectrum, so doesn't omit parts of the spectrum like LED, Fluorescent, HID, etc. You cannot easily filter to correct the weirdness of spectral emissions that are produced by LEDs, and it's made even harder because LED colour shifts in unpredictable ways as they get older.
The bottom line is that LED is a compromise and you will pay a lot of money for video lighting that is reasonably decent.
Here is a long but well written article on colour and LEDs http://resources.made-in-china.com/article/industry-view/OmE… - it's not particularly relevant to Videography, but covers the basics of what I just mentioned. From there you then need to work out what your camera needs, and what colours you want to display accurately.
I guess the closest we can get are the smart RGB led bulbs, which can change colour temperature, and can dim quite well.
Nah - those RGB bulbs are toys and they have really poor colour accuracy. How would you know what combination was correct anyway? They dim well because they are pretty gutless, plus they are using colour mixing and proper control, rather than some clunky old 1960's technology wall dimmer that is specifically designed to be the absolutely cheapest possible way of dimming a glowing coil of tungsten filament by applying a horrendously chopped up and pulsed waveform to it.
There are plenty of ways to make a proper dimming LED bulb, and there are even special luminaires that adjust colour as they dim, to stop the "grey look". It is really simple to dim LEDs, either by flashing it on and off very quickly (PWM dimming) or by adjusting the power (current control).
It amazes me that people desperately try to hang onto their clunky old 1980's halogen transformers and 1970's incandescent light dimmers like they were some kind of valuable item that they deem far too expensive to replace… yet have no problem paying $1000 to upgrade their mobile phone every year or so.
Philips Master LED Downlights
A range of Philips LED downlights are on sale…
These are NOT DOWNLIGHTS.
They are MR16 12V retrofit LAMPS.
Thanks Steptoe for amending the incorrect Title. A "downlight" is a lighting fixture, and what Woolies are selling in this deal.
Thanks also to the person who negged me for pointing out the error.
Bunninga used to sell a 10pc Trade Pqck of these in 60dwg. They cleared them last year for $10. Insufficient quantity to post though.
Do they have GU10 lamps on sale? Looking to replace a number of 20w halogens. Not sure what 5w is equivalent to.
Will these replace 12v halogen downlights without needing to change the transformer?