BCGPER
Starting Another Thread
- Location
- Sunny Arizona
A couple of guys were asking about my shop lighting in another thread. To keep from derailing that thread. I'll post this here. Just a quick copy and paste of an e mail to a friend.
A couple years ago I installed 4 LED replacement bulbs in my exterior lights. The benefits proved to make it worth doing the entire house. The house is all LED now, with the exception of about 40 fluorescent bulbs. With the phasing out of all T-12 lamp production, I decided it was time to start looking at an alternative.
Much like you, I was shopping at COSTCO one day, and snagged a couple of the drop-in replacement bulbs. I really liked these bulbs, slightly brighter that the T-12's they replaced, 50,000 hour life, and less than half the energy consumption. I was sold! The entire change out was going to cost me $600+, so it was going to have to happen in stages. Returned to Costco a week later, and as COSTCO seems to do, they were completely sold out.
I thought, hell I'm smarter than Costco, I'll track down the "manufacturer", well they say they're the manufacturer but these are all made in China. After several unanswered e mails and phone messages, it was obvious they wouldn't sell to the public. While researching new suppliers, I learned of all the different types of LED replacements. The lower lamp cost and the ability to do away with the light ballast seemed to be a no brainer in my mind.
What I eventually settled for was the 6000K direct wire 110 volt lamps. the 6000 color is whiter than I really wanted, but not blinding. I had a bunch of 4 foot lights to modify, and two 8 foot lamps. The 8 foot bulbs were $60-$80 a piece so, time to rethink that idea. Replacing an 8 foot lamp with two 4 foot lamps would cost about $60 for everything, plus I'd have all the same lights.
Now, as much as I hate the place, Ebay was by far the cheapest place on lights. I decided to roll the dice and order 20. I installed a couple and turned the power back on and wow, what a difference! Of the 20 lamps in the initial order, two were DOA. I wasn't surprised, since this is cheap Chinese crap. I contacted the seller and explained the failure and asked if this is fairly common. He said its not that unusual to get a bad one, but two was rare. He agreed to give me 10% off my next order, which seemed fair enough to me. I ordered another 20.
Installing the next 20 was a frustrating ordeal. Of those 20, 14 were DOA. I'm pissed, to say the least. Contacted seller again, and he is absolutely shocked. I've had Ebay deals go south before, and was preparing to ship all 40 lamps back. The seller asks if I'll work with him. He wanted me to open up the defective LED's and send him photos of anything I can find. The problem with a lot of them was very obvious, the power wires to the LEDs were broken during the manufacture of the lamps. He sees the issue, and immediately sends me out another order of 20 lamps, and don't bother shipping the bad ones back. SWEET! After an hour with my soldering gun, I had 9 FREE working LEDs.
So, I found a unicorn, an honest Ebay seller. I ended up with 54 lamps for $300, about $5.55 per lamp, and did away with every ballast I had. Time will tell if I see anything on the power bill.
And what you really wanted before my ramblings, the link:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/26223017219...49&var=560983419237&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT
A couple years ago I installed 4 LED replacement bulbs in my exterior lights. The benefits proved to make it worth doing the entire house. The house is all LED now, with the exception of about 40 fluorescent bulbs. With the phasing out of all T-12 lamp production, I decided it was time to start looking at an alternative.
Much like you, I was shopping at COSTCO one day, and snagged a couple of the drop-in replacement bulbs. I really liked these bulbs, slightly brighter that the T-12's they replaced, 50,000 hour life, and less than half the energy consumption. I was sold! The entire change out was going to cost me $600+, so it was going to have to happen in stages. Returned to Costco a week later, and as COSTCO seems to do, they were completely sold out.
I thought, hell I'm smarter than Costco, I'll track down the "manufacturer", well they say they're the manufacturer but these are all made in China. After several unanswered e mails and phone messages, it was obvious they wouldn't sell to the public. While researching new suppliers, I learned of all the different types of LED replacements. The lower lamp cost and the ability to do away with the light ballast seemed to be a no brainer in my mind.
What I eventually settled for was the 6000K direct wire 110 volt lamps. the 6000 color is whiter than I really wanted, but not blinding. I had a bunch of 4 foot lights to modify, and two 8 foot lamps. The 8 foot bulbs were $60-$80 a piece so, time to rethink that idea. Replacing an 8 foot lamp with two 4 foot lamps would cost about $60 for everything, plus I'd have all the same lights.
Now, as much as I hate the place, Ebay was by far the cheapest place on lights. I decided to roll the dice and order 20. I installed a couple and turned the power back on and wow, what a difference! Of the 20 lamps in the initial order, two were DOA. I wasn't surprised, since this is cheap Chinese crap. I contacted the seller and explained the failure and asked if this is fairly common. He said its not that unusual to get a bad one, but two was rare. He agreed to give me 10% off my next order, which seemed fair enough to me. I ordered another 20.
Installing the next 20 was a frustrating ordeal. Of those 20, 14 were DOA. I'm pissed, to say the least. Contacted seller again, and he is absolutely shocked. I've had Ebay deals go south before, and was preparing to ship all 40 lamps back. The seller asks if I'll work with him. He wanted me to open up the defective LED's and send him photos of anything I can find. The problem with a lot of them was very obvious, the power wires to the LEDs were broken during the manufacture of the lamps. He sees the issue, and immediately sends me out another order of 20 lamps, and don't bother shipping the bad ones back. SWEET! After an hour with my soldering gun, I had 9 FREE working LEDs.
So, I found a unicorn, an honest Ebay seller. I ended up with 54 lamps for $300, about $5.55 per lamp, and did away with every ballast I had. Time will tell if I see anything on the power bill.
And what you really wanted before my ramblings, the link:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/26223017219...49&var=560983419237&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT
