Interior LEDs

[paul323]

My 32' Pearson has incandescent spotlights down below; they suck up around 1.7a each. I have one LED bulb, which uses less than a milliamp, and so was considering at replacing some others. I have come up with 3 options:

1) LED 'spotlights' - seen them from $15-$55! My current thoughts are around ~$30 from DrLED (https://www.professorled.com/catalog...products_id=50), or $15 from superbrightleds (Super Bright LEDs – LED Lights, Bulbs, and Accessories). Anybody had experience with SuperBrightLEDs?

2) LED cluster bulbs - seem to be slightly dimmer, but a 24 LED bulb for cars/trucks (30 lumens) costs around $7.50. Why not use these?

3) Anybody tried building your own?

Would welcome any thoughts/advice. The low power consumption, cool operation and long life makes me love LEDs, but the price...ouch!

[night0wl]

Constant current bulbs matter. You'll burn out a lot of LED bulbs with the cheap-o cluster bulbs. Boat batteries vary voltage significantly and thats just not handled well by inferior bulbs.

[Paysay]

I've installed a number of cluster LED's in my Pearson 36-2 with excellent results. I used accent lighting kits from Home Depot for about $35. I've used them to replace the 12 florescent fixtures that came with the boat. They provide as much light as the fixtures they replace and the color is great. These LED's are not intended to be used on DC power and say so on the package, but they worked for me and I've been using them for over a year. You have to make sure the LED fixture has current limiting protection built into the fixture, not the power supply. They provide a lot of light for a little over a tenth of an amp. BTW, the last LED fixture I installed was a high power LED fixture from West Marine. It's dead. It could be the switch or a bad connection but the Home Depot LEDs are still going strong.

My next LED project is to put a red LED fixture over the chart table and in the galley and RED courtesy lighting above the cabin sole. Any suggestions?

If only someone would design and build an LED cluster that would plug in to those incandescent spotlights fixtures that Pearson used.

[F4d3d]

MaineSail started a great thread about LED's, and a guy from MarineBeam had a really informative post within the thread.

Here it is: LED Bulb Comparison

[remetau]

We have spent a small fortune trying out different LED lights mostly with very disappointing results.

Then we found Innovative LED Lighting Products.

His lights are the closest that we have seen to an incandescent bulb.

[Allanbc]

I used the Gala 2.4 watt LED Fixture available at SailorSams.com: 12 Volt LED Lights, 12 Volt LED Bulbs, 12 Volt Refrigerators/Marine Refrigerators, 12 Volt Rope Lights/LED Rope Lights, Boat Shrink Wrap, Built in Coffee Maker, Dock Cushions/Dock Fenders, Dock Ladders, Dock Lights, Electric Cooktops,.
They were affordable and work great on my Pearson 365.

**I have no business connection other than being a satisfied customer.

[degreeoff]

I built my own,LED wholesalers @ www.LEDwholesalers.com - BA15s White 8-30V DC&12V AC 18LED 3.6Watt 288Lumen @ $16 a piece for a warm white light just a bit dimmer than a 10 watt and then I bought a 12 pack of RV lamps (1157 bulbs) off 6 pk - Gustafson Ceiling Light w/ Switch 12 volt - Class A Customs for like $3 a pop....work like a charm and I can have all 10 lights on and draw 1 amp or so!....not to mention the housings cover my old Catalina light holes and are all plastic!!

[sck5]

I have replaced all my interior LED's with sensibulbs since they have a much warmer light than most others. But I still have an oldfashioned bulb over the chart table because the LED's dont render colors very well. If you ever need to look at charts at night you might consider leaving that bulb as it is.

[Gene T]

I replaced the halogen lights with some from china off ebay. Work great - about $7 each.


More on my web site
LED Lighting

Gene

[dhays]

I just posted on LED replacement bulbs for Legacy. You can find it here. It has lots of photos of the bulbs used and installation pictures. It is still a work in progress as I've just ordered some different bulbs for some of the fixtures.