Ancor LED bulb

[fcsob]

This bulb is a single contact bayonet basr with 12 leds. It is in a new fixture in the head. I seem to get about 30 to 50 hours of service from them before on led starts to blink then two ect. I have replaced it three times, warrenty,one shiped from Ancor. Any ideas?

[eherlihy]

Bad contact, causing resistance and voltage drop. Could be in the fixture, or the wire to the fixture. Low voltage is compensated by an increase in current draw, and heat as a byproduct. Increase in heat, causes further voltage drop, and current draw. It's a vicious cycle until the heat cooks the magic smoke out of the LED.

[donradclife]

Originally Posted by eherlihy

Bad contact, causing resistance and voltage drop. Could be in the fixture, or the wire to the fixture. Low voltage is compensated by an increase in current draw, and heat as a byproduct. Increase in heat, causes further voltage drop, and current draw. It's a vicious cycle until the heat cooks the magic smoke out of the LED.

Don't think so--study Ohm's law and try again.

[eherlihy]

Originally Posted by donradclife

Don't think so--study Ohm's law and try again.

Very constructive.... I am sure that the OP values your input.

You've earned yourself an addition to my ignore list...

[SlowButSteady]

Touchy, touchy....

How about both of you expanding a bit as to WHY others are right or wrong before you snipe at one another? After-all, this ain't the OT or PRWG pages.

However, loss of the factory-installed smoke is pretty highly correlated with electronics failures.

[dacap06]

Originally Posted by donradclife

Don't think so--study Ohm's law and try again.

Don, not so helpful, that, and flat wrong to boot. While your advice applies quite nicely to the simple, standard incandescent light bulb, the LED light is a semiconductor device that resides on a circuit board with a voltage regulator.

Mr. Herlihy has it right - the circuit tries to maintain constant output of light. It compensates for low voltage with additional current to deleterious effect. For semiconductor devices, too much current is their worst enemy. The power absorbed (R*I**2) across the high-resistance junction generates more heat per second than it can dissipate per second, which melts the junction. Thus ends their useful life.

[Maine Sail]

Originally Posted by fcsob

This bulb is a single contact bayonet basr with 12 leds. It is in a new fixture in the head. I seem to get about 30 to 50 hours of service from them before on led starts to blink then two ect. I have replaced it three times, warrenty,one shiped from Ancor. Any ideas?

The LED's from Ancor are a very cheaply made product, likely made with very inexpensive ballast resistors and cheap orphaned emitters. Quality bulbs will use a DC/DC constant current regulator to feed the emitters what they need for a long life.

I highly doubt the Ancor bulbs have the circuitry or heat sinking to keep the emitters at a temp they like.

You might try a factory made LED nav light built for the purpose from the likes of Hella, Aqua Signal or others..

[bljones]

Originally Posted by dacap06

Don, not so helpful, that, and flat wrong to boot. While your advice applies quite nicely to the simple, standard incandescent light bulb, the LED light is a semiconductor device that resides on a circuit board with a voltage regulator.

Mr. Herlihy has it right - the circuit tries to maintain constant output of light. It compensates for low voltage with additional current to deleterious effect. For semiconductor devices, too much current is their worst enemy. The power absorbed (R*I**2) across the high-resistance junction generates more heat per second than it can dissipate per second, which melts the junction. Thus ends their useful life.

Yeah, so there!

[dacap06]

Originally Posted by Maine Sail

I highly doubt the Ancor bulbs have the circuitry or heat sinking to keep the emitters at a temp they like.

Egads! Thanks for that info, Maine! I don't have personal experience with Ancor and didn't realize the company didn't do a proper job of designing support circuitry.

Ugh. How do people like that stay in business? As soon as clientele catch on their sales should plummet.

Tom

[xymotic]

Originally Posted by dacap06

Don, not so helpful, that, and flat wrong to boot. While your advice applies quite nicely to the simple, standard incandescent light bulb, the LED light is a semiconductor device that resides on a circuit board with a voltage regulator.

Mr. Herlihy has it right - the circuit tries to maintain constant output of light. It compensates for low voltage with additional current to deleterious effect. For semiconductor devices, too much current is their worst enemy. The power absorbed (R*I**2) across the high-resistance junction generates more heat per second than it can dissipate per second, which melts the junction. Thus ends their useful life.

]boy, that's a lot of big words. I'm not sure I understand completely, but I think you're saying the magic smoke got out? could't you just use the Internet tubes to pump more in?