X10 Community Forum
🔌General Home Automation => Automating Your House => Topic started by: Msradell on January 18, 2010, 10:10:35 PM
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The price of a LED lights is dropping and it soon will be reasonable enough to consider using at home. Does anyone have any experience using LED bulbs with X10 systems? If so do they require an appliance module like CFL's or will they work with a lamp module? Due to their extended life and even lower energy consumption they look like a good future alternative.
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I bought several different LED lights about a year ago for evaluation. Two were 12V MR16 halogen replacements, and one was a 4W 120V Lumoform for an otherwise dark interior hallway. One MR16 used 48 individual LEDs, and the other had 9 surface mount LED chips.
The 12V MR16 LEDs worked well. The surface mount version had a wider beam width that worked better in our landscape lights. However, even though they were supposed to be warm white, they both turned our red landscape gravel gray. So while they provided the necessary illumination, the total effect was not as pleasing as the halogens they replaced. Both of those (and all the halogens) have since been replaced by Feit 12V MR16 CFLs, which cost less than half as much, and provide a more pleasing spectrum.
The Lumoform turned into a nasty noise source. Two of the Leviton X10 switches (which DO incorporate AGC) on that circuit started to misbehave. It turned out that the Lumoform LED was generating a strong signal at almost exactly 120 KHz, and corrupting X10 transmissions. That has since been moved to another application, where it sits behind a X10 XPPF filter to prevent its noise from reaching the powerline.
Bottom line is that I am sticking with CFLs for now.
Jeff
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The price of a LED lights is dropping and it soon will be reasonable enough to consider using at home. Does anyone have any experience using LED bulbs with X10 systems? If so do they require an appliance module like CFL's or will they work with a lamp module? Due to their extended life and even lower energy consumption they look like a good future alternative.
I have tried dimming LED's. And whereas the test bulb did dim... it didn't last long. I wouldn't use lamp modules on LED's or CFL...even is they claim to be dimable. The appliance modules sometimes work... but often leak enough power to allow CFL's to flicker or LEDs to glow (dimmed). SocketRockets can seem to work... but aren't recommended for ether CFL's or LED's... I don't believe.
There is NO single perfect light source.... except maybe the sun. Sunlight is certainly priced right and its light spectrum seems well suited for most people. I have often considered light tubes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_tube) [ran from roof through the back of closets] as a way to get natural light to my basement areas.
CFL are a environmental hazard... by anyones standard. I don't know of anyone that would recommend their use around children. Although I do use them myself. Incandescence and halogen both produce much more heat than light... although the spectrum's are pleasing. LED's lights are still pricey to buy... but their off colored, directional, and dim light... doesn't cost much to operate (I love that part).
I think that currently the best solution isn't a single easy fix.. but a new attitude towards lighting.. as the science it really is.
I am old enough to remember when poorly wired homes were more the normal than the exception. One large light bulb in a fixture (often on the ceiling) would provide light for an entire room. It wasn't unusual back then to see 150 watt bulbs in those fixtures even though the fixtures were often rated for only half that wattage. But safety concerns were discarded then... much the same as we discard safety and use CFL's today.
Efficient, effective, pleasing light can only be obtained by proper planning and good wiring. A lot of a little bit of everything... is much better than an all of one thing.
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Here is my test of an EarthLED EvoLuxS LED Bulb.
http://forums.x10.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=12j256188cc9ofcrcv3fhbv3k5&topic=18332.0
I would say an appliance module would be best. Even at 100% a Lamp Module can slightly distort the AC waveform and you run the chance of an accidental dim condition.
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I would say an appliance module would be best. Even at 100% a Lamp Module can slightly distort the AC waveform and you run the chance of an accidental dim condition.
Brian,
Do you see any residual glow from LED bulb when "new" Appliance Module is used?
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Yes just not as bright a glow with the new one.
I tried a few before posting.
Leviton 1 LED .5W; Sylvania 22 LED 2.1W Light Bar; Feit 3 LED Night Light replacement bulb and a 15 LED white 1.5 W generic one from the net.
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Link to a disassembly of the Home Depot $20.00 EcoSmart LED Bulb.
http://www.edn.com/blog/PowerSource/39582-Home_Depot_s_20_EcoSmart_LED_light_What_s_inside_.php