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LED Lamps-LED BulbsThe Latest in Lamps and Light Bulbs
Introduction: LED lamps are solid state lamps that uses light emitting diodes (LEDs) as the source of light. LED lamps have been used in electrical and electronic equipment for years in place of small incandescent lamps.
Many years ago aircraft cockpit
instrument lighting consisted of dozens of small
(peanut size) incandescent light bulbs that had a
very short life period. It wasn’t uncommon to have
to change a dozen or more of these peanut light
bulbs on every preflight or during the flight. A
great deal of labor was saved when they were
replaced with LED lamps as they have a much longer
service life.
LED lamps are now competing with compact
fluorescent light bulbs (CFL) for home lighting. Because
light output
of individual light emitting diodes is so small as
compared to
incandescent
lamps,
multiple diodes are often used together for
sufficient illumination.
However, in recent years diode technology has
greatly improved with high power light emitting
diodes that have higher
lumen
output which are making it possible to replace
other lamps with LED lamps. Some high powered LED
chips used in some commercial LED lights can emit
as much as 7,527 lumens while using only 100 watts
of power. These very high lumen commercial LED
lamps are not always interchangeable with other
types of commercial lamps. LED diodes use direct current (DC) electrical power so as a result they include internal circuits to operate on standard household AC voltage. LEDs can be damaged as a result of their higher operating temperatures so the heat sinks and cooling fins are used to disparate the heat. As a result LED bulbs offer longer service life and higher energy efficiency than both incandescent and CFL lamps but the costs are higher.
Household LED lamps are made in
The biggest drawback is their high cost which can
run between $20 and $30 for a single light bulb
that is equivalent to a 1-29 watt CFL bulb. The
manufacturers claim that they will last hundreds of
hours. Most homeowners have not been is any rush to
replace there CFL lamps with LED’s because of the
high cost. They are still getting over the
disappointment of having been forced to replace
their incandescent builds with CFL bulbs that don’t
last as long as the manufacturers claimed. LED lamps do work great in the world of electronics and aircraft cockpit lighting but I do not believe the average house hold will be purchasing them for some time in the future simply because they do not believe they are cost effective.
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