THE BEST LED light fixture out right now

We have our own website, that sells products but I can't help but tip my hat to this company. LLF Inc. who was bought out by CREE one of the main LED Chip Manufacturers in the US has the best led fixture out there right now:

They sell a 6-inch and 4-inch LED fixture that you can install in new construction or retro-fit into existing cans (plug and play):
What's so great about it?

• It's CHEAP - I've seen it sell for well under $100


• It's bright (enough) - equivalent to a 65W bulb using 12W


• It's widely available - type in "CREE LR6" and you can find it both on the internet and in the majority of electrical wholesale stores (No Home Depot or Big-Box retailers yet). Also from what I've heard from the wholesalers - it's selling like hot cakes.


• It's dimmable on any pre-existing system or using any standard dimmer.

This is a BIG deal especially in homes because having seen and personally talked to a large number of manufacturers from China, USA, Korea, Taiwan the one thing they can't seem to nail down is dimmability. 100% of all the manufacturers are in one of these categories for dimmability:

1. It dims partially - only down to about 30% then it start flickering

2. It dims on their own proprietary dimmer - which means you have to switch out your nice looking dimmer for a plain jane knob dimmer typically

3. It dims using a remote control - HUH?! - Why would you want to have a remote to dim your lights?!? - oh and to make it work you have to throw in a transformer (proprietary of course) between your power supply and the lights.

4. They say it dims - and it doesn't at all. When you put the bulb on a dimmer, and try dimming it produces a seizure inducing flicker.

So hat's off to Cree. For your marketing and foresight. By the way, we're actively looking for a BRIGHTER, DIMMABLE solution that will compete directly with the LR6. And when we find it, you can guarantee you'll see it in our store. :)

"Multiple Self-Sustaining" LED Streetlights

Things aren't always what they seem. But sometimes they are. This Prisma streetlamp not only uses High power LEDs to shower the streets with it's luminescence, but it's interactive and pays for itself to boot. It's supposed to be able to be controlled by a user, say for street fairs, which is pretty nifty, and even has solar panels(but then again what gadget nowadays DOESN'T have it) to help run the motor that turns the head assembly. Kind of defeats the purpose though if the main power for the light is still coming from the grid. The actual self-sustaining part is the fact that the vertical light can be pointed at various signs, banners, effigies of Jesus, or other advertising detritus to add an additional revenue stream to the mix. Not quite the supergreen product, but more like a light sea foam. Sadly (or perhaps happily), this is only a concept product, so you won't be hacking a Batman symbol on the top dome any time soon.
[via Prisma Design]

Light Bulbs with Fans?!

I bet Thomas Edison never would’ve thought we’d end up making light bulbs with fans inside them when he invented the light bulb 100 years ago. That’s what I’ve been seeing more and more of lately both online and at the Las Vegas Lightfair I attended a couple months back (more on that in a future blog entry). Why? Because it’s a race right now for every manufacturer to make a brighter bulb and grab the largest share of the market possible. So why the fans?

To understand this a little better, let’s get into a little bit of LED bulb design theory. There’s three main components in an LED bulb:
1. Chip/Die – This is the LED itself
2. Heatsink – This is what keeps LED Chip/Die cool
3. Optics – This is the lens that directs the light out of the bulb – giving you a narrow/wide beam of light

CREE is the #1 US manufacturer(brightest) for LED dies right now. (See our LED Buying Guide for more information). We can pretty much assume the majority of manufacturers are using the same chip. What about the lens? As important as the lens is, you can only bend the light in so many ways, and the light output increase is only marginal using the same chip.

So what’s the solution? Pack more LED’s into one place or drive them harder by putting more electricity through them. What happens when you do either of these and what’s the #1 killer of LED’s? Heat.

So we need a way of keeping them cool. OK let’s just make a bigger heatsink:

But now the bulb won’t fit in a traditional socket. “Doh”

OK, what about a fan? “Aha!”. This will let us keep a small form factor, and keep the bulbs the same size.

Sounds like a great idea at first but aren’t LED’s rated at 50,000 hours? That’s 17 years at 8 hours a day. Ever opened up a computer after 2 years and seen the amount of gunk the fans have picked up? Imagine the amount of gunk that they will pick up after 5 or 10 years? What happens then? Fan stops > LED overheats > LED dies. There goes $50 to $100.

That’s my thoughts. I just don’t think LED bulbs with fans are the way to go. There’s no way they can possibly last 17 years unless we come up with a self-cleaning fan technology. I DID find a company that came up with a brighter bulb without a fan and am about to get samples of this bulb. Pictures to come…
Anyone think otherwise? Anyone tried an LED bulb with fans?