LEDs

[jeepr]

OK, I searched around and didn't find any real discussion of the pros and cons of all LED lighting. I was thinking of using all LED lights for my teardrop lighting. The pros would be very low power use and long lifespan. The con would be the initial purchase price, although they have come down in price.

What are everyone else thoughts on LED lighting?

I like the idea of the ease of installing different colored lighting. I have a couple of red ones in my travel trailer for when we are dry camping, so I don't burn the battery out too fast. They are the boards that fit inside of the square RV lights and just plug into the regular plug.

Something like this
click here

[Endo]

LEDs are a good option if you want to conserve power. They also last a REALLY long time before you need to replace them. I used some LEDs. All of the trailer running lights and the brake lights are LED.

I also used LED lights for my "porch lights".

If I was concerned about power consumption I may have used LED lights as my interior lighting as well. Since we always camp were power is available that was not a concern for me.

The main reason I went with the LED trailer lights/brake lights is because they match the flush mount LED lights I installed on the Jeep.

[emiller]

I use all LED lighting and yes it's expensive. My interior lights are from a yacht supply company and light up blue and my galley light is from AW Direct a tow truck supply company. They are LED running lights amber and come in different lenghts, with chrome teardrop ends.
http://www.awdirect.com/finditem.cfm?itemid=18540
The same galley light I have for running lights also 4' long strip along the bottom under the door from the front to the fenders.

[dovaka]

if you make your own lights buy converting standard bulb ones it costs next to nothing really as long as you shop around for the leds
if you buy premade ones then there expensive just because there the new thing

[asianflava]

With the exception of my tail lights and porch lights, all the exterior lighting is LED. Inside I have dual LED dome lamps with individual switches. I planned on converting the porch lights to LED but found that I don't use them as much as I thought I would.

[halfdome, Danny]

I have all LED running lights, you would have to be totally blind not to see my TD at night, their great . I have two LED strips in the cabin for indirect lighting & they are flickering & burning out one bulb/LED at a time. I guess not every LED lasts 100,000 hours. Danny

[brian_bp]

I would definitely prefer LEDs for all "vehicle" lighting applications on the trailer (for all the reasons given above), although I have not converted my 1979-vintage stuff yet.

I like the clear-lens style, which do not show any colour until they light up, but note that you need red reflectors on the rear and amber reflectors on the sides. If you're not using at least one lamp in each required location with coloured lens and reflector sections, you need separate reflectors, which doesn't seem as clean to me. I would use red-lensed reflective units for the tail lights, amber-lensed reflective units for the side markers, and clear-lensed colourless units for turn signals, third brake light, etc.

Others will make different choices, which provides the variety we treasure.

[mikeschn]

I really like LEDs, even on the classic styled teardrops...



Mike...

[sushidog]

I have all LED running lights, you would have to be totally blind not to see my TD at night, their great . I have two LED strips in the cabin for indirect lighting & they are flickering & burning out one bulb/LED at a time. I guess not every LED lasts 100,000 hours. Danny

I've heard of this happening before. The problem typically stems from overvoltage from your converter or the vehicles charging system.

Here's an interesting link that discusses some LED sources.

http://www.rv.net/forum/index.cfm/fusea ... m#20080848

[Classic Finn]

Im using all Led,s on our tear.. now that I finally have them all hooked up and working Im trying to get some decent photos of them on..

They are expensive (especially here in Finland) but Im really glad I used them..marker, forward lighting are also Led. Ohh and the license plate lighting.









Classic Finn

[halfdome, Danny]

Heikki, nice looking LED lights . I especially like the ellipse side markers, tried to get them in chrome here locally and they were discontinued. It looks like you have red and amber tail lights is that a requirement over there? Danny

[jimqpublic]

One nice thing about LED's is that because they draw so little power they aren't likely to cause problems tapping into the tow vehicle lighting circuit. Our Chalet with conventional bulbs caused a turn signal flasher to go bad in the Outback so I upgraded to a Modulite relay system. LED's wouldn't need this.

[47tear]

Has anyone thought of converting the Sylvania DOT-IT lights to 12v for interior use? They're relatively inexpensive and easily available. They use 3 AAA batteries (lets see, that's 1.5v each, stacked in series totaling 4.5v). I guess my question is how would one convert them to run off the 12v system?

[toypusher]

Has anyone thought of converting the Sylvania DOT-IT lights to 12v for interior use? They're relatively inexpensive and easily available. They use 3 AAA batteries (lets see, that's 1.5v each, stacked in series totaling 4.5v). I guess my question is how would one convert them to run off the 12v system?

I'm no expert, but I would be willing to bet that you could build some circuitry that would reduce the 12VDC to any other voltage that you need. Maybe one of the electronics wizards will chime in on this!!

EDIT: A quick search with google and the first one I got was this ebay listing: http://cgi.ebay.com/4-5VDC-650mA-COBY-C ... dZViewItem Seems like you could make it work for you!!

[toypusher]

A little more searching and I found this:



You would have to try different size resistors, but should be able to work it out.