Question 1

Why is LED a better option?

Accepted Answer

LED lamps can be simply divided by 3 major parts, LED chips, adaptor and hardware/housing.
Compared to traditional light emitting products, LED lamp is extremely energy-efficient as the LED chip, a revolutionary design after Edison. The structure and methodology behind LED chips made it very durable. Simply with these characteristic of the LED, it saves users expenditure and gives our motherland earth a cleaner environment. And that is just a small sect of LED’s “goodness”. Here are some more:

LED Chip is Instant ON

LED lights switch ON and OFF instantly, it almost doesn't need more warm up time and less flicker. Therefore LED light is precise in how the user manipulate it and clean as the environment gets brighten with no hesitation. It’s not merely light turning on instantly, it is a characteristic that LED has to offer.

LED chips last much longer - Saving even more

Most of LED lamps on the market claimed its lifetime is longer than than 25,000 hours, which is over 22 years if used for 3 hours per day. Conventional bulbs last around 1,000-2,000 hours (1-2 years) and CFL around 6,000 -15,000 hours (6 to 13 years). In fact, that’s about the LED chips. As a LED lamps includes other two major parts, especially the adaptor (driver), this is the most critical part to decide how long the lifetime is. Thus, when a LED lamp die, perhaps the LED chip still can work well, it is just because the driver die. Normally, Driver’s lifetime is much shorter than a chips.

LED gets the green light - More light with much less energy

Over the lifetime of an LED product, less electricity and replacement products are used; normally we can find the descrition from the product package. Lumen and watt. Lumen basically decides how much light it can provide, but watts decides how much electricity to drive. As LED’s tech improve everyday, the efficiency had been improved from 50 lumen/watt to nearly 200 lumen/watt in just few years. Therefore, when one watt can only bring 50 lumens few years ago, it can provide more than 4 times of brightness. The traditional bulb, it can bring around 100 lumen/watt. All this adds up to lower CO2 emissions, a win-win for you and the environment. As LED lamps are very efficient, they are the perfect product to compliment renewable energy sources such as solar panels or wind power.

LED is Mercury free - Unlike CFL

A small amount of Mercury is used in CFL bulbs. Any reduction in the use of Mercury will benefit the environment.

LED is highly energy efficient – Less heat, more light, lower cost

Use less electricity for the same light output - 85% less electricity when compared to conventional lighting and around 18% less electricity compared to CFL. Worldwide, around 20% of electricity is consumed in lighting. LED can make a big impact on your energy use. Savings really ratchet up in areas such as security, where lights are left on for longer periods.

LED is fun

The range of LED products is increasing and products like LED strips that can change color and brightness make it easier to produce light effects almost anywhere.

Question 2

What is a Lumen?

Accepted Answer

How do you understand lumens in light bulbs and light fixtures?

The lumens definition is "a unit of luminous flux in the International System of Units that is equal to the amount of light given out through a solid angle by a source of one candela intensity radiating equally in all directions."

Lumens (denoted by lm) are a measure of the total amount of visible light (to the human eye) from a lamp or light source. In short, lumens means brightness, the higher the lumen rating the “brighter” the lamp will appear.
The lumens is one of method to find out how bright a lighted bulb or lighting fixture is. If you want a fixture with bright, it's the key to choosing the perfect piece for your lighting scheme.

What’s the Difference Between lumen and a Watt? And lighting efficiency comparison

There is often a confusion between Lumen and Watt. Watts measure energy output, not light output. Normally not rely upon wattage to indicate how bright a bulb is. Watt and lumen units represent different quantities, so you can't convert watts to lumens.

However, you can judge two number to define the luminance efficiency, such as higher lighting efficiency is better than low efficiency. For example the lighting efficiency on the 30w/2400lm is better than 42w/3000lm on the same item.

More light (Lumen), less energy (Watts) with LED

With low energy LED lamps, more light output can be achieved with much less power consumption. When using LED more energy is converted to light rather than heat. As technology improves, more lumens will be produced using even less Watts.

Question 3

Guide to Buying LED Lighting

Accepted Answer

LED is the abbreviation of light-emitting diode. It is a semiconductor device that emits light when electric current flows through it. When the electric particles meet with the semiconductor elements, light will be generated. It's a common and regular application into the various product, everywhere we can get it around no matter in the commercial /industrial / home improvement, to choose an ideal LED product you shall know more about what LED stand for?

Benefits/ Perks of LED

Efficiency: Compared to conventional incandescent lamps, LED lighting lasts longer, is more durable, and is over five times more efficient. LED bulbs typically use only 2 to 10 watts of electricity.
Brightness: LED lighting is measured in lumens, not watts.
Cost: LED lighting fixtures have a higher upfront cost, but will have a greater lifespan in the long run.
Design: The compact size of LEDs make them an ultra-flexible design element, which has allowed designers and manufactures to create shapes, silhouettes and technologies that simply weren’t possible before.
Cool, not hot: LEDs convert electricity to light and do not cause heat build-up.
Mercury free: No mercury is used in the manufacturing of LEDs.
Slow failure: LEDs slowly dim over time at the end of their lifespan, rather than burning out abruptly.
Dimming: In earlier years, LEDs did not “dim” in the way incandescent lights did, but they’ve come a long way. More and more fixtures now offer a “warm dim,” which not only lowers the light output, but also the color temperature.

Choose product is with qualified manufacturer source/ production date code / safety label.

To have clear info to help you with good purchase experience and maintain or solve if you have any problem during the use.

The product specification with clear basic info as below

Lumen
Watt
Volt
Use location
Color temperature
Efficiency
LED lifetime
Color rendering Index (CRI)

Complete package, user manual, safety installation

Durability: LED lights are quite sturdy, and this durability minimizes the risk of your light breaking and requiring repair or replacement.

Safety: LED lights are safe choices because they don't heat up like other light bulbs, which can reduce the risk of lightning-caused fires or burns.

Question 4

What are LED IP Ratings?

Accepted Answer

IP is an acronym "Ingress Protection". It is a measurement of the protection an item will have against solid objects (dust, sand, dirt, etc.) and liquids. Companies often send their products to laboratories for testing to find out the IP standard of its product stands.
Each IP rating has two numbers, both of which give you information about the protection level. A higher number means greater protection against solids and liquids. The first number (0-6) refers to the level of protection against solid objects and moving parts, such as dust, debris, or other solid matter.
The second number (0-8) refers to the level of liquid and moisture protection. It is more commonly known as one product’s ability to waterproof.

What IP product you want to buy or you shall buy?

Define the location of which product will be used.
Fully understand the IP number that refers to the product’s ability withstand solid.
Understand the IP standard the product has to offer.
Purchase the item and read the manual to see how to use the product properly.

Quick Tips:

Low IP ratings are appropriate for:
- Indoor use
- Protected use inside sealed products
- Inside sealed signage
- When using aluminum extrusions

High IP ratings are appropriate for:
- Unsealed outdoor locations
- Places that have a lot of debris
- Areas with heavy foot traffic
- High splash areas
- High contact areas (people touching them)
- Wet locations

What is the difference between IP65, IP67 & IP68?

The differences between commonly sold IP65, IP67, & IP68 are slight, but very important. The following is as a simple guide, we can see that all status are protected at the highest level from solids and dust. The variations come with the protection against liquids.

IP65 = Water resistant. “Protected against water jets from any angle”. Do not submerge IP65 LED lights, these are not waterproof.

IP67 = Water resistant. “Protected against the events of temporary submersion (10 minutes)”*Do NOT submerge IP67 LED lights for extended periods, these are not waterproof.

IP68 = Waterproof “Protected against the events of permanent submersion up to 3 meters”

Question 5

What is color temperature?

Accepted Answer

Color temperature (CCT) is a characteristic feature of light that refers to the color of light, symbol K (kelvins).

That is a way to describe the light appearance, it can lets us know what the look and feel of the light produced will be, on a scale from 1,000 to 10,000, 2000K to 6500K is usually for commercial and residential lighting applications.

With an increase in color temperature the red components of the light decrease, while the blue components increase; therefore, the higher the light’s color temperature, the “bluer” it is, and the lower the color temperature, the “yellower” its color will be.

At the lower end of the scale, from 2000K to 3000K, the light produced is called “warm white” and ranges from orange to yellow-white in appearance.

Color temperatures between 3100K and 4500K are referred to as “cool white” or “bright white.” Light bulbs within this range will emit a more neutral white light and may even have a slightly blue tint.

Above 4500K brings us into the “daylight” color temperature of light. Light bulbs with color temperatures of 4500K and above will give off a blue-white light that mimics daylight. Understanding Color temperature (CCT) makes it easier to choose lighting that gives you the look and feel you want.

Question 6

What is LED Efficacy?

Accepted Answer

One term that comes up a lot in regards to LED Lighting is Efficacy. LED Efficacy is lumens per watt (lm/w) which is calculated by Lumens divided by the power usage in Watts.

Lumens per Watt (lm/W) is a useful way to measure the efficacy of lighting products, this will tell you how well an LED Fixture or Lamp will produce visible light. This will also help you compare different LED products so you can compare apples to apples.

Efficacy must factor in before purchasing LED products. There are many different LED lamp on the market, all of them claim to be the best. However, when you compare LED efficacy, it will help to identify what lamp you should buy.

For example, one lamp is 13 watts delivering 1000 lumens, and another lamp is 9 watts delivering 1000 lumens. Both are the same lumen, 1000, but 9w that one is with higher efficacy. Because the first lamp (13W) is 77 lumens per watt. The second lamp (9W) is 111 lumens per watt. This means that the second lamp is delivering more lumens per watt, better than the first lamp.

As the same lumen condition, a higher efficacy equals more energy savings over the long term of a project by using less energy to deliver more lumens.

Efficiency: LED Lighting VS Incandescent Light

LEDs' efficiency is more than five times as great as its incandescent counterparts. They use only about 20 percent of electricity to deliver the same lumen for the light, so with much higher efficiency.

Question 7

What is Lux?

Accepted Answer

Lux is the unit of illuminance, to measure the luminous flux incident per unit area, easier say is the brightness on a surface. Lux is lumen per square meter (lumen/m2), so while 1 lumen per square meter equals 1 lux.

Lux of environment for the reference

Suggestion lux is 300~500 at the home.
A sunny day is 100,000lux
A cloudy day is 500~6,000lux
The reading area is 500~1000lux
Office/Classroom is 300~750lux
The living room is 200~3000lux

Different areas need different lux, depends on users’ requests, like doing the surgeries, doctors need higher lux, 2000~5000, or display the product at the main window in the market/department store, may need 1500~300lux.

When the surface is close to the light source the lux will be stronger, higher, the photo as below for reference. Therefore also need to consider the height when installation to avoid the illuminance is not enough or too brighten.

Question 8

How is LED life expectancy measured?

Accepted Answer

The lifespan of traditional incandescent bulbs is calculated quite simply. It’s referred to as Average Rated Life (ARL), which is the length of time it would take for 50% of the sampled bulbs to fail completely (an average of 1,000 hours for traditional bulbs).

The lifespan of the modern LED, on the other hand, is measured differently.

That’s because LED lights rarely fail completely as traditional bulbs do. Generally spe

So LED lifespan needs to be calculated in a less binary way, leading manufacturers to define it as the point at which luminosity has reached 70% of initial output. This measurement is usually expressed as B50-L70, which is shorthand for the time that 50% of LED bulbs in ideal conditions will have 70% of their rated output.

However, unlike traditional bulbs that end up at a single maximum figure of 1000 hours, the B50-L70 of LEDs ends up as anywhere between 10,000-50,000 hours.

Every LED will have an L70 rating, which is usually calculated in hours. For example, an LED bollard with L70 of 50,000 will - in 50% of all cases - have a rated lifespan of 50,000 hours, at which point they will emit 70% of their original output. If an LED has L50 of 50,000 hours, its output decays faster than one with L70 of 50,000 hours, and so on.

Knowledge