LED illuminated home

[Tipsy]

I believe I can make substantial savings on my electric bills if I converted my home lighting to use LEDs. If so, could someone please give me a summary of the sort of kit/components I should be looking for as it all seems too confusing to me (unless I were to buy the inhibitively expensive off-the-shelf-kits from the common DIY shops but that would defeat the object of saving money!) .

Ideally, I could maybe have the option to choose mood effects - flashing patterns and colour-changing etc maybe even use voice-commands! To say "Red Alert" and they all change to Red would be pretty cool for instance. But at a minimum, some need to be very bright - for bathroom, kitchen and work-area while also being dimmable.

Although they'll have to be powered from the mains AC supply, I'd like the option to switch to vehicle battery's in case of power outage.

Is it possible for a novice like me to make my own kits from cheap components or am I pipe-dreaming again?

Suggestions most gratefully recieved.

 

[audioguru]

Cheap LEDs are nearly useless to light anything. They are simple indicators. Bright ones simply are focussed into a very narrow beam that is also useless to light anything.
Expensive high power LEDs can light a room but compact fluorescent light bulbs use 25% if the current used by a same-brightness incandescent light bulb, they last for years and are very inexpensive.

If you make a mains-powered light and it causes your home to burn down then insurance will not pay if they find it was not certified.
If you electrocute yourself or somebody else with your home-made lights then again the insurance might not pay.

 

[Hero999]

I think CFLs still represent better value for money at the moment.

LEDs are better for spotlights and coloured lamps.

 

[tcmtech]

I converted my house over to higher quality CFL's a number of years ago a and I probably save around $5 a month off of my near $100 a month electric bill.
For me lighting is not the majority power user.
To save money on the electric bill doing an honest home energy audit to see what you have that uses the bulk of the power is the first and best step. After that is changing how the biggest power consuming devices are used and possibly replacing them if more efficient one can justify it.

If lighting represents more than 25% of your electric bill then possibly changing to CFL's or application specific LED lights may well be worth it.

 

[Tipsy]

Wow, I didn't realise. Are CFL's what we call low-energy bulbs?. I use them where possible and incidentally, when we had a 7-hour brown-out last year, some of them continued working when the rest of the block was in darkness

Ok, pipe dream dissolved, I'll stick to my low-energy bulbs for now as I like the way they take time to warm up - allows my sensitive eyes to adjust when nature calls in the middle of the night.

But I would still like some mood lighting and effects if possible. Perhaps a future project.

Talking of saving electric, I recently got a monitoring unit that tells me that my PC is quite a power hog and that a (admittedly lesser-powered) laptop uses about almost two-thirds less electric so I'm currently looking for a cheap high-spec laptop or two as I'm online almost all my waking hours give and take.

Thanks for the informative inputs, most appreciated.

 

[audioguru]

Everybody else calls a compact fluorescent light bulb a compact fluorescent light bulb. Why does it have a different name in the UK?
A truck is a truck, not a lorry.
The trunk of a car is the trunk, not the boot.
The hood of the car is the hood, not a bonnet.
Engrish is weird.

I have two compact fluorescent light bulbs outside. When the temperature is below freezing they are extremely dim for a minute when they are turned on.

 

[superfrog]

I believe England has precedence over English I would even say that the whole of UK has precedence over english.

As hear by one of my native english colleague during a business trip in the states : "Where did you learn, your english is really good"

 

[Tipsy]

We do have what we call Flourescent Tubes in the UK and have done for decades, but I (probably wrongly) assumed the "compact" distinction was to do with the new low-energy type of lamps?

Off-topic; so please don't get me started on how the US has bastardised the English language - why do you call a liquid (petroleum) a gas(oline)? You can't spell Colour nor pronounce A Hundred or Aluminium for instance. George DubYa Bush is a great example of made up language in the US

 

[tcmtech]

Everybody else calls a compact fluorescent light bulb a compact fluorescent light bulb. Why does it have a different name in the UK?
A truck is a truck, not a lorry.
The trunk of a car is the trunk, not the boot.
The hood of the car is the hood, not a bonnet.
Engrish is weird.

How many times have you seen someone from the UK region on a television interview of some sort and they have to run the sub tittle translator text at the bottom of the screen so the rest of the English speaking world can have some idea what they are saying?

And how many times during the interview will do you see that person say something and the subtitles never bother to try and translate anything they said?

When they have to translate "English" to English so the rest of the English speaking world can understand it that sort of explains a lot to me!

 

[audioguru]

but I (probably wrongly) assumed the "compact" distinction was to do with the new low-energy type of lamps?

They are at least 12 years old and are new in 3rd world countries. Is the UK in the 3rd world?

You can't spell Colour or Aluminium

In Canada we spell Colour as colour.
Aluminum is spelled aluminum, not aluminium. You guys add another "i".
MATE.
I am a guy so my mate is my female wife, not another guy.

Sub-titles on TV to translate the Engrish from the UK to English that everybody else knows?
Yes, except the Formula One car race has announcers from the UK and we hardly know what they are saying because there are no sub-titles.
But then the American stock car races on TV use hill-billies as announcers and it is impossible to understand their slang.

Engrish is weird.

 

[superfrog]

You might be biased by the fact you get north american tv. It takes me about 30 minutes adaptation before being able to understand a Texan, and it tends to be because he makes an effort to speak to mes a to a 4 year old.

For the country with the highest nuclear weapons stockpile, not being able to pronounce the word is a bit embarassing.
Aluminium ... aluminum is just wrong.
Water, still has a t in written form, but for how long?

While I would agree that english is a weird language in general with inconsistent grammatical and pronunciation rules, defending the American dialect is an impossible stance IMHO.

I would not trust people that waste perfectly adequate tea in seawater with a language anyway

 

[Roff]

While I would agree that english is a weird language in general with inconsistent grammatical and pronunciation rules, defending the American dialect is an impossible stance IMHO.

I would not trust people that waste perfectly adequate tea in seawater with a language anyway

Yeah, well, at least we don't add 'r' to words that end in 'a', and drop them from those that do. Except in and around Boston.
My friend Petah has some weird idears.

 

[tcmtech]

It takes me about 30 minutes adaptation before being able to understand a Texan, and it tends to be because he makes an effort to speak to mes a to a 4 year old.

The rest of America doesn't understand half of what they say either.
I have seen interviews that where in that part of the country that justified the sub title translator being used as well. As I recall the hurricane Katrina media coverage had some of the translators scratching their heads about what many of the people from the south where saying in general as well.

Then Canada also has its home brew French Canadian English that leaves us just as confused too!

 

[audioguru]

I pronounce water as "water".
Brits pronounce water as "woetah". Where did the "o" come from? Were did the "r" go?

Most French Canadians speak no English. Their French is completely different from real French.

 

[Hero999]

Yeah, well, at least we don't add 'r' to words that end in 'a', and drop them from those that do. Except in and around Boston.
My friend Petah has some weird idears.

That depends on where you live.

In the north of the UK they don't do that so much, someone from Nigel lives would pronounce the 'a' in glass, like you do. Being from the south I say it as an 'r' sound.

I remember my familly buying a CFL about 20 years ago. It had a magnetic ballast, was much larger than its modern counterparts and would take ages to warm up. It was also very expensive. Now CFLs are cheap in the UK, they have electronic ballasts which are much smaller and warm up more quickly.

 

[superfrog]

Nah, Quebec variation of French is very is not hard to understand because of the accent, but because both languages use very different vocabulary. as a french native speaker, I personally love it.
I'd love ot work there for a while .

Just to be a tiny bit on topic, fluorescent tubes can be a bit more efficient that cfl.

 

[audioguru]

Compact fluorescent light bulbs get hot. For the same amount of light as an incandescent room heater light bulb they use 25% as much power.
I like Sylvania (Osram) 3000k temperature colour which is pure white. Guess where they are made.

 

[transistor495]

Guess where they are made.

Yes, they're made in India..though price is bit high

 

[danrogers]

we do call them compact flouros here in the uk. lol @ the us trying to defend their mutations of the english language

 

[QuietMan]

I hare ya'll bin disrespektin my state. Now be cool, ya'hair?