Does this product exist?

Walking around a department store looking at all the LED replacement bulbs for regular household lightbulbs I got to thinking: Any pro replacements that will slip right into existing fixtures?

I realize a 1kW PAR 64 is out of reach for now, but how about all those DMX-controlled fixtures with a "downlight-style" 150w12v or 250w24v reflector lamp? Those should be within reach soon, right?
 
Re: Does this product exist?

I do sales for a Electrical Distrubutor here in the USA, as far as available replacements from reputable manufactures (Philips, GE, Sylvania, etc.) the largest edison base PAR38 lamp available is 22/23 watts...which *supposedly* is equal to a 90PAR38 Halogen.
Regular edison base type *A* style lamps (60,75,100 etc) seemed to have hit a snag once they hit the 60w equivalent (12/13w LED)
The major mfg's have shown at trade shows their 100w LED Type A equal lamp....but they have yet to ship (over a year past due)
On-line you can find some people claiming to have 100w equals, but they are not made by a major MFG.
I have not yet seen anything equal to the PAR56/64 style lamps, at least not available from a major mfg.
But on-line, I am sure if you search hard enough you can find just about anything!
We get updates everyday from fixture manufactures of all new LED products that they are coming out with, the real good part of this is the more they come out with the lower the cost of LED is becoming.

I am sure if they do become available you will probably see them long before anyone here in the US will.
 
Re: Does this product exist?

Walking around a department store looking at all the LED replacement bulbs for regular household lightbulbs I got to thinking: Any pro replacements that will slip right into existing fixtures?

I realize a 1kW PAR 64 is out of reach for now, but how about all those DMX-controlled fixtures with a "downlight-style" 150w12v or 250w24v reflector lamp? Those should be within reach soon, right?
The issues are the LED packaging and the number of diodes to get sufficient output, and getting rid of the heat. Most conventional fixtures are fairly enclosed, as lamp heat isn't particularly detrimental to bulb life of a halogen bulb.

Philips has a BR30 60watt replacement claiming I think 800 lumens that I use in my house. It's a great bulb, but even at this low power, it has a special design of an exposed heatsink that sticks out from the fixture trim.

The other fixture I'm starting to use at home is a Commercial Electric retrofit bulb that replaces both the bulb and the 5" or 6" trim ring for recessed fixtures. So far I like them, but for whatever reason (presumably cooling) they chose to alter the fixture rather than just make a bulb.

One other question is - other than cost - what's the advantage of retrofitting an LED bulb in a conventional fixture? One of the reasons I really love my LED Pars is they are pancake shaped, and about 4 of them fit in the same area in a case as a Par64 can.
 
Re: Does this product exist?

I'm sure they're being made already but a lot of the Chinese companies have been manufacturing awful LED retrofits.

For a regular 60W replacement, check out Philips' solution. In my opinion, it's the best one on the market right now.
Philips Lighting - L Prize

disclaimer: I was employed by Philips Color Kinetics in a previous life.
 
From what I've heard from Philips reps, the lights in the hardware type stores are years behind the entertainment sector, like Vari-Lite. It sounds like cooling and lumens/watt at higher outputs are the big hurdles.
 
Re: Does this product exist?

The issues are the LED packaging and the number of diodes to get sufficient output, and getting rid of the heat . Most conventional fixtures are fairly enclosed, as lamp heat isn't particularly detrimental to bulb life of a halogen bulb.

Philips has a BR30 60watt replacement claiming I think 800 lumens that I use in my house. It's a great bulb, but even at this low power, it has a special design of an exposed heatsink that sticks out from the fixture trim.

The other fixture I'm starting to use at home is a Commercial Electric retrofit bulb that replaces both the bulb and the 5" or 6" trim ring for recessed fixtures. So far I like them, but for whatever reason (presumably cooling) they chose to alter the fixture rather than just make a bulb.

One other question is - other than cost - what's the advantage of retrofitting an LED bulb in a conventional fixture? One of the reasons I really love my LED Pars is they are pancake shaped, and about 4 of them fit in the same area in a case as a Par64 can.

Yep. The biggest issue is thermal management, getting the heat away from the LEDs. LEDs get less efficient as they heat up so the better your thermal management is, the more efficient and brighter you can make your fixture. Things like fixture size and the size of the LED optics also come into play but are of lower concern. (if you didn't care about lifetime or cost, you could build a retrofit for 500W or 1K PARs, but it's cot currently practical)

The other big issue is one of use. If you are looking for saturated colors, you can equal a 1KW PAR with a ~50W LED fixture (have been able to for some time) , but that's not the case with white light and tints. Those colors require significantly more output, and it's quite wasteful to build a retrofit for white light and then drop a Congo Blue gel in front. And if you want to eliminate your dimmer rack, you need some way of getting reliable data into the fixtures. Most conventional PAR fixtures aren't set up for data input, and the metal can tends to make wireless a less attractive option (the Hue lamps that Bennett linked to use Zigbee, which is reasonably reliable but too slow for the entertainment industry).

From what I've heard from Philips reps, the lights in the hardware type stores are years behind the entertainment sector, like Vari-Lite.

Caleb - I'd be interested to know who you heard this from (PM me if you'd rather not post publicly). While it may be true in some isolated cases, it's simply not true as a blanket statement. Because in general, a specific power LED will be available for around 5 years (this does vary), manufacturers typically design around the latest and greatest to maximize the time they have between product generations. So a brand new hardware store lamp design is probably using newer LED technology than a 4 year entertainment fixture. Plus, newer LED packages tend to by higher efficiency, higher output, lower cost/lumen, better binning, and can withstand higher operating temperatures. All those parameters are useful when designing products for sale, as a generation newer LED can mean that you have a superior product to your competitor. This is one of the reasons that most of the big LED lighting companies stick with the industry leaders in LEDs instead of using the less expensive products from Korea and China - the cheap LEDs are typically a generation or more behind.


Note: I work for Color Kinetics, a division of Philips.
 
Re: Does this product exist?

Caleb - I'd be interested to know who you heard this from (PM me if you'd rather not post publicly). While it may be true in some isolated cases, it's simply not true as a blanket statement. Because in general, a specific power LED will be available for around 5 years (this does vary), manufacturers typically design around the latest and greatest to maximize the time they have between product generations. So a brand new hardware store lamp design is probably using newer LED technology than a 4 year entertainment fixture. Plus, newer LED packages tend to by higher efficiency, higher output, lower cost/lumen, better binning, and can withstand higher operating temperatures. All those parameters are useful when designing products for sale, as a generation newer LED can mean that you have a superior product to your competitor. This is one of the reasons that most of the big LED lighting companies stick with the industry leaders in LEDs instead of using the less expensive products from Korea and China - the cheap LEDs are typically a generation or more behind.


Note: I work for Color Kinetics, a division of Philips.
Additionally, there's a lot more money in the volume of consumer products than in the several orders of magnitude fewer entertainment fixtures, so successful product differentiation due to better technology or specs can be a significant market opportunity.

There are still quite a number of holes in the market - the L-prize bulb, while technically advanced, is butt-ugly, and still not rated for use in enclosed fixtures. Because of this, I can't use them in fixtures that are exposed (too ugly), and I also can't use them in fixtures where they're unseen, since the bulb can't handle the heat of the enclosed globe of my light. That leaves me with I think one desk lamp with a suitable shade where I could use this bulb. I have gone to this one: Philips - AmbientLED Energy saving household light 7W A19 Soft White - 046677409913 - Standard - Energy-saving light bulbs - Lighting which looks a lot better than the L-prize bulb, but still has the same "not for use in enclosed fixtures" limitation. It's also cheaper than the L-prize bulb. When an "enclosable" LED bulb exists, I'll buy a couple dozen.

I'm also waiting for the mini socket version of some kind of 60watt replacement fan bulb - they make 3w LEDs, but they're not even close to bright enough.

Someone solving these problems will sell a lot of bulbs, and it won't be with old tech.

-------------------------

I've spent a year of my life at the day job evaluating and replacing about 800 bulbs, Par30s and MR16s, with LEDs. We went with Philips gear (Rob you can pay me later), and in the time of the project (slightly over a year from about April 2011 - August 2012) there have been 3 generations of Philips bulbs we looked at. Dizzying is an understatement. That being said, in the downtown hi-rise I work in, electricity runs about $.40/kw ($.10 for the electricity plus $.30 for the cooling to remove the heat), and our project payback is less than 12 months. We've had the bulbs in for 9 months or so and out of 800 fixtures, have had zero failures. Energy savings aside, the bulbs will pay for themselves just in labor saved from bulb changes.
 
Energy savings aside, the bulbs will pay for themselves just in labor saved from bulb changes.

This is what we have seen as well for church installs, more specifically lamp/fixture hard costs.

Looks like the consumer vs pro comment wasn't expounded upon originally (meeting months ago) and misunderstood on my part, sorry for the confusion. I can say that as a company, we have been very happy with the various Philips branded LED fixtures we have used.