Dimmable LED lights - any available yet?

[Gary_W]

Hi all,

Having just spent lots of cash on lights that take 240v hallogen bulbs and a Rako system to control them, Tony Blair announces that high energy bulbs are being banned...

Are those of us that want to dim our lights going to find a suitable replacement bulb that does what we want? Is this available / will it be available?

Gary

[Steve1951]

Are you talking GU10s?

You can get low energy GU10s around £6 each!!!!!!

However to the best of my knowledge they cannot be dimmed.

Steve

[Gary_W]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the reply.

I'm talking about a dimmable alternative to hallogens. I know about the LED version of the GU10, but as you say they can't be dimmed.

The lights we just bought work on 240v G9's, and we have a few other G10 12v halogens that dim.

The G9's will be controlled via Rako, so just wondering what the future holds for those of us that have jumped on the 'scene selection' bandwagon...

[Bruce_]

Because there are so many people with low voltage light fittings, dimming systems, etc installed. It's not going to be easy or quick to simply ban using it. There would be a lot of people rather unhappy if they suddenly had to replace it all with non-dim fluorescents, which is what's being suggested.

I don't think you should be worrying anytime soon.

Over the next year or 2, you're very likely to start seeing "GLS replacements" which are dimmable. So I would suggest waiting for a little while.

One problem with "low energy" is that a triac dimmer has a minimum working current. Usually it's around 5-10W. Many LEDs are less than this, and the result is the light being on at 100% constantly. So don't be too quick to replace a 60W GLS with a 5W LED

[Steve1951]

Bruce and gary
Are we at cross purposes??
I thought Gu10s are either Straight 240v Halogen

LED

Or..

Low Energy.I didnt think that LED and low energy were the same thing but that is what you seem to be saying?

Please advise...always willing to learn.

Sorry dont even know what Rako is.

I am an electrician and try to keep up with the lighting trends but failing by the looks of things.

Regards

Steve

[Gary_W]

Bruce - Thanks for the reply; I really hope you are right.

On further frantic googling, I'm left with the impression that halogens are not going to be banned at this stage, though as usual no-one seems sure. If anyone has got a definate answer on this one then that would be good. It made interesting reading for me anyway, as it turns out that traditional incandescent bulbs are 5% efficient (which I knew) and halogens are 9% efficient. Compact flourescents are 20%...

Steve - there are indeed 3 kinds of GU10. The term 'low energy' seems to have some degree of flexibility to describe the other two technologies, those being compact flourescent and LED. Both of these two use far less energy than the halogen. As I understand it, LED uses the least of all.

The problem at the moment is that flourescent is difficult to dim and (unless someone knows better) there isn't a way of dimming the LED fittings.

RAKO is one of the many kinds of lighting controller on the market. In my room, there will be 4 lighting circuits. You put a Rako radio controlled dimmer in ceiling next to the lamps, inline ones with the table lamps, box mounted ones etc. So it is really easy to retrofit (in theory, haven't done it yet )

What then happens is you can set up lighting 'scenes' such that, at the touch of the button, the table lamp goes up to 70%, the ceiling lights turn on etc. This should all work with my Harmony 895 remote (with the RAVIR interface) so I should be able to hit 'watch DVD' and it will sort out the lights as well as turning on all the relevant devices and starting the film

[Steve1951]

Thanks Gary thats what I thought about the GU10s.

I think I will leave the lighting controls to you!!!!!


Steve