Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

[redwire]

My garage ceiling fluorescent light fixtures are oddball F40T12 METRIC 1160mm/3.8ft tubes on a 120VAC magnetic ballast, 2-lamp.
I can find F34T12 tubes but $12 each, a ballast costs $25 so that could be almost $50 if everything needs replacing. The fixtures seem not worth repairing.

Converting to LED would be best, but getting long 4' LED tubes out of china is expensive; minimum 25-lot case of lamps on Aliexpress looks like an expensive venture and chinese LED quality is all over the place.

Anyone know of some alternatives? I have around 6 fixtures to fix up.

[goontron]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

https://www.1000bulbs.com/category/t8-led-tube-lights/

Just had the over-the-range lamp die on me. F20T12. Bulb and ballast. I ordered a new Floro bulb and trigger-start ballast just because im a stubborn old Ham, but i found that they do have some single LED tubes for sale on this site.

[stj]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

before you buy any led replacements, compare the Lumen's
nothing beats a real T12 tube still.
even the "slim" tubes they push as energy saving replacements.
for example the 36w 4ft to replace a 40w 4ft are all over-driven to get the brightness and only last a few years.
fucking rubish pretending to be enviromental upgrades!!

[eccerr0r]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

I'm just sticking with regular fluorescent tubes, but my F40T12s are regular 4ft length so the cheap tubes fit just fine. If you have a weird length fixture you might as well throw it out and buy a new fixture with LEDs if that's the way you want to go. I'm surprised there is a 1160mm tube, regular 4 ft tubes are apparently nominally 1200mm (4*25.4*12=1219mm) so 1160mm is a huge distance off... interesting.

I haven't had those linear fluorescent ballasts die on me... seems fairly robust.

[petehall347]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

T5 can be 1160mm
https://www.ledsales.co.za/products/...er-(1160mm)-HO

[eccerr0r]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

Incidentally I think that most of the LED direct fluorescent replacements are slightly dimmer than the equivalent linear fluorescent. However linear fluorescents like compact fluorescents have warm up time as well, though it seems much better than the swirls.

[stj]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

"slightly dimmer" ??
most are 50% dimmer.

they probably think they can get away with it because the led's are directional and a real tube puts half the output upwards.
that is of course bullshit because the fittings are designed to take that into account and reflect it back.

[eccerr0r]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

I don't know about half, but they do advertise less power draw as well. This is completely different than incandescent where they target parity light generation -- but fluorescent tubes are NOT power wasters and generate just about as much light per watt, and in order to make a power consumption stand from the LED side, they deliberately reduce power -- and unfortunately they reduce brightness...

Ridiculous, isn't it? Now go back to cheap fluorescent tubes that last "long enough," if you don't mind the warmup time.

[petehall347]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

cant beat incandescent lights . i do however like T5 led.s . or tube lights . once was told tube lights take 2 hours running time to switch on so leave them on more than incandescent .

[petehall347]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

best running tube lights on dc they last longer . or just use old ones on dc to give them a new lease of life .. be careful with dc ...

[redwire]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

I found fluorescent lamps do not last long in on/off use, despite their 15,000 hr rating. It must be cathode-stripping or something that makes the mercury condense on the tube's inside glass.

Philips has a T8 LED tube lineup but it's terribly complicated, as with all their LED lighting products and the website is beyond confusing.
They only work with ballasts according to a chart, and about $17 each at the local hardware store. Some you can direct wire.

LED's use about 1/2 the electricity for the same light output, but LED tubes are all less light output, and shining up to reflect off the white paint reflector seems silly.

I need to change from T12 to T8 sockets, buy tubes and possibly ballasts. Pretty much an entire fixture.
Bet it's cheaper to put in a bunch of E27 lightbulbs as a fixture.

[stj]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

pretty sure T8 & T12 have the same pin spacing, and most sockets have universal slots anyway.

[RukyCon]

Re: Fluorescent light to LED conversion?

If the ballast really is magnetic, then you should swap it out before trying anything like LED tubes on the fixture as the ballast may not be able to run them and even if it did, it might burn out the ballast which (depending on how old the ballast is) may not be very fun (as some (mainly older ballasts) are capable of going out violently).