Re-wire a house to use 24v LEDs ?

24vdc LED strip lights are pretty great and easy although not particularly cheap. I like the COB(chip on board) type since they have a more even light spread and are less ugly to look at if you can actually see the strips, usually I try to hide the strips and bounce the light off something like a wall or ceiling.

As for dimmers to control the lights. I am currently using a variety of cheap PWM dimmers similar to the one you mention but mine don't have RF control. I can say that I have burnt several out by trusting the official specs and have done some disecting of the control boards so I would recommend no more than half the claimed amp capability. Most seam to operate with a very simple 555 timer ic and a mosfet. With what I have learned from looking at the designs and wanting something that can handle up to 10 amps for real for some of my lighting runs I am working on designing a simple esp8266 D1 mini hat pcb board to PWM dim an LED 12-24vdc. So then it can be controlled in many ways with local switches/dimmer knobs attached to the esp8266 or via wifi or bluetooth for my smarthome dreams. Right now this project is waiting on a few parts to arrive to test out the component configuration before I finalize version one of my PCB.
 
Would be nice to find 12V and 24V light bulbs. Then such a project would make perfect sense.

An adapted UPS to charge a battery bank and from there DC connection.
 
I replaced all my 'standard' light sockets with LEDS - e.g. 60w -> 14w kind of thing. As an example, our Kitchen has 11 flood lights in the ceiling and is on a lot - so that's 11 * 46w = 506w/hour. 506w * 6hrs = 3kwh/day of savings. Yes, we could also turn them off more - but you know, saving that for the 'emergency' :)
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Unfortunately - almost every LED 'bulb' has burned out faster than traditional bulbs and has cost A LOT of money for supposedly long lasting LEDs, but there's no denying the power savings.

For my 48" fluorescents under the house - I've been replacing them with 48" 120v LED tubes as the traditional tubes/ballasts stop working. So far, these seem to last longer.
 
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OffGridInTheCity said:
Unfortunately - almost every LED 'bulb' has burned out faster than traditional bulbs and has cost A LOT of money for supposedly long lasting LEDs, but there's no denying the power savings.
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If you got a cheap brand that can sometimes be the problem but with your use case being recessed lights it is most likely not letting the LEDs and more importantly the LED driver circuits cool enough and so the high heat of being on all the time shortens their life dramatically. Most LED bulbs bought on the shelf say on the packaging that they are not designed to operate in enclosed spaces like recessed lighting. Even though they are producing much less heat because of how efficient the LEDs are they do produce some heat and LED diodes and the driver circuitry do not like heat. If they were not on so much you could probably get away with it since they would have an opportunity to cool but it sounds like you have them on a lot.

A couple options I can think of is to search for bulbs that are designed and tested for recessed lighting use cases. Or maybe just putting everything on a dimmer with a timer or something so that they are turned way down most of the time and therefor have less heat generation. Alternatively and probably your best option would be to retrofit with the purpose built shallow canless LED lights. They then have all that surface area to cool and sometimes have the most sensitive driver circuits in a separate component that lives in your ceiling. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Commerc...sed-Integrated-LED-Kit-4-Pack-91478/310114064
 
cak said:
If you got a cheap brand that can sometimes be the problem but with your use case being recessed lights it is most likely not letting the LEDs and more importantly the LED driver circuits cool enough and so the high heat of being on all the time shortens their life dramatically. Most LED bulbs bought on the shelf say on the packaging that they are not designed to operate in enclosed spaces like recessed lighting. Even though they are producing much less heat because of how efficient the LEDs are they do produce some heat and LED diodes and the driver circuitry do not like heat. If they were not on so much you could probably get away with it since they would have an opportunity to cool but it sounds like you have them on a lot.
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Agreed - but of course they don't say this. This includes the 100w and 60w replacements of all kinds - I've tried at least 6 different kinds and they all just burn out as mine are in enclosed glass / bedroom type things.

cak said:
A couple options I can think of is to search for bulbs that are designed and tested for recessed lighting use cases. Or maybe just putting everything on a dimmer with a timer or something so that they are turned way down most of the time and therefor have less heat generation. Alternatively and probably your best option would be to retrofit with the purpose built shallow canless LED lights. They then have all that surface area to cool and sometimes have the most sensitive driver circuits in a separate component that lives in your ceiling. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Commerc...sed-Integrated-LED-Kit-4-Pack-91478/310114064
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Good thought but these are regular screw in flood light sockets... and I don't plan to change that.

I do like LEDs.... in spite of things. Just with the 'lifetime promises' were backed with a bit more heat tolerance for normal fixtures.
 
cak said:
recessed lights it is most likely not letting the LEDs and more importantly the LED driver circuits cool enough and so the high heat of being on all the time shortens their life dramatically.
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100%. Adding a "light blub extension" helps to move the electronics away from the pocket of hot air, but then the bulb sticks out and some people don't like that... makes the room a lot brighter though, allowing to switch to a lower wattage LED that produces less heat in the first place.

The best solution for me was to replace the whole thing with LED lights like these:
www.aliexpress.com

1.27US $ 39% OFF|Karwen Led Downlight White Ceiling 5w 7w 9w 12w 15w Ac 220v 230v 240v Led Downlight Cold Warm White Led Light For Bedroom - Led Downlights - AliExpress

Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com
www.aliexpress.com www.aliexpress.com
Looks so much neater, and dimmable versions are also available. Best of all, only 1 of 50 units has failed after several years of use.
 
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