Problems with Dr. LED Lights

[kirkalittle]

10 Years later, the masthead tri color and anchor light drop-in LED replacement bulb still working fine.

[Norsely]

Originally Posted by transmitterdan

I can make a "guess" what is going on. LED lights are often driven with very high current pulses for short times. The average current is low but the peak current is high. The long cable up the mast may not be able to keep the voltage high enough during the peak load and the "smart" drive circuitry shuts down due to low voltage. It would take specialized equipment to test for this theory.
There might be no good solution if the theory is right. A large capacitor at the spreaders might help but would not be easy to install. Another thing that might help is larger wires that are twisted together all the way from the breaker to the fixture. But again, this is very hard to do.
Did you measure the voltage at the fixture when the lights are switched on?
Let us know what Dr.LED say about it.

I should have updated his thread a while ago, please forgive me, but the problem turned out to be MUCH MORE INFURIATING that any genuine technical issue. It finally surfaced that the lights had been mis-packaged as 24V lights (my boat's a 24V boat, obviously), but the lights I was hooking up were actually 12V. So of course they'd be dead by the time I got from the spreaders to the deck. Stupidest thing I've ever run across in the boating world, except for this one mechanic named Carl in Marina del Rey, who remains the dumbest dinosaur I've ever met. Long story.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[Nicholson58]

Originally Posted by YOLO321

These posts about Dr. LED from 2010 do not promising. Now its 9 years later and I see they are still in business. I am considering purchasing some bulbs from them. Can anyone give me current insight/opinions on Dr. LED and their bulbs????

I was never a fan of DR LED. At the time I thought their stuff was not so good based on study of various types of current management.

I like Marine Beam fixtures and replacement bulbs as well as IMTRA.

For a sailboat, LEDs should be PWM regulated at high enough frequency that they do not interfere with your radio. PWM bulbs will always have voltage ranges listed sort of like 9 to 40 VDC or some other range covering 11 to 28 typical on 12 and 24 volt boats. At the time of these posts not all suppliers were marketing good PWM bulbs. There are more now and the price is lower. Buy in bulk at the boat show">Annapolis boat show if you can or some other boat show.

[sailah]

I replaced every bulb in my boat with cheapo no name LEDs 5 years ago. Zero failures. I pull the mast every fall for transport so I check them in the spring and they always work.

I just found out what type of bulbs they were and bought a bunch on Amazon/eBay. I did mast head, steaming, anchor, deck flood, cabin reading lamps, cabin over heads etc.

The best LED for a boat though has to be LED strip lights. I bought a 5m roll from Amazon in WARM WHITE. Has self adhesive tape (which stinks honestly). I put a 1m section under the deck at my nav station and another under the deck in galley. The warm white is key as the color is very nice on the wood vs the harsh white.

Lights up the entire boat way better than those brass round overhead things. It's pretty much the only lights I use on boat now. You can cut it along the LED at various points and then solder on new leads to fit almost anywhere. A 1m section draws less than an amp as I recall. A regular incandescent overhead was about the same and light output is far better.

https://www.amazon.com/ALITOVE-Flexi...gateway&sr=8-3

At the nav I have a vinyl headliner and the adhesive didn't work very well so I used silicone clips to hold it up. Galley still holding fine.

Highest recommendation

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by sailah

The best LED for a boat though has to be LED strip lights. I bought a 5m roll from Amazon in WARM WHITE. Has self adhesive tape (which stinks honestly). I put a 1m section under the deck at my nav station and another under the deck in galley. The warm white is key as the color is very nice on the wood vs the harsh white.

Lights up the entire boat way better than those brass round overhead things. It's pretty much the only lights I use on boat now. You can cut it along the LED at various points and then solder on new leads to fit almost anywhere. A 1m section draws less than an amp as I recall. A regular incandescent overhead was about the same and light output is far better.

Another vote for LED striplighting. To put it up, I first painted a stripe of contact cement on the boat, let that dry, then stuck the strip up. That's stayed put so far.

I'm in freshwater. I don't know how the cheap LED strips would stand up to constant salt air exposure. Might be good to spray or paint the strip with a good clear lacquer.

[sdowney717]

Strips are good.
I changed my old wood trimmed brass trimmed lights to LED using G4 adapters and round LED bulbs.
While that was ok, I wanted brighter, so I bought ceramic G4 sockets and added a socket inside each reflector, so every light fixture now has 2 G4 led bulbs, And that was plenty bright. Drilled an angled hole, and a little epoxy to hold them in.

The G4 sockets
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3280...249d4c4dXAxlja

The G4 adapters
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1526...27424c4d627XQc

The G4 LED bulbs I bought from Amazon and Aliexpress. Both have same output, I prefered the Amazon as the bulbs were a little smaller.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3262...27424c4d2d8uc5
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I actually put 3 bulbs in one fixture, and it is real bright. Just to see how it looked.

[sailah]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

Another vote for LED striplighting. To put it up, I first painted a stripe of contact cement on the boat, let that dry, then stuck the strip up. That's stayed put so far.

I'm in freshwater. I don't know how the cheap LED strips would stand up to constant salt air exposure. Might be good to spray or paint the strip with a good clear lacquer.

I use the "waterproof" SMD5050 LEDs. The 5050 is the size and I think it works well on boat for lux. The waterproof is a silicone half round coating so I have noticed no issues being in salt water. They make an uncoated version for a house or something inside and I agree that's probably not the best for a boat.

The coated version feels fairly rugged and fully encapsulates all the LEDs.

[sdowney717]

Originally Posted by sailah

I use the "waterproof" SMD5050 LEDs. The 5050 is the size and I think it works well on boat for lux. The waterproof is a silicone half round coating so I have noticed no issues being in salt water. They make an uncoated version for a house or something inside and I agree that's probably not the best for a boat.

The coated version feels fairly rugged and fully encapsulates all the LEDs.

Same thing, bulbs I bought are sealed in clear rubber that keeps them protected.
I upgraded existing fixtures to preserve the interior look.

these bulbs are also dimmable, by using a dimmer control made for dimming led. I bought a remote control dimmer from Aliexpress seller and tested it but never installed.

I had planned to , but the idiot OEM shared the ground return wire with a fan and nav lights buried inside the ceiling in the head and the dimmer needs a single negative line to the led's.
Maybe someday I will fix their wiring.

[Pegu Club]

We bought a dozen bulbs from them three years back (2016) and they are still running fine. Hope that helps,

Fair winds,