Everywhere there is a replacement of conventional lamps with LEDs. Today it is the best way of lighting for cars and houses, more durable and easier to replace. So, what is the principle of the LED and how to choose the right one?
LED and how it works
An LED is a special electrical device that converts current into some kind of glow. Today, LEDs are better known as LED, which means "light emitting diode".
The device is a semiconductor and consists of a crystal-chip, housing, contact leads and an optical device. The light comes from the crystal, and its color may vary depending on the material used. The brightness of the LED, as well as its color, can also be different. So, for example, for a greater light effect, several crystals are often inserted into one lamp, producing a single-color light, which together forms a bright glow.
The brightness of the device directly depends on the strength of the electric current supplied to it. In turn, too powerful a flow of electricity causes a rapid overheating of the internalcrystal and disables it. In view of this, the design of the LED is somewhat costly in terms of the cost of materials, which somewhat negatively affects the choice of such lamps.
By brightness, LEDs are usually divided into categories:
- ultra-bright, their minimum power is 1 W;
- high brightness LEDs - reach 20 mW;
- standard bulbs.
Today, a block of LEDs is widely used, which is built into the lamp. Thanks to him, it is possible to adjust the brightness and select the optimal glow mode.
The advantage of LEDs over other types of lighting
LED is today's best choice of lighting type and has a number of advantages:
- Durability.
- Ability to adjust the color and brightness of the lamp.
- Color saturation, the ability to choose a red, blue, green LED or make the color change.
- Electronic control capability.
- Environmentally friendly materials that do not contain heavy substances that are harmful to the environment and dangerous if not properly disposed of.
- Low power consumption, several times more light is produced per watt.
- The light is pure and as close to natural as possible.
- They don't overheat thanks to a competent light guide.
- Reliability and durability.
Why have LEDs become popular in the automotive industry? This type of lighting is ideal for cars, gradually replacing halogen and xenon lamps. Hispositives:
- possibility to direct the lighting behind the steering wheel - the creation of adaptive headlights;
- aesthetically looks better than other types of headlights;
- improved safety through better visibility on the road;
- vibration resistance;
- often LEDs are installed in a housing where moisture does not penetrate;
- reaching the working state is faster, for this reason the brake lights work better.
Of course, these advantages are inherent only to really high-quality products, so it is not worth saving on them, especially since their service life is significantly increased compared to Chinese products. Additionally, the period of operation of LED lamps, when compared with conventional ones, is also much longer.
Classification of LEDs
There are 2 main types of LEDs - for illumination (indicator) and for illumination. Their strength and durability depend on the supply of electric current, in view of this, the second type of LEDs lasts a shorter period, since the crystal wears out faster. However, these lighting devices are very durable and last for several thousand hours.
Lighting LED is a device that provides reliable and powerful light. It is widely used in design, creating the right level of illumination.
According to the type of housing, it is customary to distinguish the LED in the form of "Star", "Piranha" and SMD. Among them, the most popular are "Piranhas", as their luminous flux seems to be of better quality. Their constructivea feature is the shape of a rectangle with leads along the edges, with the help of which a rigid grip is ensured with the surface. In addition, the substrate of the device has excellent heat dissipation. These devices are widely used in automobiles and advertising. They are varied in size and colors: red, white, green, blue LED.
Indicator LEDs have a simpler design, their light is not as strong and is used to illuminate displays and dashboards. Round, oval and rectangular indicator LEDs are distinguished by shape.
Lenses are also different, they can be built into both lighting and indicator lamps. Some are designed to scatter light (the vast majority of these devices), others are designed to focus, thanks to a directed beam of light produced. Moreover, in the second group, lenses are flat, cone-shaped and round.
According to the color of the lens, LEDs are:
- colorless transparent;
- painted transparent;
- painted matte.
In addition, the color scheme of the device is now very diverse. There is a yellow, red, blue, green LED, etc. These colors are skillfully combined to create an even wider spectrum. The most difficult, oddly enough, to get a pure white color.
White LED is obtained in three ways:
- simultaneous use of red, blue and green in the correct proportions gives the impression of white;
- using a blue diode mixed with yellow;
- third methodrequires the use of fluorescent materials, which converts ultraviolet light, acting like a fluorescent lamp.
White LED is the most common, though somewhat difficult to obtain. It is cold and warm. On a light bulb, this parameter is usually indicated in kelvins, the lower the indicator, the color will be yellower and warmer. Manufacturers recommend choosing an average setting, although you can also quickly get used to the cold, bluish light.
Choosing a lamp for your home
Choosing a lamp for your home includes several steps, where you need to decide on the type of network, the diameter of the base and the appearance of the lighting fixture itself.
The 220 volt LED is produced in the most common types of base - E27 and E14. The numbers indicate the thread diameter in millimeters. The first type of lamp is often found in the form of a ball, the second - a ball or corn.
What are their main advantages? Firstly, it is the ability to block and adjust the brightness of the glow yourself. Secondly, it is the choice of color lighting and the ability to remotely control it. Thirdly, the durability of operation and increased reliability.
When choosing a shape, you need to pay attention to the fact that corn lamps, although they have fairly good characteristics, are still unsafe. Their contacts go out, and manufacturers have recently refused to release devices of this shape.
Smaller lamps are used to illuminate non-residential premises or bathrooms,therefore, if there is no need to use a 220 volt LED, you can get by with small flat devices with a G53 and GX53 base. These are round lamps where several diodes are used.
The color is recommended to choose regular white, as it is not too warm and not too cold color, the optimal characteristic of which is 4200 K.
Pay attention to the following characteristics when purchasing a lamp:
- number of diodes - how many LEDs are in the lamp, its brightness depends, especially with a long period of use, when they begin to fade and burn out;
- operating temperature mode - you need to consider that when choosing a lamp for the street, it must be effective even in possible frosts, this is usually indicated in the device passport;
- possibility of ripples - flashing occurs in cheap lamps, usually when buying an expensive one it is minimized;
- operating conditions sometimes require increased protection of the device, for example, resistance to moisture, you need to ask the seller about this parameter;
- when choosing a manufacturer, you need to pay attention to the diameter of the base, since not all imported developers produce a 220V LED;
- required luminous flux, which is measured in Lumens - lighting or indicator lamps.
Manufacturer's Choice
There are many manufacturers on the market with varying levels of quality. Accordingly, their supplier pricing policy is also significantly different.
MainThe disadvantage of LEDs is their cost. Therefore, if you are already paying a lot of money for a product, it is necessary that it be of really high quality. Therefore, it is worthwhile to approach the choice of the manufacturer and supplier with responsibility.
Manufacturers can be conditionally divided into 5 groups.
- Chinese cheap unknown brands.
- Famous Chinese and Asian manufacturers. The most popular are Selecta, Camelion, LG. They use modern equipment, and the quality of their products is quite high, so a fairly large segment of the domestic market is occupied by goods from Asia. Separately, it is worth noting LG LEDs, which since 2016 have significantly reduced the price of their product due to the use of new technologies in production. And the quality remains the same. There can be no doubt about this. The company specializes in medium power lamps and performs quite well relative to analogues.
- Domestic manufacturers who make a high quality product, but their technology is quite expensive, so the price of the lamps is appropriate. Unfortunately, on the territory of Russia, they learned late about the wide possibilities of LEDs and there are not so many domestic manufacturers. This, for example, "Optoman" and Gauss. These companies have their own product range and are available throughout the country.
- European manufacturers are mainly represented by German companies Philips, Osram, Bioledex, which have vast experiencelamp production. Perhaps Philips remains the leader in this market segment, although it is relatively expensive.
- Chinese-Russian projects such as Ecola, Newera are also good quality and price brands that are much younger than competing firms.
Thus, among such an abundance of manufacturers, it is sometimes quite difficult to choose a worthy brand, therefore it is especially important and necessary to pay attention mainly to the characteristics of the product and its operating conditions.
Approximate algorithm of actions when installing an LED
If you have even the slightest knowledge of electrics and have had experience installing any lamps, you can try to install the LED yourself. First you need to make sure that the lamps are working. The sequence of actions should be as follows:
- studying technical specifications and calculating how many volts one LED consumes;
- drawing up a wiring diagram taking into account voltage;
- calculation of power consumption of the electrical circuit;
- next you need to choose a power supply that would fit in terms of power, it can also be a driver;
- on the legs of the LED the polarity to which you need to solder the wires is indicated;
- connecting the power supply;
- installation of diodes and their fixing;
- if everything is in order, it is necessary to measure such characteristics as the amount of energy consumed, heating, electric current;
- electric current correction;
- warming up for half an hour - so that nothing happens during the initial installation and in order to warnoverheating, it is better to buy LEDs on a star-shaped substrate.
During operation, especially if it is a Chinese-made product, sometimes it is necessary to replace the LEDs. Instead of contacting specialists, the replacement can be done independently if you have the right tools. Having untwisted the lamp, diodes ring with the help of a digital multimeter. They, in turn, are dimly highlighted, and some of them may not work. Unnecessary diodes are unsoldered and replaced with new ones. Of course, this happens when spare LEDs are available, you can use an old lamp for this.
Today, the Arduino program is a popular addition. The LED, connected to it, can be made to blink. The Arduino board has many features, I / O, and you can connect almost any device to it. This program is able to receive signals from various devices, which makes it work on them. It is an easy and convenient programming environment that is easy for even the average user to handle.
Choosing LEDs for your car
Car owners are increasingly switching to a new type of lighting in their car. This is a really good decision not only in terms of the mode of operation, but also in terms of the appearance of the car. The car will change significantly, attracting the views of drivers passing by. LED type lighting can safely replace all the lamps that are used in the car.
How to choose the dimensions and light for the front stop-signals?
Most of the automotive industry uses lamps without a base, installed in the opening between the headlights. The advantage of LEDs is their resistance to any temperature, since they are close to the main lighting lamp, overheating of the crystal and its premature failure is possible. In view of this, when choosing lighting, it is necessary to pay attention to the additional protection of LEDs - the presence of an electric current stabilizer.
When choosing lamps, you need to pay attention to their series, for example, the SF series, although it does not have a stabilizer, is quite suitable for a car, as it has a large number of diodes and operates in a wide range, perfectly illuminating the space.
You also need to pay attention to the size of the lamp, so the example SF is a fairly large device. You need to think carefully before buying lighting.
Also popular is a series for dimensions - SMD, which has excellent characteristics, but also costs a lot of money.
Car rear lighting
It is customary to equip the rear brake lights with base two-pin LEDs. The most popular series: MSD, 14HP and 3x1W. They have a slightly different mode of operation, differ in the number of diodes. But all of them are quite high. These LEDs are bright, provide rich light and long life.
The most affordable - SF series lamps.
LEDs for salon
Before choosing lamps for the interior, you need to decide on the type of lighting andceiling size.
In the salon you need to pick up a scallop-type lamp - these are oblong devices, 31-41 mm in size. There are 3 types of LEDs for the interior.
- Installed in the ceiling lamp connector instead of the old ordinary light bulb. In size, such LEDs are almost identical to conventional lighting fixtures, they are used when it is impossible to use another lamp due to the small size of the ceiling.
- LEDs are larger than a standard light bulb. Before installing the necessary one, make sure that such a device fits under the ceiling. Due to the larger size, the number of diodes in the lamp also increases. Thus, the lighting becomes much brighter than usual.
- Matrices containing a large number of diodes. If the ceiling is large enough to accommodate a rectangular matrix, then this type of lighting will be the brightest and most saturated.
In interior lighting, SF or SMD lamps are used.
In addition, the replacement of fog lamps with LED lamps is widely used in cars. Particular attention should be paid to motorists who want to stand out among others to the backlight with LED strip and "angel eyes".
Summing up
LED is a great alternative to old light bulbs that helps solve the problem of insufficient lighting in a room. Even at a higher cost than a conventional bulb, this is a great investment as the LED can last for years and brighten up your home and car.
