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What is the secret to making LED light bulbs last as long as the package says?

These bulbs are not economical at all because I have to constantly replace them. Saving on electricity does not justify these expensive bulbs burning out in less than a year. The only two that have lasted are in my range hood for light above my stove. Those experience extreme heat and yet they are fine. I have had to replace 2 light fixtures that have permanent LEDs and no replaceable parts too.

Hugh_Jeggs ,

I replace bulbs as part of my business. Cheap LEDs are a false economy

I only use Osram or Phillips, cost me a bomb to start with but now it’s rare I ever have to replace a lamp

Pyr_Pressure ,

Never buy fixtures with irreplaceable built in LEDs, they’re mostly a scam to get people to buy a $50 fixture instead of a $30 fixture and a $5 bulb.

Also LED bulbs, the light emitting portion (light emitting diode, LED) is just a small part of the actual “bulb”. LED bulbs also have lots of little circuitry components which are typically what dies first. The actual LED is unlikely to fail, but the circuitry can easily get burnt out in cheap bulbs.

Don’t get the cheapest ones that you can find.

Don’t put them in airtight enclosures (i.e. those old nipple lights)

Dont turn them on and off constantly. You’re not using much energy, it’s fine to them on for a bit. They more they turn on and off the faster they will fail.

st3ph3n ,

Make sure the LED bulbs you’re using are rated for use in enclosed fixtures. Heat is the #1 killer for them. My basement is equipped with a bunch of enclosed fixtures that had 3 bulbs each in them, and they kept killing LED bulbs because the trapped heat had nowhere to go. They were designed for incandescent bulbs that didn’t care about being hot.

MoonManKipper ,

I’ve had the same experience - make sure they don’t get hot (or are rated for it)

snausagesinablanket OP ,
@snausagesinablanket@lemmy.world avatar

I am using GE daylight and they say 13 year guarantee on the box. They are at least 2 times as much money as all the imported ones. I have used Walmart and similar and they never last. I tried OSRAM made in Germany and they sucked for brightness. All my lights are not enclosed. They are all open air fixtures with lamp shades and my ceiling fans all have 4 candelabra style. The longest I have gotten any to last is 3 years.

Anticorp ,

Return them to the store where you bought them from for false claims or defective parts.

lovely_reader ,

Those have a 5- to 10-year warranty, depending on which kind. Have you tried reaching out to GE for replacements?

Tarquinn2049 ,

I’ve only had one led light bulb fail so far despite being an early adopter. And it failed by starting to flicker occasionally, not burn out. So the rest have lasted almost 20 years now.

Might be time to look into what you are feeding them. Check if your power is regular.

Alk ,

Get an electrician. It sounds like bad wiring or voltage control or something.

Alexstarfire ,

The only LED bulbs I’ve ever seen die have all been from one light fixture. Eaten at least 1 every 8-12 months. I’m not buying new ones to replace them. Just going through the stock I have then going with something that cares less about voltage. I’m pretty sure it’s a power delivery problem and I’m uninterested in trying to solve it because this is the only effect I’ve experienced.

fishos ,
@fishos@lemmy.world avatar

That’s a wiring issue. Bulbs burning out shockingly fast means something else is wrong. Had the same issue in a ceiling light until we replaced the wiring.

DebatableRaccoon ,

Dimmer switches + dimmable bulbs and never, ever buy whole units with non-replaceable LEDs, those things are a scam and little more than e-waste.

cecilkorik , (edited )
@cecilkorik@lemmy.ca avatar

Most cheap non-dimmable LEDs have drivers that use resistors to determine the current to drive through the LEDs. As a rule, these are always set too high to overdrive the LEDs (sometimes as much as twice their rated current) for marginal brightness gains and to burn out the bulb prematurely. I’m obviously unable to actually see directly into the operation of the great minds that design LED lightbulbs but logic leaves me with only those two plausible conclusions, I’ll let you decide which motivation you think is a bigger factor for most manufacturers.

Conveniently, most manufacturers carefully fine-tune this value to prematurely destroy the LEDs at just the right time, which requires careful balancing of resistors, and even MORE conveniently (for us) the cheapest way for them to do this is typically to use two resistors. And MOST conveniently (for us), if you were to carelessly break one of the pair of resistors they use, and leave the other one intact, the current would immediately drop to a very reasonable and appropriate level, generating much less heat, drawing much less power, making LED death extremely unlikely, and only modestly reducing brightness in many cases, because LEDs have non-linear brightness and the heavily overdriven ones are typically FAR beyond the point of diminishing returns. In some cases the reduction in power results in basically no visible difference in light output. In some cases it can be argued they’re literally stealing extra power from your electricity bill and using it as an electric heater for no purpose other than to burn out your own light bulbs prematurely so you have to replace them.

The good news is, like I said, removing one of the responsible resistors instantly solves the design flaw and is usually quite easy even without any special tools or electronics knowledge. BigCliveDotCom calls this “Doobying” the bulbs after the Dubai bulbs that were mentioned in other comments. If you watch some of his videos about LED bulbs you should be able to see the pattern of which resistors to remove, if they are on the board they will basically always be right next to each other and relatively small values (typically in the 20 ohms to 200 ohms range). The only modification I make to his procedure is that I prefer to remove the HIGHER value of the two resistors instead of the lower one, which results in perhaps somewhat less lifetime preservation (still much more than the original setting) and less power savings, but more brightness, and is usually adequately good for my purposes. I also use sturdy tweezers to remove the resistor instead of a screwdriver which seems to me that it would have a higher risk of collateral damage.

Is it a lot of work for a single light bulb? Kind of, yes. But once you get it done a bunch of times, you’ll probably rarely have to do it again, as these bulbs last almost forever. In fact, I have yet to have one actually fail, I am mostly just replacing the occasional old unmodified LED bulb from time to time.

This will not work with dimmable bulbs or certain fancy high end bulbs. Also some are much, much easier to modify than others. Clive calls the ones that are relatively easy “hackable” and it’s really a crapshoot to find them. Some have covers/bulbs/diffusers that are nearly impossible to remove without catastrophic damage to the bulb and/or your hands. Others simply use a different circuit design that doesn’t have resistors. Some only have a single resistor, meaning to change the value you need to solder a new one in its place. In my experience, the bargain-basement, junkiest, least reliable bulbs tend to be the easiest to hack this way and often skimp on things like “gluing the lens on” so it’s easy to get off. But you’ll have to experiment to find a brand and style that works well for this.

db2 ,

LED bulbs do last, that’s why they’re manufactured to overdrive the elements so they burn out sooner.

Try getting dimmable ones and run them a little lower.

Gerudo ,

I’m going to speculate you have some issues with power delivery. Are you in an older home or get hit with brown/black outs? Could be under or over voltage by enough to burn through them. I have used dollar store bulbs all the way to hue branded bulbs. I might have had one die early from dozens in 2 different properties.

Beacon ,

I've never had to replace an LED bulb, ever. They last forever if there isn't a problem with your installation, like poor electrical wiring or poor ventilation

Blue_Morpho ,

That’s unusual. I have ones that lasted 10 years but they eventually go. It’s usually the driver circuit, not the led itself.

wjrii ,

Exactly. LEDs are rated for 10k hours. 10-15 watt power supplies made both to cram into a tiny space defined by GE 100 years ago for a completely different lighting technology, and to hit a $2.00 price point for the whole assembly? Not so much.

I’ve actually got a super cheap and super bright LED in my garage that has been working for a long time, but it’s one of those big ugly sunflower looking ones that would never fit in an enclosed fixture anyway, so it actually lets the power supply breathe. Even then, I’m sure it’s putting out more lumens than is good for whatever half-assed components and heat sink are in it.

Beacon , (edited )

The first LED I bought is about 7 years old at this point, so that tracks. I was being hyperbolic when i said "forever", they aren't designed to last literally forever, i just meant many many many years

Boozilla ,
@Boozilla@lemmy.world avatar

Might be worth looking into phosphor-converted LEDs. A little slower to light up, but supposedly last longer and are more heat-tolerant.

cpw ,

Check your power. I’ve had about 50 led bulbs for about 7 or more years. Only the ones in the bathroom failed because they were cheap and not rated for use in a wet and humid environment. Their replacements are coming up on 4 years old now and no signs of trouble. None of the bulbs were particularly expensive when I bought them.

jordanlund ,
@jordanlund@lemmy.world avatar

I can’t remember the last time I had to replace an LED. You may need to check wiring and voltages.

perviouslyiner ,

and temperature.

Blue_Morpho ,

Get a hold of Royal Dubai Led bulbs. hackaday.com/…/leds-from-dubai-the-royal-lights-y…

A prince was angry that leds were burning out well before their rated lifespan so funded Philips to make an actual long lasting led bulb.

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