Household LED bulb quality is terrible!

[CR94]

Originally Posted By: DeepFriar
... I've tried the same type outside in an inverted fixture and they die in a month or less. I've wondered if the heat may not be able to dissipate in that orientation and it's killing them. Just a guess.
Yep, that's the secret. I've been using two cheapie LED's (from Aldi and Rural King) a couple of years with zero problems so far. One of those is cycled frequently, and the other is on continuously most evenings. They're in well ventilated sockets. Same for my CFL that only recently died after over 5 years of staying on from sundown until well after midnight most days.

 

[tenderloin]

We have over 35 in use..indoors and outside and have never replaced 1..even after 3+ years

 

[Andrew1972]

Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
I've only had one issue with the 80+ LED bulbs I purchased and installed-3 years ago now? I've been extremely pleased with them.
The only Feit bulbs were some 2W bulbs that have been outside under the pergola. The rest were all higher quality bulbs.


The issue though is 3 years ago these bulbs were more expensive and potentially constructed better. They dropped the price as of late and something may have to give. I say this because my two 5 year old LED still work fine that cost as much as the 12 others that fail constantly and are same maker...

 

[Triple_Se7en]

Originally Posted By: madRiver
Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
I've only had one issue with the 80+ LED bulbs I purchased and installed-3 years ago now? I've been extremely pleased with them.
The only Feit bulbs were some 2W bulbs that have been outside under the pergola. The rest were all higher quality bulbs.


The issue though is 3 years ago these bulbs were more expensive and potentially constructed better. They dropped the price as of late and something may have to give. I say this because my two 5 year old LED still work fine that cost as much as the 12 others that fail constantly and are same maker...

Do these prematurely failed bulbs have a warranty?

 

[Klutch9]

Originally Posted By: madRiver
Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
I've only had one issue with the 80+ LED bulbs I purchased and installed-3 years ago now? I've been extremely pleased with them.
The only Feit bulbs were some 2W bulbs that have been outside under the pergola. The rest were all higher quality bulbs.


The issue though is 3 years ago these bulbs were more expensive and potentially constructed better. They dropped the price as of late and something may have to give. I say this because my two 5 year old LED still work fine that cost as much as the 12 others that fail constantly and are same maker...


I think this is also part of the issue. Awhile back I bought some Feit LED bulbs from Costco, and they were built like tanks! Each bulb was heavy and had a nice aluminum heatsink built in. A few months later, they replaced them with another 'equivalent' Feit bulb for the same price and they lost the heatsink. The ones that do have the heatsink are great. A few of them get dimmed with a non-LED dimmer and they still work great. Nice CRI, too. My one CREE 4-flow bulb has also been rock solid for 1.5 years. It's on constantly (above the range) and gets regularly bombarded with steam/oil spray from cooking. That's a well-built bulb too.

 

[John09Williams]

I have 27 old-style CREE. 0 failures with an average life on the bulbs of ~1.5 years. They all see varied duty, from bathroom use where they have a high on/off cycle count to our kitchen/living room where they run constantly almost 10-12 hours a day.

These are the ones with an aluminum heat sink at the base and a rubberized glass dome. The color out of them seems easier on my eyes than any other LED I have tried. I haven't had a reason to buy any of the newer 4 flows, but I like to think that CREE didn't completely blow it on those new products, and from the other posts here it seems as if I can at least count on the 4 flows to perform as well as what I have now.

I'm a happy customer especially since I found many of my bulbs on severe clearance at Home Depot for ~$10 per 4 pack of 60W equivalents.

 

[DBMaster]

Originally Posted By: Rand
The only feit are stupid gu24 bulbs. NO ONE Else MAKES THEM.


If the fixture has space and the application allows for the additional 1/2", or so, of height, you could order GU24-E27 adapters online. I got some on eBay from China. I'm sure there must be some reason for the GU base, but I couldn't tell you what it is - other than an annoyance and a guarantee of spending a lot more on bulbs.

Example only: Adapter

 

[nthach]

Your problem is Feit - Philips, Cree and GE are always safe bets. Supposedly Home Depot's house brand is good as well.

 

[raytseng]

The new GE "HD" light ones are pretty good.

There was some article I read and their CRI was better than Cree's; even though cree's packaging makes it seem that they don't compromise on color and that's what sets them apart.

Additionally all the high end LEDs are pumping out more lumens/watt with each generation of lights, or equivilantly making the same amount of light without the big heatsinks or weird shapes

 

[Balrog006]

Originally Posted By: JBinTX30
Feit are garbage. Get some Philips. Had my Philips in over a year now. All worked out of the box no flickering nothing.


I've had great luck with that "garbage "brand.... in LED's and CFL's

One LED in particular in a ceiling can light was purchased ~4 years ago and is over the sink in the open kitchen. It's been on continuously since then due to my wife's work schedule and having to get up randomly at all hours with our now 2 year old.

By my count that's 35,000+ hours and it's operating fine.

I have a metric ton of their CFL's throughout the house and barn and have had some random isolated failures but overall they're doing better than average IMHO.

 

[Y_K]

Originally Posted By: raytseng
The new GE "HD" light ones are pretty good.


Yes, they are. HD has them on promo which they very carefully rotate across the wattage and spectrum bias.

Be it CFL or LED, in the end, it's phosphorus that emits visible spectrum radiation. Texan cockroaches and our local moths aren't attracted to various LEDs - I haven't tried all I have yet - so, do you your own research. I still prefer halogen and regular bulbs in my reading area.

 

[WhizkidTN]

FWIW: I have over 20 of the Philips "Flat paddle" style LED bulbs and several of the CREE old style and 4-flow bulbs. Haven't had a single failure yet in over 2+ years.

 

[ffhdriver]

Have several Philips "40 Watt" bulbs from Home Depot and no problems. They are rated for a 20 year life, I'm putting them in my will. lol

 

[Klutch9]

Had yet another candelabra LED go out yesterday. UGH! It was the Ecosmart brand, which is Home Depot's house brand. Formerly, I could just take the bad bulbs back to HD and they would just swap them for new ones, but they no longer do this because so many people were bringing back dud LEDs... great. So after some digging, I found the company who makes the Ecosmart brand and called their customer service department, err, voicemail... didn't get a call back. HD doesn't warranty these directly either. So I'm done with anything but name brand LEDs. Ordered a handful of new Philips 60w equivalent bulbs from Amazon to replace the ones that have gone out/will yet go out. First world problem, I know, but frustrating that so many things are made with little to no Q/C nowadays. Meanwhile, the incandescent 60w bulb in our carport has been running strong for nearly 6 years, ~12 hours per day

 

[greenjp]

Had my first LED bulb failure recently. It was a Feit 60w replacement bulb that I got in a 6 pack from Costco a few months back for $3. So a $0.50 bulb. Called the number on the box, gave the pleasant USA based customer service rep some info, and they're sending a replacement.

I have a bunch of Feit 65w BR30 type LEDs and some 60w equivalents that have been working fine for a while, this is the first one to go. As others have noted an LED lamp is a relatively complicated thing compared to incandescent or fluorescent and has a number of failure modes - just because the LED itself will last a long time doesn't mean the rest will.
jeff

 

[mjoekingz28]

I notice the heat is not in the bulb glass with LEDs, but in the base. I guess there is a lot of circuitry going on in there. Same way with CFLs, although their glass was hotter than LEDs, the base where the 'magic' happens takes on alot of heat.


I wonder if there will be an improvement or successor to these current bulbs that will allow less heat.


The gas station got new LEDs not long ago and they looked great at night. About a year later, you can see a few arent lighting up anymore. It is like a two foot by two foot square of many little LEDs and one here and one there are failing to illuminate.

 

[Y_K]

Originally Posted By: mjoekingz28
I notice the heat is not in the bulb glass with LEDs, but in the base

Primary radiation is UV, it agitates the phosphorus that emits a visible spectrum radiation. So, watch for the same or simialr carp as with CFLs: good light will cost a premium..

 

[Triple_Se7en]

I would never buy bulbs from Amazon and have them delivered across country. Too much sloppy handling by a multitude of people who are tossing, sliding, bouncing, throwing, shifting and shaking that box of yours, prior to kicking it closer to your side door at delivery.

 

[JustinH]

Never had a problem with amazon delivering anything. Everything from big screen TV's to glass items.

As for me, I have been replacing the burned out CFL bulbs with Great Value LED 60w bulbs from Walmart.

They work well and I like the color more than CFL.

 

[Vikas]

I had one which I thought was good quality LED bulb made by Osram in the garage door opener. This one went dim in only few months! It lasted less than even standard incandescent bulb in that fixture. I understand I should be putting rough service bulb there but I thought a good quality LED should last longer than standard.

Funny thing is when I went to replace is, just touching it brought back the full brightness. But at that time I was already standing on the ladder and I was not going to take another chance on it. So I replaced it with regular bulb.