Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: ** Beamshots added **

[Stromberg]

I have torchiere lamp similar to this:
http://www.stacksandstacks.com/image/60136.jpg

(300W, 230VAC)

It's working well but I don't use it much because of the power consumption and light color especially when dimmed. I'm planning to mod it with led(s) and your suggestions are welcome.

Option 1
5-6 Cree/Luxeon/SSC leds driven @ 700mA

Option 2
Single Osram Ostar driven @ 700mA

Option X
"Your suggestion here"

I'm not planning to use any optics, since the leds are pointed to ceiling and wide flood is in fact more than welcome.

What do you think? Is there really any idea of comparing amount of light between single Ostar and 5-6 "normal" highpower leds? And if they are close to equal, how about heatsinking? Does Ostar need better heatsinking?

And one more thing: if total lumen amount with led(s) is something like 1000-1200, how does that compare to original halogen? This is important because I don't know yet if I'll include dimming option.

 

[2xTrinity]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

If you're pointing all your LEDs at the ceiling, there's no need to have a single point source like the ostar. You're better off distributing your light across several emitters -- they will run cooler and more efficiently, and the heat will be much easier to dissipate from multiple points.

And one more thing: if total lumen amount with led(s) is something like 1000-1200, how does that compare to original halogen?

The halogen is probably about 20lm/W, or 6000 bulb-lumens. The reflector/diffuser is probably not particularly efficient though, so I'd esimate 4500 fixture lumens. If you normally used the lamp though with a dimmer at less than 100%, efficiency would be lower than 20 lm/W. Since LEDs are already directional, you can point them straight at the ceiling and bulb lumens will equal fixture lumens.

I personally would reccommend getting more LEDs -- you have plenty of space, and since this light is running from a wall-plug, I wouldn't spend money on premium bins to get absolute maximum efficiency (much more important when running on batteries).

DX has some pretty cheap LEDs if you're willing to wait for their long shipping process:
Cree Q5 Star - $7.65/ea, >10
Cree P4 Star - You may get better results buying more of these and running them more gently, compared to the Q5s. $4/ea, >10
SSC P4 Emitter - base is live (+) contact, $4.75/ea >10. Most lumens/dollar in LED light


Finally, I'd recommend augmenting your array with a couple red LEDs -- white LEDs are deficient in red, so that will help your color rendition, but possibly at the expense of being difficult to mix evenly. Luxeon-III red is still the best as far as I know.

 

[worldedit]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Are you sure this has a 300W bulb? That would be much to bright for a normal room. Id say those leds are about 3 times more efficient than halogen bulbs. So 6 of them at 700mA should be as bright as a 50W bulb.

I replaced the bulb of my 20W halogen desk lamp with 2 Cree P4. I dont know if its as bright as before but its enough. I used this http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.10852 as a driver and it draws 6W to power the leds.

The P4 leds produce lots of heat. If you dont want to invest in Q5s you will need a good heat sink. Maybe you can use a cpu cooler with fan.

 

[kongfuchicken]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

My parents have a bunch of these lamps in their home and they do run up to 500W I believe. They are massively bright and can fill an entire room with overwhelming light.

Making this thing led would be extremely tough (read: expensive) to match the performance of the high power halogen lamp as suggested below but it is definitively possible to make it usable within budget.

Take a look at the xitanium series of converters designed for leds. They make a wide range of flexible drivers where you'll probably find a drop-in model for what you need; then of course, it'll be about how much you're willing to sink into this project. All of those have integrated heat protection and some of them have dimming abilities.

Your option 1 looks perfectly doable. If you invest into a solid heatsink and 6 3W emitters, you'll end up with close to 1800 lumens without optics, about a third of your halogen lamp but also with less than 6% of its power consumption.

 

[2xTrinity]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Your stock torchiere probably produced around 6000 bulb lumens, 4500 fixture lumens. Much more output than your planned LED build. Honestly, If I were you I'd just buy a dimmable 70W fluorescent torchiere with a 5000k lamp. That will have a similar cool-white color temp as the LEDs, but with much much better color rendition, and roughly the same lumens as your original lamp.

Also, there are two nice features about dimming fluorescents compared to incandescents:

• Color temperature remains the same. I can't stand the orange of a dimmed incandescent. It's also means if have multiple lamps color temp is always matched.
• Efficiency remains the same. Incans get much less efficient when dimmed. So while the lm/W difference might be 3:1 or 4:1 on 100% output, it could be more like 20:1 at the lowest setting.

LEDs can also be dimmed, but as a DIY project, it would be very difficult to pull off.

 

[matrixshaman]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

One other consideration too - I've seen a lot of this style of lamps in garage sales. I think one reason is they do consume a lot of power and of course bulbs are expensive to replace. They consume a lot of power because the basic design is not efficient. They rely on high power to bounce light off a white painted reflector (most of the ones I've seen) upwards which is then bounced off the ceiling downwards to provide light. This of course is very ineffecient but it works if you need a ton of light in a place with no ceiling light. I think any LED you put in this is going to seem fairly weak for all that bouncing. 2xTrinity may have the best plan unless you come up with an entirely different idea for setting up the light. If you only needed a lower height reading light or room light you might think about putting several high power LED's on the outside bottom part of that dome.

 

[Stromberg]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Thank you all for your help and recommendations! Worldedit: I checked the bulb and it really is 300W. At full power it gives unpleasantly amount of light and that's the reason I almost never use it at full.

I think that few 3 watters could be enough because I need pleasant amount of [SIZE=-1]background light rather than room full of light. And although it could be wise to simply buy new light with dimmable cfl, this project is something that has brewed in my mind quite some time so I think I'll go for it.

I'm planning to drive the leds with this.. [/SIZE]http://www.led1.de/shop/product_inf...ma-p-574&cName=constant-current-sources-c-112

..so 6 pieces of 3 watters is the limit. 2xTrinity: instead of using red emitters with white ones, can you recommend good warm white emitters? More than perfect color rendition, I think I'll need warmer overall light spectrum.

 

[2xTrinity]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Thank you all for your help and recommendations! Worldedit: I checked the bulb and it really is 300W. At full power it gives unpleasantly amount of light and that's the reason I almost never use it at full.

I think that few 3 watters could be enough because I need pleasant amount of [SIZE=-1]background light rather than room full of light. And although it could be wise to simply buy new light with dimmable cfl, this project is something that has brewed in my mind quite some time so I think I'll go for it.

I'm planning to drive the leds with this.. [/SIZE]http://www.led1.de/shop/product_inf...ma-p-574&cName=constant-current-sources-c-112

..so 6 pieces of 3 watters is the limit. 2xTrinity: instead of using red emitters with white ones, can you recommend good warm white emitters? More than perfect color rendition, I think I'll need warmer overall light spectrum.

Cree Q2 Warm White -- these are the most efficient warm white LEDs I've ever found. About 20% lower than the bleeding edge cool-whites.

 

[Jumi]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Osrams 300W halogen is 5000 bulb lumens so only 16.67lm/W and how many of those get's out of lamp? 4000?

6 of those warm whites would give 930lumens at 700mA.

I have one E14 based Cree xr-e now with Q2 without optic pointing at roof behind sofa and it's not enough light for reading but 6x would certainly be enough.

Could that 350/700mA driver be used for low 350mA and high 700mA or how is it connected.

SSC collects dust better than cleaners at work so I would not use them without protection.

Juha

 

[Stromberg]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Thanks 2xTrinity for the info.

Could that 350/700mA driver be used for low 350mA and high 700mA or how is it connected.

Yes but it's done by DIL switch, so it's not very easy way to change led brightness.

 

[Jumi]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Could that Dil switch be bypassed with another switch? and can mode be changed when supply is connected to grid?

Juha

 

[Stromberg]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Could that Dil switch be bypassed with another switch?
Juha

Well, I think it would need some advanced modding since current selector is part of bigger dil switch, as you can see in this picture:

and can mode be changed when supply is connected to grid?

I have never tested and without some info from manufacturer, I think I'll pass.. But if you want check it from the manufacturer, I'd be interest to know what they recommend: http://www.lumotech.com/sys/

Does anybody know would this heatsink be sufficient if I'd use 5 of those Cree warmwhites @ 700mA:

It's 82mm * 68mm * 34mm and the base plate(where the fins begin) is about 5mm thick. Note that the fins will be pointed downwards because leds are pointed to ceiling.

 

[worldedit]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Just try this heat sink. It wont heat up that fast. If it gets unpleasent to touch you could attach a fan to it afterwards.

 

[SafetyBob]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

I second the computer heat sink, and use small fan if needed. The Microdrive is also a top notch power supply particularly for straight on/off.

May I also suggest the use of 4 Seoul P4's for the more natural light and just get some optics if you desire. I made some undercounter lighting as at test with 4 Cree Q5's with the optics Brum sells in the B/S/T or group buy forum.....don't remember right now. Leidi is the name I believe. You can get spot or diffused. Tried both, use diffused for your purpose, they should be available for Seouls too. They should light up the corner of the room very nicely.

Bob E.

 

[Stromberg]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

I have also thinked about using SSC's but since I'm not planning to use any optics, shouldn't SSC's be protected somehow against dust and scratches? I guess Crees would have the advantage of using them without any additional protective cover.

 

[Stromberg]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Slug of the SSC P4 is connected to anode, yes? How about in stars like this:
http://www.dotlight.de/shop/product_info.php/cPath/296_292/products_id/1011
?

 

[SafetyBob]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Those would be wonderfully nice and easy to use. Either use Artic Alumina epoxy or thermal paste and screw them into or onto a heat sink of some sort. A round piece of glass would be OK to place above the circle of LED's and if necessary, use a yellow highlighter to soften and make the light more incan like. Been there done that.

If you can find a piece of frosted glass somewhere too, that would work very nicely too. I put 2 Seoul P4s in a halogen fixture from Lowes that had frosted glass and they worked perfectly. Just epoxied the stars to the metal reflector already in the light.

Bob E.

 

[Stromberg]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: help appreciated

Uplight mod is almost ready. Almost because I have to get smaller fan than what I'm using right now. Thank you all who have helped me in this project!:twothumbs

Ps. Beamshots and more detailed description of the project are coming later on..

Glueing P4's on the heatsink:

All leds in place:

Fan attached to uplight and "light engine" sitting on top of it. I'll have to get smaller fan and attach it to the side of the heatsink, not under it:

 

[Ken_McE]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: ** Pics added **

 

[VanIsleDSM]

Re: Torchiere/Uplight LED mod: ** Pics added **

Nice work.

I've got a project going right now using warm white CREE LEDs.. because they are warm white they are only a p4 flux bin.. and I have 3 of them replacing each 50watt halogen bulb.. check it out with comparison pics:

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=183477

Looking at the graph on the CREE data sheet, I'm probably getting around 140lumen from each p4 emitter @ 700mA.. sound about right?

so 3x140=420 lumen.

Look at the pics in the thread, the ~420lumen of LED light is destroying the 50watt halogen for output.. and the halogen should be 1000lumen.. and MR16s generally have a better reflector than those uplights.. which often just have a soft white shade or white paint to reflect... When it comes to directional lighting LEDs take the cake for sure.

So in this case you can see that the output from the MR16 halogen bulbs is more than cut in half. Possibly it's not making 20lm/w to start.

...From looking at this I'd say a lot less than 4800fixture lumen for that uplight.. probably more like 3000 lumen.