Landscape lighting...............Fishing for ideas

Hello Folks.

I'm fishing for a few ideas for landscape lighting applications with LED's. THe main reason why I'm posting this request is because I just recieved an order of 10mm 130K MCD white LED's and I'm bigtime disappointed with the output of these units.

They are rated to have a 12 degree beam spread +/- 5 degrees. Yeah, I'd say 7 degree is about right. They throw a tight narrow spot with very little spill over, and at a distance of 4-6 feet or so, I get the intensity that I was looking for. The "brightness" at a distance of about 1.5 feet or so against a white wall was nowhere near 13X of a 10K MCD with a 20 degree spread.

I was planning on using the 10MM for uplighting purposes on palm trees, mounted in a copper tube, about 12-15 feet below the area of desired illumination. I wanted to keep this set-up simple and unobtrusive apon install. The copper tube would only extend about 5 inches above ground level, and would patina over time and blend in with the other natural earth tone colors over time.

I ended up ordering another 50 pcs of a 5MM 40KMCD 20 degree LED's last night. I'm trying to avoid building a matrix if I can help it just for astetics, and reduced build time and complexity. I also like the idea of using non-luxeon types of LED's just for the reason of reduced current draw and cost. I'd like to be able to keep the copper tube idea of mounting the LED's, but I'm thinking that I'm going to have to group mutiple (4) LED's together ( in series ) to achieve the desired effect. I may have to build a "bullhorn" style of framework(think of the letter T , with the top bar drilled out to mount the led's) but that's gonna' be tough to fish the wire through, and very conspicious).

SO here I am, fishing for ideas on types of LED's to use, and also to see what else has been done before just for inspirational reasons. Post away people. I'm curious to see and hear what the more experienced crowd has come up with.

Thanks in advance.

Try sanding or cutting the LED's for a wider spill beam.

Try clustering three 5mm LED's together in a slightly larger copper tube, like 3/8" or 1/2" copper pipe. Still pretty unobtrusive in a landscape application.

Consider multi-die LED's like the SMJLED.

How are you making it weatherproof?

Keep us informed. This is an interesting project.

Forgive the ignorance, but what is a SMJLED? I'm new to the game here!

beondwacko =--> SMJLED

beondwacko said:

Forgive the ignorance, but what is a SMJLED? I'm new to the game here!

Click to expand...

The link above is for the PR base SMJLED. You can get bare SMJLED's too. Here's a link to lamda's SMJLED page on his web site: http://home.mchsi.com/~lambda_lights/smjled.htm

How about this:
http://www.rgbsunset.com/cart.php?target=product&product_id=10&category_id=4
It's currently landscape lighting my flat.....can't wait to get a house and install it outdoors.
Phil

That's a labor intensive conversion! Interesting though. As soon as the 40KMCD 5mm LED's arrive from Hong Kong, I'm going to start experimenting with wiring them in series (3-4) and making clusters out of them. I'll end up doing some fancy soldering with come copper pipe, maybe 3/8'' ID and I'll flare it up to be able to hold the 3 or 4 leds. A bit of epoxy, and it should work out. I'll also hot glue the bottom of the tube to keep some of the excessive moisture out, and the wire tail secure as well. In the mean time, I just finished trenching 190' for a landscape lighting job I had today. THe temp' was in the Mid 80's. I'm shot.

Me thinks you'll end up w/ 3LEDs in series w/ a resistor. I have some experience with the 8mm 13-lumen 55-degree LEDS, they are multi-chip and run on 150Ma. With a 27mm reflector they throw pretty good. I will next play with the 4-chip 10mm 30-degree LEDs 60-80Ma. about 1/3 the cost of a uncut SMJLED [cut ones have a very wide viewing-angle meant for use with reflectors]. The Sandwhich Shoppe has the uncut SMJLED BTW. Ya know...most of the 12V MR11 or MR16 LED track-light bulb products are touted as running on 12V [AC *or* DC], if you consider the lumens and ease of constructing a working setup with more light...hmm. Multi-LED or Lux 1W or 3W already housed. Some would be better about water than others. {eBay}
Trivial to mount MR11 or MR16 into PVC plumbing adapters.

Then there's LED cluster bulbs made for cars: http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/store/commerce.cgi?product=CAR
premade matrixes: http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/store/commerce.cgi?product=OTHER