Chi Wing (Cheap) LED's on E-Bay Question

Chi Wing (Cheap) LED\'s on E-Bay Question

hi all,

I have previously bought white Nichia LED's before from Solar Energy Alliance http://www.solarenergyalliance.com/ledheaven/index.htm and found them to be fantastic, yet I have seen some cheap blue LED's from Chi Wing on E-Bay, and have a few questions that you may possibly be able to help me with.

E-Bay Url for Blue LED's is

http://www.stores.ebay.com/chiwingledproductshop/plistings/list/all/dept11/index.html

Questions include:

Have you (in the UK) bought any and if so :

What is their delivery time ?
Do you have to pay any import taxes ?
Are any, and if so how many were faulty ?
How does the brightness compare with the blue LED club keyring ? . . .
1/2 as bright ? the same ? brighter ?

note: I have chosen LED Club keyring as a comparison, as I picked one in my local Poundland store recently and can use this to make a mental comparison.

I understand these costing £7 + £7 P&P i.e. £14 for 100 will not be as good as those produced by Nichia Corporation but I was just wondering if they are worth a purchase.

Any and All comments greatly appreciated.

Re: Chi Wing (Cheap) LED\'s on E-Bay Question

I'm on the east coast of the USA, so I don't know how comparable the shipping time will be, but it was very quick--something like 5 days. I bought 100 UV and 50 white (5mm) and was very happy with the price and in dealing with them. They were friendly, quick, and helpful

So far, all of the LEDs have been good and there were more than the quoted number (2 extra UV and 1 extra white). The UV were as bright as the ones that I ordered domestically--the 12 mW kind that you see in most stuff. The whites were a very good with color--better than the nichias that I've seen. They were well focused and with no visible discolorations.

I'm sorry I don't have more specific info on the blue LEDs that you're looking at. I hope someone else can answer those specific questions.

Re: Chi Wing (Cheap) LED\'s on E-Bay Question

I've bought both white and UV from Chi Wing, at 100 units, price, including shipping was about 30 cents per LED, and so far I have not had any dead ones. Shipping time to NH (Northeast USA) was a little over a week, and if you're a stamp collector, the package had LOTs of colorful Hong Kong stamps all over it. A little bonus, for some...
Before I purchased from him. I checked his feedback and it was excellent, and there were buyers in the UK, as well as USA.

These are most likely factory direct, no middlemen to increase the prices. There is also another LED vendor. Ken Ma, on E-bay, he sells "Wilycon" LEDs at a reasonable price, these have been written up on the LED Museum.

/ed B in NH

Re: Chi Wing (Cheap) LED\'s on E-Bay Question

Ssssh don`t want everyone climbing on to cheap LED sources ;-)

Well realistically it should help drive costs down from people like Nichia.

I`ve ordered from Chi Wing on Ebay, quality is good, haven`t yet put any in front of a light meter in comparison to Nichia`s finest but subjective impressions....

Perhaps if Craig dosen`t have any we could arrange for some to get sent over to his end for his expert verdict, if he has time.

Whites are a good uniform colour with quite an even beam, Blues compare favourably with some Kingbright`s I had lying around. UV`s are cute and may have some new uses coming up .....

There are other Far eastern Vendors comming into the high brightness LED market, Yoldal`s PR certainly keeps my inbox full ;-). Wilycon as well. These mainly seem to be made with Cree and Uniroyal dies, the factory in China mounting the LED dice to the lead frame and encapsulating them.So hopefully their isn`t any upcoming patent battles about to ensue that would drive the cost back up.

Delivery from HK was about 4 or 5 days to me in Edinburgh, below £18 there is never any customs charges, above that you would probably have to be unlucky to get charged any import dues on a small package.Raw LED devices are not subject to any specific extra tariffs but large quantaties may be subject to VAT if spotted plus the charge your carrier makes for collecting the VAT.

In summary at 14p for a high brightness blue LED it`s cheaper than you can buy a low brightness red down at Maplin`s. Brian Lam at Chi Wing seems like a straight dealer, polite and helpful and delivery was faster than I get from some UK based suppliers.

HTH
Adam

Re: Chi Wing (Cheap) LED\'s on E-Bay Question

I bought a package of the blues. So far, no complaints. They're quite bright and a nice color. I paid $20.50 shipped for 100 of them. Considering that locally they're about $3/ea, I'd say that's a DARN good deal.