Philips 10 watt AmbientLED MR-16

So while visiting my local Home Depot, I happen to stumble across this. At first, I thought it was just another one of their low lumens Philips LED MR-16s but then I noticed that it was rated at 415 lumens and claimed to replace a 35 watt halogen MR-16 (The other Philips MR-16 was only 130 lumens and the EcoSmart I previously tried was 295) It was also not located where all the other light bulbs were kept but rather in the middle of the aisle where they displayed track lights.

35$ later







Compared to a Halogen MR-16



Front



Info on bulb




Upon powering it up, I heard a faint "whirring" sound and saw dust blowing around in the beam. That could only mean one thing so out came a small Phillips screwdriver. Pop out two gray rubber plugs on the sides and remove two screws and yep, it's fan cooled



Two more screws from the inside, unplug a connector, and the optics and LED board will just fall out. Four warm-white Rebels



This is the top of the heat-sink where the LED board mounts



Other side of the heat-sink which faces the fan



Some thermal material that was between the LED board and the heatsink. Thinking of replacing it with an Arctic Silver product



Power Supply/Driver board




Not too hard to take apart and put back together. I'll take some beamshots tonight when it is dark.

Small fans are notoriously noisy... how noisy is it and what size? May be able to replace with a super quiet one.

The fan is actually very quiet, just a faint whining sound. The drive on my netbook is actually louder. I believe the fan is about 25mm

Beam pictures on my desk


(35 watt Halogen)


(10 watt AmbientLED)

Fan cooling is not a good idea. It seems that the Cree MTG MR16 solution is more superior.

Fan cooling is an excellent idea.
I like the Cree MTG too. But, haven't seen it at the local lowesdepot.

Problem without a fan is that the LED and driver will run very hot. How long do you expect it to last?
With the fan, it'll run much cooler and last longer. But, the fan might eventually burn out. I have plenty of small fans, on electronics, that have lasted a decade easily. So, I expect some fans to burn out, and others to last forever. Without active cooling, I don't expect to many overhyped LED bulbs to last more than a couple years in most common fixtures. Also, you don't need much fan speed since you're only dumping 10watts, if that, and there is also a heatsink. Computer CPU's from 50w-100w is what many will think about when they see a fan.

My Evolux bulb has a fan and it is silent. This bulb runs cool, definitely cooler than the non-fanned Tess, Ecosmart, or Sylvania bulbs. And, its considerably brighter.

Microa said:

Fan cooling is not a good idea. It seems that the Cree MTG MR16 solution is more superior.

Click to expand...

Why do you say fan cooling is NOT a good idea? It seems to me that fan cooling provides superior cooling as opposed to heat sink only? Is there something I do not understand about fan cooling?

I was wondering how that small bulb was going to stay cool with almost no heatsink until I scrolled down and saw the fan. Hopefully they used quality parts. I'm concerned about the bulb clogging with dust after a while. You may have to open it and vacuum the dust yearly.

scottwalker99 said:

Why do you say fan cooling is NOT a good idea? It seems to me that fan cooling provides superior cooling as opposed to heat sink only? Is there something I do not understand about fan cooling?

Click to expand...

Will the fan last 22.8 years?

scottwalker99 said:

Why do you say fan cooling is NOT a good idea? It seems to me that fan cooling provides superior cooling as opposed to heat sink only? Is there something I do not understand about fan cooling?

Click to expand...

The main appeal/advantage of LED lighting is the long lifetime. The key to a product that will last a long time is to select components that will live a long time. Anything with moving parts will fail sooner that a similar device with no moving parts. If the fan is built with excellent bearings that are well sealed, and the gunk is cleaned out of the air passages, then it might be fine. This seems unlikely, though.

Aluminum electrolytic caps are another high failure item, and I don't see any in your photos (btw, nice job on the photos!). That's a positive.

Honestly, I don't know of any good way to provide good cooling to a MR-16 bulb without a fan. This is a basic problem with trying to retrofit LEDs into a small enclosed light fixture that was designed for an incandescent bulb.

regards,
Steve K.

This thread is the CREE MR16 REFERENCE DESIGN. It's worth to have a look. http://www.cree.com/products/pdf/XLampMTG_MR16_Ref.pdf

NickBose said:

Will the fan last 22.8 years?

Click to expand...

If it uses a sleeve bearing, I'm betting it won't. Of the CPU fan failures that I've seen, all of them were sleeve bearings. I hope they chose a ball bearing design.

Yuandrew, you should be able to tell the difference by spinning the fan with your finger and watching it closely as it slows to a stop. A ball bearing fan will have a "lumpy" slowdown but a sleeve bearing will cause it to slow down evenly.

you could find a bush bearing that would go the distance. and a crappy ball bearing that wouldnt. what i am sure you wont find is someone thats going to clean the fan periodically, or someone who doesnt giggle a bit at claims of 22.8 years . point 8 gimme a break.

but then i spose if they work ,stay cool , last , give a nice light and i had the right fitting i would try them. maybe a fan is the only way.

i have to ask , the fan is an open system ?

beerwax said:

you could find a bush bearing that would go the distance. and a crappy ball bearing that wouldnt. what i am sure you wont find is someone thats going to clean the fan periodically0

Click to expand...

Point well taken. I've had ball bearing fans fail, primarily from gunk building up.

"Honey, when was the last time you vaccumed the lightbulbs?" :laughing:

PhotonWrangler said:

"Honey, when was the last time you vaccumed the lightbulbs?" :laughing:

Click to expand...

I started to laugh, then I realized it will not be funny when the 100 watt LED equivalents come out later this year.

Update: I called Philips @ 18005550050 (option 1), and asked for information. There are two lines of these lamps, Endura and Ambient. The Endura are the commercial, longer life product. They have lists of compatible dimmers etc, showing tests for 1, 3, 5 and 8 lamps. Guess what, it depends on the model of dimmer and lamp, how many lamps you can have before it flickers. The beam spread angles available are 15,24,36 degrees. Not what I expected from a 'flood' lamp. Customer Service @ Philips can't yet get any product information from Engineering on the Ambient lamps, only for the Endura lamps. They did say the Endura MR16 compatible dimmers also work with the Ambient.

Update: the flashing is almost gone now after a few more hours of operation. I let them rest for a few hours then retried, same performance as when switched off. I did find HD carries one of the "compatible with 8 lamp" dimmers, the DV-600P's.

2 of 6 units purchased have fan vibration by the next day.

I didn't find a beam spread/angle spec, probably less than 60. At about 21" the light fell off substantially (<1/3 of center) by 8" radius.

These lamps are a few bucks cheaper at HD, as of this writing they are 33.

When used with a Hampton Bay track and a Lutron Skylark Contour CTCL-153PDH-WH dimmer there is instability/flashing and it varies by load (1 track of 3 works better than 2 tracks of 3) despite being well within rating limit.

Minor modification was needed to work with the track fixtures. The retainer clips needed a 1/4" trimmer off each end to not interfere with the lamp. The fixture is designed to use a non-fanned lamp and has a removable UV filter that cannot be used (and isn't technically needed for LED) with these lamps. However there is at least an 1/8" of play between the clip and the lamp allowing the lamp to move in the housing. This isn't critical.

I've used three of the AmbientLED MR-16s to replace 50w halogens. To my eye and lux meter they aren't quite as bright, but close enough. Color temp is OK. One of the three has a faint but noticeable whine -- it's obviously the cooling fan. There's a little more glare than the halogens, I think because the emitters are less recessed in the reflector. The beam angle is roughly similar to the 50w halogens. They work OK on my Lutron dimmers. They won't go quite as dim, but are adequate. There's no blinking, surging or strobing. There's a little lip on the circumference that makes a hard fit in some MR16 fixtures. I've tried other brands of LED MR16, but the Phllips is the best I've found -- so far. It's not perfect but not sure there's anything better except for custom designs. After replacing three MR16 and five PAR30 halogens with LED equivalents, my office is a lot cooler.

A Cree-based MR16 using the MT-G emitter might be better, but I haven't found any distributors for that. Would be interested if anyone knows where to get them (retail bi-pin GU5.3 12v dimmable MR16s using MT-G emitter).

The phillips MR16 is made by Tess, the fan used in it is a Sunon fan.

Thanks to this thread, I bought one of these to try at the local Home Depot. The box is nearly identical to the original post, but now says "435 lumens", on the front, rather than 415. Interestingly, the Philips web site only shows the EnduraLED version. It also draws 10 watts, is rated at 475 lumens, and comes in three different color temps.

My house uses 50 watt MR16s mounted in downlights with gimbal trim as "wall washers". Magnetic transformers. Replaced one of the halogen MR16s and the LED bulb is *way* brighter. No test equipment needed, as there is nearby MR16 on the same wall for easy comparison. May not be a totally fair comparison though, as the old MR16 probably had 3000 hours of use. I could see the 'tint' on the bulb, and some degradation of the reflector. The nearby MR16s are the same age. Also, they are on dimmers which, at full brightness, only provide 95% of max power. (Thanks to California Title 24...)

In the 'high use' areas of our house, and given the outrageous Tier 2 and Tier 3 electric rates around here, I figure they will pay for themselves in less than six months.

wws944 said:

My house uses 50 watt MR16s mounted in downlights with gimbal trim as "wall washers". Magnetic transformers. Replaced one of the halogen MR16s and the LED bulb is *way* brighter.

Click to expand...

Cool! Can you share some pictures showing the comparison?

PhotonWrangler said:

Cool! Can you share some pictures showing the comparison?

Click to expand...

To make the comparison fair, I need to compare it to a halogen MR16 that has a lot fewer hours on it. The one I replaced looks like it was probably on the verge of burning out. (E.g., dark tint on the enclosed capsule, some flaking of the aluminum on the reflector.) Its mates in the room are the same age, and probably in the same condition. Might have time to do it this weekend.