LED replacements for salon lighting

[stevewitt1]

Hello All
One of my projects this winter is to replace those fixtures that slide. (mine work on their own schedule and sometimes come on by themselves having been left off center)
I want LED and more light than the factory gave my boat when it assumed that I'm some sort of a mole or other nocturnal creature.  I also prefer to spend my time on the hook.(too cheap to pay transient fees) so, of course, I want the best of both worlds, more light and less power consumption.
What have others used to replace with?

Steve
visit us at www.ocontoyachtclub.com

[patrice]

Hi,

If you know the type of socket you need.
You can check there
Deal xtreme, with a search of led bulb.

http://dx.com/s/led+bulb

[stevewitt1]

I really want to replace those fixtures.  I prefer not to just replace the bulb.

[Ron Hill]

Steve : Look in any of the marine catalogs and pick the fixture that turns you on!!  Then get an LED bulb to fit that fixture.

Personally, I put new LED festoon bulbs (superbrightled.com) in my "sliders" and am happy!! A thought

[stevewitt1]

Thanks Ron
I just seem to have issues with the sliders.  Mostly I slide and then they might or might not make contact.  I often slide through center.  I haven't tried to disassemble and lube, but see that as a temp fix.  Are you happy with the light from the festoon?  I replaced my festoon lights in my Bayliner 3270 with festoon but was very disappointed with the light output but then they didn't have those little yellow square HO LED's in them.
Steve

visit us at www.ocontoyachtclub.com

[Fuzzy]

Steve:
I agree with you, the slider light fixtures are the worst piece of crap anyone could have designed.
I replaced mine with flourescent fixtures w/real switches on them.  I'm happy with those but I know
if they were LED's they would use less power.  I imagine you could find similar size/style fixtures
with LED's.
Larry

[TonyP]

We have replaced all our bulbs with LED replacements ... not cheap but supposed longer life and of course less power consumption
Go for it

Tony

[Albreen]

I took the recommendation I found here on the forum in another posting for this interior cabin LED light from Sailors Solutions and have been very happy with the look, brightness and color of the light itself. I installed one fixture this past summer to be sure I liked the light overall and will now replace two other halogen gooseneck lights in the salon added by the PO. Only drawback is I had to add a piece of teak to back the light placed on the upper teak interior rail. Not very difficult, but another step in the process. 

http://www.sailorssolutions.com/?page=ProductDetails&Item=SBSB01

[Jeff Tancock]

HI guys,
I too installed the Sensibulb (chrome edition) from Sailor's Solution. I replaced my 4 berth lights and they are a fantastic improvement in the berths. My sliders also have to be replaced....one is broken and one is a pathetic fluorescent installed by the PO and one has LED replacements for the festoons. The light from the festoon replacements aren't very nice on the eyes. I was looking at the fluorescent replacement that Sailors Solution has and wondered if any one has experience with them. I had thought that the Sensibulb lights wouldn't really be great in the saloon. Maybe I will have a look at that option.....Any other thoughts out there?

[stevewitt1]

Jeff
I also have a light that mounts on the aft side of the mast in the salon along with a compass below it.  This add on, believe it or not, is probably the most useful light in the main salon.  Now I want to find a good LED conversion for it. It has a 15mm (1156) base, I believe, and the light comes out the sides too so I think there are some viable conversion LEDs.  I wanted to post a pic of it but don't know how.
Steve

visit us at www.ocontoyachtclub.com

[Stu Jackson]

I wanted to post a pic of it but don't know how.

Steve,

The search engine on this board is pretty good.  I typed in "posting photos" with the quotation marks as suggested in the stickies  (A Quick Start Guide -- a.k.a. Too Much Information on this Website):

http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,3701.0.html

added to "101 Topics"

[Ron Hill]

Guys : A little "turner cleaner" does wonders on the slider contacts!!  A thought

[stevewitt1]

Thank You Stu and Ron, I'll try some tuner cleaner

[Indian Falls]

You can now get water proof LED rope or strip light.  I made my own using strip LEDs from Allied Electronics, they did not have water proof at the time so I pulled mine through some clear shrink tubing. I used screw mount zip ties and put 17 feet of led strip light under the lip of the teak rail under the ports in the salon on both sides.  Awesome light!  I used the same stuff to replace the guts of the 12 volt fluorescent light in the head.  I posted some of this, a quick search for leds should yield all the projects done by other members.

don't search for just   led   search for "led" and you get all the pertinent posts.

[Clay Greene]

We replaced the bulbs in the sliding fixtures with Imtra Festoon bulbs.  They produce more light with 1/10th of the power consumption.  Not cheap, however - I think each bulb was $15 or so. 

We also replaced the fixture in the galley with Dr. John LED under counter fixtures.  We liked this so much that we bought a second for the same space but slighly aft and another for the port side above the electrical panel.  You can get these with a red light option, which is what we have in the galley for night sailing.  The fixtures were about $50.  This would be an option for replacing the sliders. 

Speaking of Sailor's Solutions, I noticed on their website that they have a device you can attach to the electrical panel to turn your boat lights on and off remotely.  That may make it onto the Christmas list.