Brooklyn Bridge Goes LED

[Ken_McE]

100 watt HID mercury bulbs to be swapped out for 24 watt LEDs:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/200...ooklyn_bridge_to_have_lowerwattage_led-2.html

*Where can I lay my hands on one of those 24 watt LEDs...?*

 

[EricB]

I didn't think they were bright enough for that yet. I imagine these must be some expensive high end ones for them to be bright enough to actually replace HID's, and on such a landmark structure, of all things.
Also in the news here in NY is that one of our buses is also having the interior replaced with LED's. I was wondering when they were going to start doing that. This, plus Rockefeller Center and the New Year's ball. So many conversions is such a short period of time! This could be the year of the LED; unless there are even more rapid conversions and developments in store in the following years!

 

[PhotonWrangler]

I gather that each 24-watt LED is probably an assembly of several LEDs. I'd like to see what they plan to deploy there.

 

[TPA]

I didn't think they were bright enough for that yet. I imagine these must be some expensive high end ones for them to be bright enough to actually replace HID's, and on such a landmark structure, of all things.
Also in the news here in NY is that one of our buses is also having the interior replaced with LED's. I was wondering when they were going to start doing that. This, plus Rockefeller Center and the New Year's ball. So many conversions is such a short period of time! This could be the year of the LED; unless there are even more rapid conversions and developments in store in the following years!

I hope they put some red LEDs in there to help boost color rendering. Littlite does this with their gooseneck LED lamps and it works wonders.

 

[RGB_LED]

This is very cool. It looks like city officials are finally seeing the cost-benefit from LED's... As EricB says, this could very well be the year of the LED.

Reminds me also of the CN Tower that recently replaced all their conventional lights with LED's. http://www.cntower.ca/portal/GetPage.aspx?at=1577. It's sometimes a bit gaudy when they light it up for special occasions but it's cool that they implemented something like this on such as massive scale. There's a YouTube video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cpv3GQFLDbU and the company who did the work is called... http://www.colorkinetics.com/.

 

[EricB]

I hope they put some red LEDs in there to help boost color rendering. Littlite does this with their gooseneck LED lamps and it works wonders.

The current mercuries are basically the same color as the average white LED; at least the "pure" white ones used in standard bulb replacements (not the really bluish whites used for decoration, of course). So there should not be any color rendering issue. When I got my first white LED (a penlight), I had always said it was like a "micro mercury".

Besides, color rendering if it was needed would probably be done on the phosphor level anyway (since that's how they make these new "Warmer" colors coning out now).

 

[VanIsleDSM]

Yes, you'll see the phosphor glow much more red in a warm white LED.. but you can achieve better efficacy by using red LED lighting and normal white LEDs, as we all know how much more efficient they are than warm white.

This is only handy in an array though... and obviously costs more to implement.