LED Factory Lighting – making the right choices?

If chosen wisely, LED Factory Lighting will save you substantial energy costs when compared to conventional lighting, but with so many choices available how do you ensure you are making the right purchasing decisions to protect your investment in LED Factory Lighting?

Any LED specialist is going to tell you that their product is fantastic and will outperform others, but with so many stories of premature failures and Companies refusing to support their warranties, how can you protect yourself?

LED technology is still relatively new and there is still a lot to learn, during the early LED lighting revolution in 2010, many importers were selling LED Factory Lighting as a solution that would last forever and be maintenance free. Many users have been caught out financially and seen premature failures and substantial lumen losses due to poor quality LED technology.

Before you invest in LED Factory Lighting, ask the following questions:

1. What is the warranty on the product and what is included/excluded? Are there limitations on operating hours and ambient temperatures? Does the warranty include lumen depreciation?
2. How long has the Company been in existence? Can I speak to some of your customers who have had product installed for more than 3 years?
3. What LED’s and Drivers are used? Can they provide the actual model numbers? If you have this information, you can investigate the projected performance of the LED and Drivers rather than just being told it is a Bridgelux LED for example. There are many different types of LEDs and quality and brightness ranges throughout a specific manufacturers portfolio.
4. Has the product been independently tested by a 3^rd Party to confirm the safety and performance of the product? You cannot always rely on the importers test certification as being authentic and the CE mark is effectively worthless unless you have sight of the certification to back up the importers declarations.
5. Memberships of Associations and ISO 9001 Certifications do not confirm or endorse the quality of the product. Be wary of suppliers using this as an indication of quality products.
6. Do you have any long terms test data showing how the complete luminaire will perform over 6000 hours of use? All LED manufacturers will be able to offer some form of IES LM80/TM21 data that shows and projects how an LED will perform over 6000 hours, but unless you have access to long term lumen testing of a complete luminaire [fitting] you only have half the information and can be misled by not knowing what LED is actually within the fitting.

What makes an LED Luminaire last?

A correctly designed LED luminaire will last if designed correctly and uses quality components:

Thermal Management is a critical part of any luminaire design, not only the LED’s but more importantly, the LED driver that contains many heat sensitive electrical components. To simply mount an LED driver on the top of an LED heat sink without any detailed thermal testing and analysis is never going to provide a long term reliable solution. At BSSLED, we thermally test all our products to work in ambient temperatures of between 40°C – 50°C depending on the product group. This information is available to potential customers.

Unlike many of our competitors, we use bespoke aluminium extruded finned heat sinks to keep the LED’s well below the maximum junction [operating] temperature. To simply bolt a high powered LED board to a piece of powder coated sheet steel shows a total lack of knowledge on LED thermal management.

Design the LED array to be under driven so not to overstress the LED with too higher current. The higher you drive an LED the higher the light output but also the lower the life cycle. LED drive currents vary from one LED type to another, but any supplier should be able to provide you with the maximum drive current and the actual drive current. Once again, without knowing the LED specification, this information is worthless.

Lumen Output is important, but where the light goes is possibly more important. LED Factory Lighting can be made up of LED Low Bays and LED High Bays depending on the mounting height and other factors. We are often asked for a 200-watt high bay from prospective customers and when we question what is being replaced, they advise it’s a 400-watt metal halide. Our 150 watt LED High Bay is specifically designed to replace a 400-watt metal halide and uses specific optical lenses to place the light where needed. Many imported LED High Bays use unlensed LEDs and therefore need a much higher wattage to give the same light output due to the amount of light wasted/absorbed due to lack of light control.

Why BSSLED?

Established in 2010, BSSLED manufacture all our products in the UK using Osram LEDs and Drivers.

We include a full 5-year warranty including lumen depreciation on all our products.

Our LED Low Bay is the only industrial LED Factory Lighting product verified by the LIA Labs and been tested to IES LM84 long term lumen test showing just a 2.5% lumen loss after 6000 hours.

We offer a full lighting design service and site visits if necessary and have product available for immediate delivery.

And the most competitive prices in the UK!

For more information, contact us at info@bssled.com or call us on 01670 432400