GASP ! An LED light bulb that lasted five years!

[paulg]

We’ve got a lot of lighting in this house and some years ago I decided to change to LED light bulbs.
Concurrent to that I was working for a large Japanese company that entered the LED lighting arena. Our group was setting up some testing and QC by coincidence.
And so I purchased various brands of LED lamps for use throughout the house and found that their lifespans were generally terrible. The quality of one brand was so bad that two fell apart in my hands when new; I took those to work for “show and tell”. I don’t see that brand on the market anymore and few of the other lamps lasted one year.
I got so frustrated with intermittent blinking ceiling lamps that I elected to replace almost all the lamps with an arbitrary brand. After that my ceiling lamp failures greatly reduced.
One of those lamps finally failed and it is a “Green Watt” lamp. Note that I put the date of installation on the lamps nowadays to see how long they last. The kitchen has twelve of these lamps and this was the first to go.
I cannot remember where I bought this lamp! Oh well, I’ll try my local ACE first.
In the future I will print the place of purchase next to the date of purchase.

 

[mattl]

 

My entire house is LED lit.  Many are on smart devices to come on at dusk and go off at various times, some dusk to dawn. Many have been in use over 5 years and it's very rare for one to go out. Most are from well know brands, some are store brands. Overall I have zero complaints, and a well lit home for very little cost.

 

[cfz2882]

12years :

I have had an outdoor LOA brand par lamp on constant since 2010-it has dimmed quite a bit and color has shifted toward blue...

 

[ea56]

Most all of our lights are now LED bulbs. They seem to last a bit longer than CFL’s and much longer that incandescent bulbs, with one remarkable exception. We moved into our home at the end of September 1994, so we are fast approaching 28 years here. In the closet under the stairs where the electric water heater is located and we have a pantry the lone incandescent light bulb is the same bulb that was in the socket when we bought the home. Its a 75 watt Sylvania. I have no idea how long it as in use before we moved in almost 28 years ago. But this has to be some kind of record. And BTW, this bulb is turned off and on at least 10 or more times everyday.

Eddie

 

[appnut]

Eddie, I have a light bulb for my hall light that's original to the house when it was completed July 1984. It's not used very often.

 

[ea56]

Wow Bob, thats 10 years longer than my Sylvania incandescent bulb! I just can’t bear to take this bulb out of use, I have to see for myself how long its gonna last.

Eddie

 

[bradfordwhite]

The secret to those bulbs lasting like that is most likely the fact you only have it on for a few minutes at a time. It never gets hot enough to "burn up".

 

[mattl]

Most incandescent bulbs fail when turned on due to the sudden surge of current through the filament. Dimmers tamed that surge and helped bulbs last longer.

 

Odds are these long lived incandescent bulbs where some of the bulbs that were manufactured with heavier filaments often branded long life that were often placed in hard to reach areas.

 

[lakewebsterkid]

LED

We had quite a few LED bulbs make it past 5 years, though we rarely use lights.

 

[sudsmaster]

I've replaced just about all the incandescent bulbs here with LED's.

Even some linear (shop light) fluorescent bulbs, too.

Also replaced some microwave bulbs with LED versions, although in one microwave oven the LED bulb has gone out. I don't know why, it's kind of a chore to extract the oven from its perch and figure out what the problem is.

 

[paulg]

Went to buy Greenwatt and couldn’t find them

I knew I bought them locally, not on-line. Couldn’t find them. Went with FEIT which has fared well in this house too.
My minor detective work reveals not-so-sunny reviews for Greenwatt. Go figure. I have no good data anymore as to who is making LED lamps and which are good / bad…. IF such information is even available.
This time I dated the lamp and put the place of purchase. I’ll never be able to shut off my QC past…. Sigh.

 

[circlew]

I bought some Ledvance Sylvania LED bulbs a couple years ago, which are made in USA. These have glass bulbs instead of plastic, and put out a very good light - I can't tell any difference between these and incandescent ones.