Streetlight LED Conversion

[danbrotherston]

I guess faulty units have a tendency to fail early?

Unsure if there would be a point of having random lights turned off.

Where I work we spent $100G converting everything to LED.  Supposed to pay for itself with a few years, but already the lights are burning out at a quicker pace than the old fluorescent and realizing now it won't pay for itself, ever.

If they are failures, what you are seeing is early failures, those do not have any reflection on the long term reliability of the lights.  Generally the cause is manufacturing defect, or installation error.

I don't know about your workplace, but there was a pilot testing these lights here.  Additionally, I believe they are under warranty.

[Canard]

We switched all our fluorescent tubes at our shop to LED a year ago and haven’t had a single failure. I’d estimate we have a couple of hundred of them.

[Coke6pk]

I've only had one issue with an LED failure, and the manufacturer quickly replaced the item at no cost.

Coke

[tomh009]

Agreed. From a commercial point of view, the big cost savings is in labour (for not doing replacements), not in replacement bulb cost or electricity cost.

Our condo building (136 units) replaced everything and we have had just a single failure, of a parking deck light controller (not the LED itself).

[jeffster]

Unsure if there would be a point of having random lights turned off.

Where I work we spent $100G converting everything to LED.  Supposed to pay for itself with a few years, but already the lights are burning out at a quicker pace than the old fluorescent and realizing now it won't pay for itself, ever.

If they are failures, what you are seeing is early failures, those do not have any reflection on the long term reliability of the lights.  Generally the cause is manufacturing defect, or installation error.

I don't know about your workplace, but there was a pilot testing these lights here.  Additionally, I believe they are under warranty.

Hopefully that's all it is...

[Ace]

Did anyone notice these LEDS burn out quickly? In the Homer-Watson Stirling area, about 4 burnt out already...in what, 4 weeks?? Or is it a software issue?

The LEDs should not be failing this early. It's likely an issue with the photocell atop the light which instructs it when to turn on/off. This is also why you'll see some of them stuck on during the day. 

Report the addresses to the Region and I'm sure they'll have them fixed promptly. 

I've not seen exactly what the region's installing but here's an image from a similar project I've worked on. 

[timc]

AFAIK, Kitchener isn't using photocells on their lights.

[Square]

AFAIK, Kitchener isn't using photocells on their lights.

Kitchener is using the photocells until the networked system becomes live.

[timc]

Kitchener is using the photocells until the networked system becomes live.

Good to know!

[Square]

I think the network lights in Kitchener are live. Today at 4:57pm, all the lights in my neighborhood went on at the same time!

[Canard]

This might seem like a silly question, but are the lights on the Spur Line trail also networked?

Why I ask: we were parked in the lot off of Regina on the trail watching LRV 504 roll by Thursday evening, when suddenly, every single light on the trail went off and back on briefly - maybe 0.5 seconds. It was so strange!

[Pheidippides]

Could be that the photocells are just really sensitive? Walking along Spadina the other night right around dusk a similar thing happened all the lights within about 100m in either direction came on, but then went off very quickly, but that happened to correspond with some clouds moving brisk out of the way of the setting sun so it got brighter again momentarily.

Could the lights along the spur just have been tricked by the lights from the train momentarily?

[ijmorlan]

Could be that the photocells are just really sensitive? Walking along Spadina the other night right around dusk a similar thing happened all the lights within about 100m in either direction came on, but then went off very quickly, but that happened to correspond with some clouds moving brisk out of the way of the setting sun so it got brighter again momentarily.

Could the lights along the spur just have been tricked by the lights from the train momentarily?

Unlikely. If they aren’t networked, they will all have slightly different thresholds and so will not respond precisely equally to a change in illumination. There will always be some non-synchrony in when they turn the lights on or off.

[Canard]

Right, that's what I was thinking - just didn't know how to word it. Even if the power was cut, and restored, briefly - they would all flicker to life at slightly different times (tenths of second differences). But they literally like BOOM BOOM all went off and on again. I could have sworn it got brighter, first, but it might just be my imagination.

[Pheidippides]

Software agreement for streetlights (to dim and turn on/off etc.) up for approval (page 41).

Staff are now saying that the payback period for the return on investment has been reduced from 8 years to 5.5 years.