Wednesday, December 20, 2023

Using LED's to replace the flourescent bulbs in a street sign

UPDATE: the 5630 LED's are burning out after only two months of operation!

I have been using LED strips to replace the flourescent bulbs in a street sign.  My first attempts was to wrap the LED strips around the dead light bulbs.  That did not work that well.  My next attempt is to make a signboard and cover it with eight LED strips on each side.This will require 12 volts at 20 amps to run it! I switched the power to wire nuts and 12 volt 10 amp power supplies after this picture was taken. The barrel connectors in the picture got really hot.


This is the sign with the old LED strips wrapped around the bulbs.


This is the LED's that I am using in the new sign lighting panel.


WARNING!  The finished product was Light Blue in color, not white as was expected.  I am not sure what caused that as there are multiple power supplies involved.  However my pictures show it as whte.

Another issue is that the LED strips are falling down!  I had glued then with E6000 glue in at least three places (Each end and in the middle) but that and the adhesive that came on them were not sufficient!


Bad news: After only two months many of the LED's have burned out!  It cannot be the power suppy as there are two of them from different companies.


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