Can light bulbs make a difference?

[Dave2002]

Now probably back to the original incandescent bulb. I ordered some (2) LEDs from that well known river place, and they arrived quickly. I only tested one - but I assume they are both functional. However in the dimming modes with my lamp they make a noise. This would perhaps not always matter, but it's for a bedroom, so really not great. Contacted am.uk but they don't have any better product that they know about, so have issued a refund. I suppose I'll just have to make sure that I turn the light off during daylight and/or peak period hours to keep costs down. The 100 W incandescent bulb does not make a distracting noise, even if dimmed.

[Bryn]

Now probably back to the original incandescent bulb. I ordered some (2) LEDs from that well known river place, and they arrived quickly. I only tested one - but I assume they are both functional. However in the dimming modes with my lamp they make a noise. This would perhaps not always matter, but it's for a bedroom, so really not great. Contacted am.uk but they don't have any better product that they know about, so have issued a refund. I suppose I'll just have to make sure that I turn the light off during daylight and/or peak period hours to keep costs down. The 100 W incandescent bulb does not make a distracting noise, even if dimmed.

See https://blog.recessedlighting.com/led-buzzing/

[Dave2002]

See https://blog.recessedlighting.com/led-buzzing/

I can't say I like that procedure mentioned in that article. It wouldn't help anyway - though the one thing I could try is to see if the other bulb of the two I ordered buzzes in the same way. The dimmer is in the lamp base, and I don't intend to replace that because of the bulbs.

If it wasn't in a bedroom lamp I might just live with it, but for bedrooms this is no good.

[Bryn]

Some points worth making, here: https://www.howtogeek.com/865953/rea...t-prematurely/

[Dave2002]

Some points worth making, here: https://www.howtogeek.com/865953/rea...t-prematurely/

Recently had other issues with LED bulbs - in two different locations. Firstly, in our kitchen, we have a fitting which contains 4 x MR16 bulbs to light up a counter top. We have found up to now that some of the brightest and whitest give the best light. However recently one or more failed, so tried to get replacements. Some of the bulbs have terrible flickering. I think this may be due to the transformer used to drive them, which presumably was intended for halogen lights. No amount of replacing with different bulbs has solved this problem. Replacing the transformer is not a good option - as it would be difficult, perhaps expensive, and not guaranteed to work. The other case is of a light fitting for a utility room. The fitting presumably has its own voltage reduction circuits (transformer or whatever - maybe some form of switch mode PSU) as it seems to be a complete integrated unit. This one flashes rapidly, and it is impossible to live with. I think we might still be in time to return the LEDs, which were sold as "halogen replacements". This is completely unsatisfactory. The kitchen light unit is just about bearable if one alternative make of LED is put into the unit, though that then results in a different overall quality - with white light covering most of the counter top, but the light from the inserted bulb is yellower, and generally weaker. There is a limit to how many times I want to fiddle around trying to get satisfactory lighting - so we'll probably live with this somewhat unsatisfactory compromise.

Halogen bulbs, which might work in the utility room fitting now seem to be almost unobtainable - which is probably overall a good thing - but at least in the short term trying to get satisfactory light from the fitting seems impossible, so it'll probably have to be replaced. This is a real nuisance given that the room really does need to have acceptable lighting, and that replacing a light fitting is almost inevitably going to be more difficult and expensive than simply changing a bulb.