Lighting questions

[dar636]

Hello - Our boat is as built, still having the 32v and 120v lighting in each space. I've done the easy LED upgrades on the majority of the 120v circuits most of which are run off of the inverter when away from shore power, an Outback 3200w inverter/charger. I have not gone through replacing bulbs with LED's on the 32v circuits yet.

I am at a crossroads and trying to understand which path makes the most sense from a power usage standpoint. Light quality on the 32v side is a consideration too.

For instance, in the engine and genny rooms there are 4' 120v fluorescent fixtures and 32v bulbs in those glass hurricane enclosures. In the heads there are the Hatteras combination fixtures with small 120v fluorescents and 32v incandescent lamps.

Does it makes more sense to convert to LED 120v fixtures, or to convert the 32v fixtures to LED? I'm not sure what is most efficient - to reduce loads on the inverted 120v circuits, or to upgrade the light quality on the 32v side?

Additionally the wife and daughter generally select the 120v light simply because they are brighter than the 32v option. I am leaning towards upgrading the 120v side and deleting the 32v circuits.

Except for the working spaces I am trying to keep the LED colors in the warm spectrum, so far so good, I'd appreciate hearing what others have decided.

 

[Photolomy]

All of our 120v lights are LED now. That is pretty simple to do. Some bulbs are full size and some (in the recessed lighting) are smaller size, but all with the same size screw on part. LED strips in the heads. And like you, that is predominately what we use.

However, there are a couple 32v lights we do use. There is a hallway light, I believe the salon light, and of course the ER lights. I do have 120v LED in the ER as well, but the switch is harder to get to and when I am just popping in I use the original ER lights. And we definitely used the 32v lights when the marina shuts the power off prior to a hurricane. We don't live on the boat then, but we do come aboard a lot to prepare and check on things and having lighting means a lot.

I too was on the fence about maintaining the 32v side, but I found that there are enough 32v bulbs available to maintain the 32v system with minimal effort. The only issue I ran into was the recessed 32v lighting in the hallway. A normal sized bulb won't fit. The bulb part is too large. And I couldn't find any of the original tube like small 32v bulbs. I have found these to work really well, though I can't say yet how many years they last (probably many since we do not live aboard)...

https://store.marinebeam.com/32v-edison-screw-base-led-bulb-for-32vdc-systems/

Note that there are two versions, one with a globe and one without. The non globe version can fit in the recessed lighting and the globe versions can fit in the larger fixtures (such as the ER or galley ceiling lights).

For the smaller 32v bulbs, there seems to be plenty available and we stocked up on spares in the various sizes. From the indicator lights to the dome lights.

Anyways, with that LED option, now we have all the 32v bulbs we need and it is easy to keep the 32v side fully functional.

 

[oscarvan]

I believe all of my 120 is LED, and I'm about halfway through the 32V system.

 

[Captain Ralph]

As they fail, our 120v florescent lights get replaced with the new LED tubes.
In the engine room, they are better than the original gas tubes.

Thank you for the 32V, Edison bulb info.
These will work great on our 43 year old Bertram.

 

[Scarlett]

We anchor out a lot and have completely converted to 120 volt LED’s in all spaces running off the same inverter you have and for us that works perfectly. Of course we are careful to only use the lights that are needed and keeping un needed light turned off. We also have 400 watts of solar power that keeps us charged up pretty well during the day and running the generator for cooking usually keeps us charged up pretty well. John

 

[metama]

For the Engine room lights on the 32V side put higher output 32V LED. It basically matched having the room with 2-3 tubes on the 120 side. I don't have to use the 120 it's so bright. I still need to pull down the 120 tubes for 120 LED replacement.

 

[dar636]

Thanks for the info, the link to marinebeams was useful. Yesterday I replaced the ER fluorescents with LED T8 bulbs and new ballasts, approx $20 per fixture. Nice result.

Then I went through the boat and pulled all the interior bulbs out making note of which fixtures are 32v or 120v so I can put together an order for LED replacements. This includes the 1228 bayonet style (10ea) too, there'll just be a few non LED lamps left after this point. Might be pricey, I will advise!

 

[Westfield 11]

I finished switching over the last of my 32v incandescent bulbs to LED. I used the small 5w 4000-4500k bulbs from Watt-a-Light in the heads and showers and the full sized ones in 10w for the engine rooms, hallway and generator room, all in 4000-4500k. Many of the replaced bulbs were warm 3000-3500k LED bulbs which were just not bright enough IMHO.

Color temperature is critical, while the warm 3000-3500k bulbs look more natural the bright white 4000-4500k bulbs just throw more light and for engineering spaces and hallways light is more important than color.

 

[Westfield 11]

All of our 120v lights are LED now. That is pretty simple to do. Some bulbs are full size and some (in the recessed lighting) are smaller size, but all with the same size screw on part. LED strips in the heads. And like you, that is predominately what we use.

However, there are a couple 32v lights we do use. There is a hallway light, I believe the salon light, and of course the ER lights. I do have 120v LED in the ER as well, but the switch is harder to get to and when I am just popping in I use the original ER lights. And we definitely used the 32v lights when the marina shuts the power off prior to a hurricane. We don't live on the boat then, but we do come aboard a lot to prepare and check on things and having lighting means a lot.

I too was on the fence about maintaining the 32v side, but I found that there are enough 32v bulbs available to maintain the 32v system with minimal effort. The only issue I ran into was the recessed 32v lighting in the hallway. A normal sized bulb won't fit. The bulb part is too large. And I couldn't find any of the original tube like small 32v bulbs. I have found these to work really well, though I can't say yet how many years they last (probably many since we do not live aboard)...

https://store.marinebeam.com/32v-edison-screw-base-led-bulb-for-32vdc-systems/

Note that there are two versions, one with a globe and one without. The non globe version can fit in the recessed lighting and the globe versions can fit in the larger fixtures (such as the ER or galley ceiling lights).

For the smaller 32v bulbs, there seems to be plenty available and we stocked up on spares in the various sizes. From the indicator lights to the dome lights.

Anyways, with that LED option, now we have all the 32v bulbs we need and it is easy to keep the 32v side fully functional.

Watt-a-Light has small size 32v led bulbs for the hallways, closets and heads/showers in 3 and 5 watt and in warm and bright white. They are same small Edison base, but are just a bit smaller than the incandescent ones. These are the globe type, not the exposed LED type, but the globe can be twisted off if you want the bare led type.

 

[riverrandy]

I have slowly been replacing all my 120v with LED. Recently I found 32v medium base "standard" looking light bulbs on Amazon that work much better than the 32v bulbs from Anchor! especially in the ER light fixtures. I am making my way through the entire boat with these.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07QCP32WS/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1