You spent a fair bit of money getting just the right fixtures for your retail space, restaurant, manufacturing plant, event venue, warehouse, or whatever—they match your decor, they still work great, and you don't want to go to the expense and effort of replacing them all. Is there a simpler way to replace your fluorescent, halogen, metal halide, high pressure sodium vapor and other inefficient lighting technologies without having to do rip everything out and start from scratch?
Good news: yes, you can!
There are a number of LED solutions on the market today to make upgrading to LED simple, whether it's office lighting or high-power parking lot lights you're looking to make more efficient and get a longer operating life out of. In this article, we look at some of your options.
The Very Easiest: Replacing the Bulbs in Standard Lamps
You can find LED lamp bulbs anywhere from Walmart to Lowes to ELEDLights that you simply screw into your lamp, and voilà —you're saving energy and enjoying an average of 30,000 hours of operating life. There's no rewiring required, no need to replace your lamps or standard ceiling fixtures.
The same is true for PAR, R, and BR and lights—just screw in the new bulb and you're ready to go.
Also Easy: Replacing Fluorescent Tubes with LED
Ballast-compatible LED tubes are swap-out replacements that "just work" in fluorescent fixtures with magnetic ballasts and most electronic ballasts. They can also be used in ballast-free fixtures, or a fixture with a dead ballast—simply rewire the fixture to bypass the ballast. This means that your LED tube can outlast your ballast, and you won't need to spend money on a replacement ballast.
Almost As Easy: Replacing Fluorescent Tubes with LED Retrofits
These LED tubes work without a ballast, so to make them work with your existing fluorescent fixtures—regardless of what kind of ballast they have—you simply rewire the fixture to bypass the ballast. It's an easy fix that a qualified electrician can make quick work of.
Also Very Easy: Replacing Higher-Power E26/E27-Base Lights
Corn lights with E26/E27 bases—the most common light bulb base—can be used to replace halogen, CFL, metal halide, and other HID lamps up to 200W. These are found in wall packs, downlights, ceiling lights, low bay and shop lights, and other applications. As with standard light bulbs, you simply screw these in.
Almost as Easy: Replacing High-Power E39/E40-Base Lights
For lamps with mogul bases—including wall packs, parking lot lights, security lights, high and low bay fixtures, and more—corn lights are available with E39/E40-compatible bases. To run LED lights in E39/E40 sockets, you'll need to wire the power directly to the socket, bypassing any ballasts or capacitors. This, again, is a quick fix for a qualified electrician and saves you the expense of a brand new fixture and the installation costs for same.
Take a look at the retrofit LED lighting options carried by ELEDLights, all designed to give you the benefits of LED lighting while saving the expense of replacing your existing fixtures.