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I wish I could get bulbs that are easily repairable. Zigbee bulbs I bought ~7 years ago have started failing in a very specific way, the smart functionality sto

I wish I could get bulbs that are easily repairable. Zigbee bulbs I bought ~7 years ago have started failing in a very specific way, the smart functionality stops working intermittently then entirely, but they work fine as dumb bulbs after that point. I'd like to see bulbs that can be assembled by hand in order: socket, controller, LEDs, enclosure. This way if any one part fails I only need to replace that part. Parts that have failed can be sent back and recycled.

SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
>I'd like to see bulbs that can be assembled by hand in order: socket, controller, LEDs, enclosure. I'll bet you dollars that none of those things are failing. It's very likely capacitors. To make these cost effective, they have AC/DC converters and aren't putting a ton of love into SMPS buck switching. They're choosing the cheapest components pushed to their limits. Or, just plain don't care at all. The rated hours of a typical electrolytic cap is something like 2000 hours at it's rating and at 20ºC which these are not. So if you need more than that you over-rate it. But that's expensive, and someone will look at it and say "You have 12VAC, you can buy a 16V cap and that's all". Without too fine a point on the underlying issue... Stop buying future-trash made by people that really don't care what they're making.
- sokoloff 3y ago
  > "You have 12VAC, you can buy a 16V cap and that's all" 12VAC has an RMS measure of 12 volts but a peak voltage of ~17V. (I'm not saying that no one's done exactly that, but when they did, they were operating outside the rating in the first 1/120th of a second of operation.)
  - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
    I threw numbers out. But in many applications in many circuits with many aluminum electrolytics that would still be fine. It's tantalums that you super-duper do not ever exceed the rated voltage of, and double that for reverse polarity.
dontlaugh 3y ago
A widespread DC socket standard for LEDs would go a long way towards this. The fitting could then do the AC to DC conversion separately and could house any controller, but the LEDs itself would be very simple.
- SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
  >A widespread DC socket standard for LEDs would go a long way towards this. I can see California behind a tree rubbing it's hands together.
  - dontlaugh 3y ago
    I’m too European to get that. Would you not like a DC light socket standard? It’s quite the waste to have AC to DC happen in every light bulb.
    - lostlogin 3y ago
      Poe might be an option. It would also reduce the amount of crappy devices taking up WiFi bandwidth. It would be a pain to retro fit though.
      - watermelon0 3y ago
        AFAIK lightning solutions using PoE already exist in commercial space. For general use, I'd assume that PoE hardware/software is a bit too expensive, but maybe we can have similarly priced bulbs/lightstrips than Philips Hue.
      - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
        Eh... not a great fit. POE++ Super Extra is 100W per port. Figure a dumb 75W-equivilent is like 10-14W. You get maybe 8 bulbs per run assuming everything is exactly as rated. But specifying doesn't work like that. You won't know if someone will plug in 24W bulbs. You need to plan sockets for the most someone could use. If you wanted DC retrofit, you would be better of doing it at the light switch and just using the same wiring and sockets.
pbhjpbhj 3y ago
Does "right to repair" help? Can you in theory replace controller boards?

SV_BubbleTime 3y ago

>I'd like to see bulbs that can be assembled by hand in order: socket, controller, LEDs, enclosure. I'll bet you dollars that none of those things are failing. It's very likely capacitors. To make these cost effective, they have AC/DC converters and aren't putting a ton of love into SMPS buck switching. They're choosing the cheapest components pushed to their limits. Or, just plain don't care at all. The rated hours of a typical electrolytic cap is something like 2000 hours at it's rating and at 20ºC which these are not. So if you need more than that you over-rate it. But that's expensive, and someone will look at it and say "You have 12VAC, you can buy a 16V cap and that's all". Without too fine a point on the underlying issue... Stop buying future-trash made by people that really don't care what they're making.

sokoloff 3y ago
> "You have 12VAC, you can buy a 16V cap and that's all" 12VAC has an RMS measure of 12 volts but a peak voltage of ~17V. (I'm not saying that no one's done exactly that, but when they did, they were operating outside the rating in the first 1/120th of a second of operation.)
- SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
  I threw numbers out. But in many applications in many circuits with many aluminum electrolytics that would still be fine. It's tantalums that you super-duper do not ever exceed the rated voltage of, and double that for reverse polarity.

dontlaugh 3y ago

A widespread DC socket standard for LEDs would go a long way towards this. The fitting could then do the AC to DC conversion separately and could house any controller, but the LEDs itself would be very simple.

SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
>A widespread DC socket standard for LEDs would go a long way towards this. I can see California behind a tree rubbing it's hands together.
- dontlaugh 3y ago
  I’m too European to get that. Would you not like a DC light socket standard? It’s quite the waste to have AC to DC happen in every light bulb.
  - lostlogin 3y ago
    Poe might be an option. It would also reduce the amount of crappy devices taking up WiFi bandwidth. It would be a pain to retro fit though.
    - watermelon0 3y ago
      AFAIK lightning solutions using PoE already exist in commercial space. For general use, I'd assume that PoE hardware/software is a bit too expensive, but maybe we can have similarly priced bulbs/lightstrips than Philips Hue.
    - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
      Eh... not a great fit. POE++ Super Extra is 100W per port. Figure a dumb 75W-equivilent is like 10-14W. You get maybe 8 bulbs per run assuming everything is exactly as rated. But specifying doesn't work like that. You won't know if someone will plug in 24W bulbs. You need to plan sockets for the most someone could use. If you wanted DC retrofit, you would be better of doing it at the light switch and just using the same wiring and sockets.

pbhjpbhj 3y ago

Does "right to repair" help? Can you in theory replace controller boards?