Direct Fit LED Bulbs

Dennis, chipset replied in one of the LED passenger car lighting threads that he buys direct replacement LED's for the LIONEL incandescent bulbs used in the 15" passenger cars as an alternative to the LED strips many use.

Hi Dennis, I don't remember the ladys name, but she sells them at york, Just went down stairs to look and found two boxes of them, no name, but they are the yellow-ish  not blue-ish lights, and they are only labeled as "LED 1445 18 volt" and "LED 1447 18 volt", they are direct replacements, no need to add or do anything but take out the old bulbs and put in the new ones. I have seen them advertised in both of the big mags, but for the life of me I can't remember the Co.'s name, some of these bulbs have been working for over 5 years! Never had to replace one as of yet! Oh, and they are set up to work with AC power, I will figure out the name, just please be patient with me, if you want, e-mail me and I will send you two of them so you can see for yourself! I want to say the Co.'s name was "Country" something but I am probably wrong...

Uncle Al

http://stores.towncountryhobbies.com

There a few different types out there. Be sure to check if the bulbs are directional or multi-directional.  Most are directional, light primarily out the top.  Whether its yellow or blue light, you want multi-directional, light out all sides.

I bought a bunch of multi-directional LED's from a dealer last year to replace the lanturn lights on all my Lionel switches. No problems yet and I power the switches at 18 volts.

Joe 

Gene, That's the place! Thank you for the help! I purchased the "Warm" lights, in the 50 pack, they have a yellow cast to them and look more like standard bulbs! Thanks for the help! Let me know what you think Dennis.

Uncle Al

Dennis,

I tried to be helpful. I was walked on by others without as much as a, "Excuse Me!"

I've had it with the rude behavior of folks on the forum now days. This will be my last post. I wish you all the best.

Try here, TrainAidsA. I have used them for probably about 3 years now, probably placed 4 or 5 orders to date and have had good luck with their bulbs and their service. Never had a problem. They are all 18 volt and AC or DC ready to go. They are also a little less expensive than many others. They have the most common bulbs, screw type and bayonet in a couple different styles. Other places offer LED bulb replacements, but many are only 14 volt, not good for command control which is all I run.

L.L.  sorry to see you go.  I always looked forward to your posts.  Bob S.

I have replaced all the Lionel #153 signals (12) with them and the 0-22 switch controllers with the non-focused  type and they are over 5 years old already and no failures.  I do have them connected to my 14v acc'y connection...

Marty

Happy Pappy,

If I walked on you with the website direction, I apologize. Not my intent, I thought I knew where he was talking about and just posted the site. 

If that ticked you off, again, that was not my intent.

Gene

Huh?  Why isn't Happy Pappy not so happy?

.....

Dennis

We are all on this forum for the open exchange of ideas and opinions. We will encounter different views and opinions on model trains (or ways of doing things) that may not necessarily echo your own belief system. If a simple response seems so troubling, so bothersome, so painful, and so insulting for acceptance and tolerance, we just don't read it and move on.

In my world people disagree with me all the time. Its no problem. They have every right to disagree and express themselves any way that they wish as long as personal insults are avoided. I see no instance on this thread where Gene or anyone else did anything wrong or said anything to offend.

Getting back to the topic of this post. After doing extensive research I find that all of the advertised "direct fit" 1447 and #53 LED bulbs are made for 12V DC operation only (as in automotive use). If you think about it this is a logical conclusion. For AC LED bulb compatibility that tiny bulb base would need to contain both a full wave rectifier and the appropriate resistor value. IMO, the chip sizes for both the resistor and rectifier would not fit in the small bulb base. It may be possible to light an LED on AC but the life would severely be affected, negating the main benefits of the LED replacement.

The good news is that you can buy AC/DC converter boards on eBay for less than $1.00 each. They contain the full wave rectifier, and a filter capacitor.  Put in a constant 12VAC (or thereabout) and drive the LED as it was intended to be driven. On a model train application they should last the life of the layout. The other thing is to remember to use multi-directional LED's when illuminating an area. Unidirectional LEDs can be used for headlights and where the light must be concentrated.

Dennis

the link to Town and Country Hobbies posted above gives a spec of 18V for their LED bayonet and screw base. I've got some, don't remember from where, that have been running just fine in my O22 switches at about 16V

Scotie

Dennis, the bulbs I referred too are indeed 18 volt, AC direct fit LED bulbs.... all self contained, don't know how they do it, but they do work....

Uncle Al

I have also used quite a few from Town and Country, http://stores.towncountryhobbies.com/leds/

When I first bought a few years ago, all the lights had the blue tone to them I did not like. Now they give you a choice and I like the clear much better.

Steve

I am just starting to look into this for myself.  Are the mth bulbs the same or are they completely different? 

Dennis,

Just a comment on your last post. I have been doing (way too much) research on this same topic in a different thread. I have been trying to figure out how to replace all of the lamps in my 022 switches (not the controller--the switch machine). I had found a very inexpensive source of bayonet & screw-type LEDs (from China, of course). The problem with using them in that application is that they must be supplied with a DC source. That's the easy part. The problem is that the bulb socket on the switch is grounded through the frame, which means it is on the AC ground return. A very helpful gentleman in the other thread said he believed that tying the AC & DC grounds together would produce 'magic smoke'. If you have figured out how to overcome this issue or find that tying them together (i.e., the DC supply is grounded to the AC ground), please let me know. DC LEDs are a much less expensive way to go, if they work.

Ken

I think I would source the LEDs with the AC source, common and hot thru a diode. The diode would protect the LED from the reverse AC peak. And the RMS value of the AC to light the LED would be VacPeak/2 minus the diode drop. Of course the cathode of the diode is next to the LED.

Drop in replacement 18 volt AC screw and bayonet base LED's can be found here.

No modifications and no external circuitry needed.

Larry

I bought a pack of fifty replacement LEDs from Town & Country Hobbies and have put them in all my Lionel 15" passenger cars.

Neal Jeter

I have been replacing my Williams and Lionel loco's and diesels,cabooses etc with LED's and LOVE it!!! Trains run better!! The Williams especially needed to be upgraded and look great now. Thanks Gene for the Town and Country connection as I had lost the address.

I use the direct fit LED's and they work fine on the AC voltage. They only drive on the signal side that forward bias the LED. The other side just gets clipped off, but the lamps glows just fine.

You do have to insure that the LED is rated for the voltage applied.

While current can pass through an LED in only one direction and it could be said that when the signal reverses the LED blocks the current, like yourself I would feel safer using a diode to cut off any possible damage from reverse peaks. Since you are now running the LED on half wave, yes the operating RMS voltage would need to be higher to account for the 1.7V drop across the diode.  This would be safe but on a 50% duty cycle the LED may still shine dimmer than on a pure filtered DC supply. If  the right amount of filter capacitance were added after the diode, it may remedy any decline in brilliance. I will need to do some experimenting to see how it all works out 

The single diode drop is about 0.7 volts.

The relationship for ripple in the capacitor filtered power supply is C x V = I x T. Where C is in uF and I and T are in ma and milliseconds respectively. So, if you are drawing say 20 ma and your time between charging is 17 msec (60 Hertz) then C = (17 x 20)/V. If we require V to equal 1 volt, then 17 x 20 over 1 is 340uF. And I would use a capacitor rating of say 25 vdc.

Hi Clack,

Well I just received 2 LEDs (DC) for test purposes. I installed one in the lamp socket of an 022 switch. I have a full-wave rectifier module and a DC-DC voltage regulator module to supply DC. I adjusted the output to 12vdc. I supply power to the rectifier from my AC transformer which is also connected to my switch. I use the constant voltage pin on my switch to provide power with AC ground as my return. I connected the + output of my DC volt reg. to the constant voltage pin, turned on my AC transformer, and then connected (actually just touched) the - from my DC volt reg. to the AC return. There was a spark and then the rectifier started on fire. I think something went wrong--just a little humor. I know, but I just had to try it--maybe need a bigger rectifier (just kidding). On the serious side, you stated in an earlier post to "source the LEDs with the AC source, common and hot thru a diode". I am a little confused. Do you mean that when I power my bridge/volt reg. modules circuit from my transformer, I need to put a diode on both AC connections. If instead, you mean I need to put a diode in the DC output side, would it be sufficient to just have one on the + side? All this would be a mute point if the lamp socket weren't grounded to the switch frame. I would then, just have a DC return.

Ken

I was thinking of just connecting the AC directly to the LED thru a diode to protect the LED on the reverse half of the AC.

But if you are using a full wave bridge, then no diode would be required...you would already have four of them anyway.

Now if you are using a diode bridge from AC that has one side common to the frame of the car or device and that is common to one side of the Led bulb, then that could be an issue.

In that case don't use a bridge, but just use one diode from the hot side of the AC and connect the common of the DC regulator to that common and the bulb common as well.

Dennis,

    Back when the LED replacements 1st came out I replaced all my old 711/072 and 022 switches and controller light bulbs with the LED's to help keep the massive power draw down on my office/gameroom multi level layout.  The LED's worked great and I also put them in some of the older Lionel rolling stock, Fish Tank car, ect.  At the time Scott's Odds & Ends supplied them to me, later T&C Hobbies that the men have posted for you, delivered slightly different ones to me.  I highly recommend them, although they now cost more money than when they 1st came on the market.  Great product no doubt about it.

PCRR/Dave

The LED's in the picture below came from Scott when they 1st hit the market. 

Hi Clack,

Well I finally have it all working--not without a lot of stupid mistakes (getting too old). The first thing I forgot is that you can't just apply DC to the constant voltage pin on the 022 switch since that power runs the switch (and it needs AC to do that), in addition to powering the lamp. However, there is a separate wire from that pin to the lamp that can be un-soldered and connected to DC power. Did that, powered the switch via the constant voltage pin with AC from my transformer, used a separate DC power supply (per the suggestion from Stan in a different thread), and then was able to use track return (anything tied to outside rails) as a ground return (DC-) to the DC power supply. Switch worked on all functions and LED looked great with intensity controllable from the DC supply.

Thank you for your input, and I hope all this helps anyone that wants to replace 022 bulbs with LEDs. I know there have been a lot of posts on using AC powered LEDs, but I can't find them for less than $3-$4 per LED + shipping. That's about the cost of 20 DC LEDs (they may even be less from China) and the price of a cheap AC/DC power supply on ebay is about $7-$10. So all you need is a soldering iron and then run a DC+ power bus to all of your switches.

Hope someone finds all of my mistakes helpful.

Ken

Ken

I suppose someone will have to dissect one of the AC rated bulbs and discover what's in the base. Pure conjecture at this point.

One conclusion that can be made: They certainly work to reduce power draw and heat as a direct replacement.

Sounds great Ken. If you never make any mistakes, you never learn anything .

If you're breaking out the soldering iron anyway, you could simply use a diode and resistor to use really cheap LED's, no need to run DC around to the switches.

Gentlemen,

    The original LED's work really well, and have not failed in many many years.  Unfortunately now they are about $4.00 a bulb, which is pretty steep, however sense the LED's hardly ever fail, to me it's still a pretty good investment, especially if you are staying with original 711/072 or 022 switches.   My old Fish Tank cars and some of my Cabooses have also had the same LED's in them for over 12 years now, making this a decent investment, especially sense I paid $1.99-$2.25 for my LED's at that time.  

PCRR/Dave

The link I posted above sells them for less than $2 each (prices are for 2 bulbs) and they are just like the ones you posted above (screw and bayonet). They are 18 volt and work with either AC or DC and some (maybe all?) are available in different colors like white, red, green, and also dome or flat top. Many of the other ones I have seen are only 14 volt.

Even at $4 each, if they outlast me I suppose it's still a good deal. Won't have to worry about buying them again anyway.