Lighting

[Sky]

Looking for efficient low energy consumption lights for camp decor. I've been seeing more and more strings of LEDs. Is this the best option? Looking for places to purchase lights and rechargeable power / battery packs.

[willowRage]

12 volt cold cathodes like those used in computer mods make great lighting for kitchens and tent areas or even your playa bike. They can run on AA batteries or a 12 volt deep cycle marine batteries and come in many color options. White has the best output for "work" areas.

[Teo del Fuego]

Google "LEDs" or hit E-bay searching for LEDs. You'll see gobs of LED string lights for sale all over the place, and yes, they use far far less power than regular battery operated string lights. The traditional string lights running off 2 AA batteries will last about 5 hours before batteries depleted. LEDS could possible last three days.

[capjbadger]

12 volt cold cathodes like those used in computer mods make great lighting for kitchens and tent areas or even your playa bike. They can run on AA batteries or a 12 volt deep cycle marine batteries and come in many color options. White has the best output for "work" areas.

Seconded for the CCFLs! These things are great and you can find some good deals on the 12" dual CCFL kits over on http://www.vibelights.com/coccliki.html
The power draw is pretty low too. They light even better if you make a little reflective holder like you see office fluorescent lights sitting in.

LED are good lights too, but they are better for "pointed" applications like flashlights. The CCFL are awesome for area lighting.

[trilobyte]

Not sure what your budget or your specific camp lighting needs are, but I'm a huge fan of the LED par cans that have recently come onto the market at (reasonably) affordable prices. American DJ's got a model that runs for $130 (I've seen it for as little as $99), it's a really bright RGB light that can be set to a bunch of different colors, set to change colors to the beat (sound activated), and color cycle through the RGB spectrum. You can hook them into an intelligent lighting controller, too (if you've got one). The LED light has something like a 100k hour life, doesn't generate any heat to speak of, and never needs a color gel (since the LED's create the colors directly). Power consumption is minimal - 12 watts, I believe. We're looking at using a couple to provide lighting under our shade structure at night, and a handful to help illuminate an art car we're building (they run on AC power, but we're going to have a generator on the ship).

Hope that info helps

~Trilo~

[gyre]

For decoration, elwire or leds may be more efficient.
LEDs have an advantage in the cold, worse in heat.
For seeing, fluorescent is the best.
I'm not sure if there is a difference in cold cathode and fluorescent.
Anyone know?

12 volt fluorescent ballasts or lights are available, even us made.

If anyone wants real power, colored HID is available up to 1000 watts.
Works best bounced off a surface.
Outline with red elwire and bounce green off the whole structure, as an example.
Low pressure sodium is a pure amber, best efficiency available.
55 watts equals 500 watts quartz lighting.
10000 lumens.
Luxeon led-25 lumens per watt

[capjbadger]

I'm not sure if there is a difference in cold cathode and fluorescent.
Anyone know?

Cold cathode is also a type of fluorescent light, it's just a cold version. Kinda like a solid EL. Office fluorescents are "hot" with plasma in the tube.

Runs easily of a 12v source which powers a dc-ac inverter (driver). It's the same tubes you see used to "mod" the insides of computers wuth lights.

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