Replacing 500w flood houselights

[Mr Steve]

Hi All,

 

A space I look after has 6x 500w garden floods on dimmers as house lights. These give a nice warm white light, with the ability to dim as the show begins. We are looking to replace these with some sort of LED equivalent. Can anyone recommend a DMX controllable white, tunaeble white, or RGBW fixture that has a similar output to a 500w halogen flood?

 

:)

[gareth]

The GDS (now ETC) ArcSystem are the 'go-to' houselights of choice for many professional venues. Dimmable, bright, and a really nice light quality.

[sandall]

The GDS (now ETC) ArcSystem are the 'go-to' houselights of choice for many professional venues. Dimmable, bright, and a really nice light quality.

Indeed, but a bit of a step-up price-wise from £30-worth of garden floods.

[timsabre]

I was asked a similar question about dimmable houselights and was looking at these

 

https://www.bax-shop.co.uk/led-bar/eurolite-led-cbb-2-cob-ww-bar

 

They're 70w so you'd probably need 2 to be equivalent to a single 500w halogen. Not too expensive though. I never actually tried them as the project didn't go ahead.

Edited October 10, 2021 by timsabre

[richard_cooper]

I was asked a similar question about dimmable houselights and was looking at these

 

https://www.bax-shop.co.uk/led-bar/eurolite-led-cbb-2-cob-ww-bar

 

They're 70w so you'd probably need 2 to be equivalent to a single 500w halogen. Not too expensive though. I never actually tried them as the project didn't go ahead.

 

Interesting option, I've ordered one to look at, as I've a temporary project these could be the solution to.

 

Most places I've seen using the security flood as houselights, never ran them anywhere near 100% in actual use, so might be an option for OP?

 

With a claimed beam angle of 38° more maybe needed for coverage.

 

I'll report back when I get a chance......

[NTABID]

We installed a new, fully dimmable LED houselight system in our 160 seater community theatre 3 years ago, and we're very satisfied with it. It's a competitor to GDS, from a small UK firm: Innovation LED (website innovationleduk.com). I've not been in contact with them since before the pandemic started, so I really hope they've survived. Certainly their website appears to be maintained.

[timsabre]

We installed a new, fully dimmable LED houselight system in our 160 seater community theatre 3 years ago, and we're very satisfied with it. It's a competitor to GDS, from a small UK firm: Innovation LED (website innovationleduk.com). I've not been in contact with them since before the pandemic started, so I really hope they've survived. Certainly their website appears to be maintained.

 

Isn't working for me - listed on Google but times out if you try to go there

[pscandrett]

Looks like the company might have fizzled out:

 

Gov uk

 

Cached version of their website from 2020 here: Cached website

 

Some images of their products (eg Montano, Adoni) can be seen in the google image search.

 

I hope they /have/ survived though.

[Dave m]

what about Birdies with GU10 dimmable LEDs?

I am aware that not all "dimmable" LEDs work with all dimmers

 

we used Tungsten Birdies in a venue I worked in, hanging from above to provide a very nice pooled lighting around the seating and walkways

[timsabre]

Without using a specialist dimmer like the Artistic Licence sundial ones, "dimmable" LED lamps don't dim well and have a distracting snap off and snap on at the bottom end - not so good if you've been used to a nice smooth halogen fade out.

It's surprising there are very few remote controllable versions of the classic flat LED floods - DMX is maybe a bit unlikely as it's quite specialist but I would have thought there'd be wifi or bluetooth ones. I can find a few - such as this one from Ledvance/Osram - but they are quite pricey.

 

I bet your tungsten birdies took a bit of looking after. GU10's seem to need replacing every 10 minutes.

[John_P]

I was asked a similar question about dimmable houselights and was looking at these

 

https://www.bax-shop...bb-2-cob-ww-bar

 

They're 70w so you'd probably need 2 to be equivalent to a single 500w halogen. Not too expensive though. I never actually tried them as the project didn't go ahead.

 

Interesting option, I've ordered one to look at, as I've a temporary project these could be the solution to.

 

Most places I've seen using the security flood as houselights, never ran them anywhere near 100% in actual use, so might be an option for OP?

 

With a claimed beam angle of 38° more maybe needed for coverage.

 

I'll report back when I get a chance......

 

 

I was tempted to order some as they could be handy uplighters for the front of stage at small gigs. Looks like you bought the last of them so I'll look forward to seeing what you think of them.

[gareth]

The GDS (now ETC) ArcSystem are the 'go-to' houselights of choice for many professional venues. Dimmable, bright, and a really nice light quality.

Indeed, but a bit of a step-up price-wise from £30-worth of garden floods.

 

Yes, it is. But the OP asked for a :

DMX controllable white, tunaeble white, or RGBW fixture that has a similar output to a 500w halogen flood

so whatever they end up with is going to be quite a step up price-wise. So my answer still stands. Edited October 14, 2021 by gareth