Why do light bulbs often burn out? The main reasons why LED lamps burn out in cars and apartments Diode light bulbs burn out in an apartment

Are you changing light bulbs too often? This question is unlikely to be asked seriously by those who use incandescent lamps the old fashioned way. Indeed, incandescent lamps cost pennies, and there is no problem in replacing a burnt-out light bulb with a new one. If a person does not care about the problem of energy saving, then everything is in order, he does not experience any inconvenience.

But what about those people who have already switched to LED lamps? What if, for example, a zealous owner, having decided to take care of energy saving, installed LED light bulbs at home, but they burn out all the time?

In this case, you have to forget about saving, because they are quite expensive compared to the same incandescent lamps. This is where a person faces a real problem.

So why not eliminate the reason why LED lamps regularly burn out? It is, of course, worth eliminating, but first it is necessary to identify the cause. Let's figure out what reasons most often lead to LED lamps burning out.

Miser pays twice

The main reason why LED lamps fail is the low quality of the LED lamp itself. In order to attract consumers with a low price, unscrupulous manufacturers make LED light bulbs bright, beautiful, but short-lived. The lamps shine so brightly on the demonstration stand, but are completely unsuitable for long-term operation over many years.

They lack reliable current stabilization and protection against increased network voltage. When the supply voltage jumps for some reason, the current through the LED crystals increases excessively, the lamp shines quite brightly and impressively, but the crystal quickly degrades in this mode. The result is predictable - the lamp soon burns out.

And some manufacturers specifically tune the visual characteristics of their LED lamps so that they shine brightly even at normal supply voltage. But at what cost is this achieved?

In order not to make the product more expensive, not to install more powerful LEDs, not to use LEDs with a more efficient phosphor, they simply adjust the voltage stabilization in the lamp so that the LEDs shine at full strength, without a safety margin.

As a result, the LEDs shine very brightly, at the same time they overheat, and again quickly fail in this mode. Thus, the life of an inexpensive but bright LED lamp is doomed to be short-lived. And is it worth talking about the low quality of soldering in cheap LED lamps, where the installation technology is obviously broken...

The cause may be sparking

Let's say you are not trying to save money at any cost, and buy high-quality branded LED light bulbs. And now for the second time in the same chandelier, in the same lamp, an expensive light bulb has a long life almost immediately after installation.

Here the reason may lie in poor-quality connection of hidden conductors. Check the condition of the wire connections in the junction box and other connection points, especially near the switch and socket. Check the cartridge and switch yourself. There should be no burnt contacts, no blackened twists.

If symptoms are detected, then solder the damaged strands or install. Clean the burnt contacts of the cartridge so that nothing sparks anywhere. If necessary, replace the cartridge with irreversibly damaged contacts.

No need to turn LED lamps on and off too often

In principle, any LED manufacturer will assure you that the number of times you turn an LED on and off will have no effect on its lifespan. Meanwhile, for a low-quality LED light bulb this indicator is very, very critical.

If you press the switch button several times a day, and the LED bulb is a cheap Chinese one with a bad ballast, then regular current surges will cause it to fail very quickly.

Illuminated switches also have a detrimental effect on the performance of lamps with electronic ballast. If you decide to switch to LED lamps, then it is better to abandon the usual backlit switch, or simply remove the backlight in the switch, otherwise abnormal starts of the lamps and, accordingly, unacceptable operating modes of the electronic ballast are possible.

There may be a problem with the power supply

If we are talking about low-voltage LED lamps, like those installed in spotlights, then they are powered by or from a power supply, which itself acts as an electronic ballast.

When the power of the driver or power supply is selected incorrectly, the LEDs can burn out for two reasons: either the LED connection diagram is incorrect, or the driver power is lower than required. It is advisable to take a power supply with a power reserve of 15-20%, otherwise the power supply itself may quickly die out.

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Andrey Povny

If, according to developers, the service life of LEDs should be tens of thousands of hours, why do LED lamps burn out so often? There are several reasons for this.

Conventionally, exactly 5 reasons can be identified, although they are strongly interconnected.

1. Workmanship;
2. malfunction of electrical wiring or lamp mounting units;
3. overvoltage;
4. temperature rise;
5. incorrect choice of power converter.

Can LED burn out, if the operating principle itself implies minimal energy consumption and immunity to vibration (the light-emitting element is a semiconductor crystal filled with a transparent compound)? Maybe.

It is true that LED power consumption is lower than other light sources. But the point is that the dissipated power is concentrated on a miniature crystal; heat is released over an area of ​​several square millimeters. To avoid overheating, effective heat dissipation and free air circulation are required.

Low quality

The quality of lamps is in first place among the reasons for LED burnout. The design of LED elements is based on a semiconductor p-n junction, which is critical to violation of operating parameters. Key parameters:

• Current flowing through the LED;
• forward and reverse voltage;
• temperature.

To minimize the influence of destructive factors, complex control circuits are developed to power LEDs. And if the LED itself still has a high cost, then the presence of additional elements increases it even more.

The figure shows that a normal driver circuit contains a lot of radio elements (capacitors, resistors, controller, etc.). The natural desire of manufacturers is to reduce the cost of products to increase competitiveness in the market and increase profits. This leads to simplification of the circuit design of supply voltage converters, savings on heat dissipation and qualified assembly of finished products.

A quick inspection of the interior of a budget lamp shows that instead of a full-fledged driver, a simple rectifier with a current-limiting resistor or capacitor is often installed. Saving on batteries- this is the first reason why LED lamps burn out so quickly.

To increase the brightness of the glow, the current through the LED is also artificially increased (more on this below). The small heat sink area leads to low cooling efficiency of the junction and its overheating. Due to poor soldering quality, the contacts in the electronic circuit are broken.

Electrical wiring fault

By popularity, this is the second reason why LED light bulbs burn out. This is due to random power interruptions.

If normal contact is broken (in a lamp socket, switch or distribution box), sudden short-term power interruptions occur in the network. The presence of reactive elements (capacitances and inductances) in the control circuit will cause voltage surges several times higher than permissible.

This problem occurs after replacing incandescent lamps, when under the influence of high temperature the spring contacts in the socket lose their elastic properties. In homes with old electrical wiring, it is not uncommon to see connections between aluminum and copper wires. Such twists are not only the cause of power outages, but also the most common causes of fires.

It is the faulty electrical wiring that is the main reason for the burnout of expensive and seemingly reliable LED lamps in a car. For the most part, the problem is not with the lamps, but with faulty contacts.

Twisting is not allowed in vehicle electrical circuits. Use adapter connectors or replace the entire area between the terminals. Try to always use soldering.

In fairness, it should be noted that headlights rarely burn out, since they are high-tech devices and are not produced (extremely rarely) by openly underground manufacturers.

Another thing is LED light bulbs, which are installed instead of incandescent ones in other additional applications. car lighting technology. Such lamps are produced by all and sundry.

Overvoltage and overheating

LED lamps in an apartment burn out due to low-quality drivers, either included in the design of the lamp or made in the form of a remote unit. This does not apply to premium LED lamps. A high-quality power supply is designed for possible overvoltage, which is normal for our electrical network.

As mentioned above, manufacturers, aimed only at increasing sales, artificially increase the supply current of lamps to increase brightness. With the same power, cheap lamps sometimes shine brighter than branded ones, which is not an indicator of quality. This fact in itself reduces the service life, and exceeding the permissible voltage is the third reason why LED lamps burn out.

LEDs in the lamp can burn out due to poor and ill-conceived air circulation, which leads to overheating. In the apartment, try to install LED light bulbs only in open lamps/chandeliers.

Burnout of LEDs in a car

For another reason, the LED lamps in the car burn out. Semiconductors have a strong temperature dependence. Moreover, the junction resistance decreases with increasing heating.

When LED elements heat up, their resistance drops and the current through them increases, an increase in current causes an increase in heating, and so on in a circle. The process is avalanche-like.

In addition to the wide range of temperatures at which automotive lighting equipment is operated (ambient temperature + heating of the engine compartment), instability of the on-board network voltage and a high level of vibration are added. The headlights, PTF and cornering lamps heat up on the side of the engine, which is located in the same space with them.

High-quality LED lamps are designed for such loads. But when superimposed, all factors lead to premature burnout of any LED lamps, including Eagle Eye DRLs, which are produced in compliance with all technological standards.

Remember! If the LEDs in the car do not light up (or burn out very quickly), first of all check the serviceability of the car’s on-board network circuit, namely the faulty contacts. In 99% of cases, they are the problem. Even if the terminals on the lamps are working properly, pulsed noise in the power circuit due to poor contact of powerful consumers can cause the LEDs to burn out.

For reliable operation of LED lighting in a car or a room chandelier, the LED elements must be powered with a stable current so that when the supply voltage changes and the temperature of the crystal changes, the current through the LED does not exceed the permissible value.

How to choose an LED lamp. Basic Rules

In order not to rack your brains about why LED lamps in an apartment burn out or new LED lamps in a car do not light up, you should remember the well-known proverb about the stingy. Good lamps cannot be cheap, and no matter how tempting the price may seem, it will all come down to either replacing the lamp under warranty or purchasing a new one.

If the manufacturer is not known, then the quality of the product can be determined by the appearance of the product:

• There should be no traces of casting or stamping on plastic parts;
• the absence of gaps and backlashes in the joints speaks about the production culture;
• there should be no signs of flickering;
• If you can compare light bulbs of the same power and with the same light temperature, then lamps with sharply increased brightness should alert you.

The choice of a remote driver is based on strict compliance of the current and voltage characteristics. If you plan to install several lamps with one driver, you need to focus on their total current consumption.

This is especially true for chandeliers that have several LEDs installed. Typically, such chandeliers are equipped with their own driver, but in some cases, you need to choose one with similar characteristics so that the LED bulbs do not burn out in the first year of operation.

Compact fluorescent lamps are gradually giving way to LED products. It is more economical. Although the service life of tens of thousands of hours declared by manufacturers is, in fact, far from the truth. Those who use such lamps in their apartments have already noticed their fragility. Let's find out why LED lamps burn out, consider each of the reasons.

Main reasons for failure

The first reason is poor contact and sparking wiring. This may take place in the switch, distribution box, or in the chandelier itself. All connections must be checked carefully.

The second reason is the “wrong” chandelier or sconce. About a third of the total power consumption of LEDs is spent on lighting, the rest is spent on heating. The latter harms the crystal and causes its accelerated degradation. Moreover, if the manufacturer, often unknown (noname), did not include sufficient conditions for its cooling in the calculations for the case. But this is typical only for the cheapest products.

Overheating occurs due to the shape of the lampshades in the chandelier. Even a high-quality lamp should not be screwed into sealed lamps (ip65 and the like), and if such a need arises, buy 5-7-watt ones. They generate less heat and last longer.

According to customer reviews, medium-power lamps last longer than, for example, 10-watt lamps. If possible, it is better to screw in three 4 W lamps than one 12 W lamp.

The third reason is low product quality. You are unlikely to be able to correct the situation if you do not know the basics of electronics. Negative factors may include:

• power supply;
• LEDs;
• layout and assembly of the case.

Faults and wiring defects

LEDs deteriorate if the network experiences frequent power surges. They can arise due to problems on power lines or directly in the apartment. It is necessary to prevent violation of the integrity of the wire insulation.

LED lamps, like fluorescent energy-saving lamps, do not tolerate low voltage. It is recommended to check the quality of connections in the junction box, the lamp connection wires, and eliminate twists.

It is convenient to use Wago type terminal blocks. In addition to these, there are reusable terminal blocks from which you can remove the wires and reconnect them. Old switches harm the LEDs and power supply because their contacts wear out over time and begin to spark when turned on/off. Each wire must be well insulated.

Checking the chandelier, identifying defects

The weak point in a chandelier is the socket, that is, the part into which you screw the light bulb. The place of poor contact becomes very hot, sparks, and sometimes becomes covered with soot (turns black). This leads to lamp burnout.

Note! If you have a multi-lamp lamp, but most often they burn out in the same lampshade, the problem is probably in the socket.

I would like to repeat: do not use high-power LED and compact fluorescent lamps in closed shades, especially with the bulb facing down. The heat has nowhere to go, and you already know the consequences.

Poor quality LED lamps

Take a closer look at the product costing from 125 rubles. Anything cheaper is outright rubbish. Such lamps have a low-quality LED board that is not capable of dissipating enough heat. A bad case is also associated with “thermal” problems; they don’t even have the simplest driver. Power is provided through a ballast capacitor; no stabilization or protection is provided. In recent years, such specimens have gradually disappeared from the market.

Install a varistor with an operating voltage of about 470 V parallel to the lamp. This will reduce the risk - it will extinguish high-voltage surges.

You can improve such a light source by increasing the capacity of the filter capacitor on the board and installing a fuse if there is none.

Other reasons why LED lamps burn out

You have reduced the number of harmful factors to a minimum, but the lamps still fail. Why is this happening? There are two more reasons:

• turning on and off too often;
• bad power supply.

Frequently turning lamps on and off

When the light is turned on, a current surge occurs through the smoothing capacitor. Therefore, there is a danger of blowing the fuse or the current-carrying path. To avoid this problem, you do not need to constantly switch the lighting. LED lamps are economical, and an extra hour of work will not hit your budget.

Voltage transformer

Lack of protection against voltage surges is the main problem with lamps in the budget price segment. The driver provides a stable current for LED operation. Often it is this that fails for the reasons described above. Check the presence of voltage at the output of the power supply, as well as the integrity of all LEDs.

For low-voltage lamps (12 V), electronic transformers are also used. If not a single lamp is lit, check this first. By the way, it’s not at all difficult to assemble one from several burnt out ones.

High-quality light is very important for your health and vision, but cheap products are a blow to your budget. Lamps often burn out, pulsation coefficient, and color rendering quality do not meet standards. Monitor the condition of your lamps, switches and wiring to avoid premature “death” of lamps. Then you will avoid unnecessary expenses.

The cost of which is quite low. In this case, we, as a rule, do not attach much importance to the problem and simply replace the burnt-out products with new ones. However, things are completely different if the LED bulb in the lamp often burns out, the cost of which is several times higher. In this case, there is no point in resigning yourself, because... the cost of frequent replacement can put a significant dent in your budget. It is necessary to understand the possible causes of the malfunction and eliminate them. Next, we will tell you why LED lamps in an apartment burn out and what to do to solve the problem.

Poor quality products

Unfortunately, the main reason for LED burnout is poor build quality. In our search for cheap LED products, we often fall for the trick of Chinese brands - bright light bulbs that, as advertising, shine quite well on the stand and at the same time have a stylish design. The fact is that most LED products from China are manufactured in such a budget version that the light bulbs burn out due to the lack of elements for protecting the LEDs from surge current in the driver circuit. As a result, during voltage surges, the current increases, due to which the LEDs heat up above the nominal temperature and, of course, burn out.

In addition, let’s return to one more reason, which is closely related to the advertising move when demonstrating the glow of a light bulb on a stand. However, we are all trying to find an option that will shine well and at the same time be cheap. That is why some manufacturers select resistors and capacitors in light bulbs in such a way that the LEDs work at full power, but brightly. As a result, the service life of the products is quickly reduced and they burn out.

Also, another reason for the frequent combustion of LED lamps is a defect in the configuration and a violation of the soldering technology, which is typical for cheap Chinese products.

You can verify the above by watching these videos:

Wiring problems

If you are sure that the light bulbs in the chandelier are of high quality and, moreover, they burn out only in one room, for example, in the bathroom, most likely the reason is in the electrical wiring. First of all, check the quality from which the wires go to the switch and chandelier. In addition, check the connection of the ceiling light. There should be no twists and especially no exposed connections, as in the photo below. It is recommended to connect the wires with special ones.

If the wiring is OK, but the LEDs burn out, check the sockets in the chandelier. They should not be burnt or completely destroyed. If the problem is in the cartridge, you can try to restore it - clean and bend the contacts. Otherwise you'll have to buy a new one.

We have provided the 2 most common reasons why LED lamps burn out. If the quality is not the issue, then most likely there is a short in the wiring somewhere, and vice versa. If you are sure that both the light bulb and the electrical wiring are not the culprits, then you can check a few more points, which we discussed below.

What else could it be?

When we looked at , we pointed to such a parameter as the number of inclusions. In LED light bulbs, as a rule, the number of switches declared by the manufacturer is unlimited. But in practice, frequent turning on of the light affects the service life of the LEDs, and if you turn on the light switch in the room dozens of times a day, then it may well be that the lamps burn out for this reason, especially if they are Chinese.

We should also talk about backlit switches. If the chandelier is controlled by such a switch, then most likely you have noticed that the LED light bulb sometimes flickers or even lights up dimly when the light is off. In most cases, LEDs are not compatible with backlit switches, so they may burn out over long periods of use. You can solve the problem by simply turning off the backlight on the switch.

Well, the last, rarely encountered situation is when 12-volt LEDs in spotlights burn out. Here the situation may be either in the wrong backlight connection diagram or in the power supply (incorrectly selected power or poor quality). We provided the correct ones. As for the power supply, it must be selected with a power reserve (at least 20%).

We draw your attention to the fact that sometimes apartment owners think that all the 12-volt LED lamps in their suspended ceiling have burned out. First of all, it is better to check the power supply, because... Most likely, it burned out, not the light bulbs!

These are actually all the reasons why LED products burn out. We hope our information was useful to you and now you know why LED lamps burn out, and what to do in this case! We draw your attention to important nuance— each lamp has its own warranty period, so if in your case the burnout occurred immediately after purchase due to poor build quality, you can safely go to where you bought it and solve this problem with the seller!

Manufacturers position LED lighting devices as the most durable. And this is understandable if you consider how little current semiconductors consume. This advantage of LED lamps makes their purchase completely justified, despite the fact that they are somewhat more expensive than similar energy-saving products.

It becomes even more disappointing when such seemingly most reliable LED light bulbs burn out in a chandelier, sconce or other installation location. Constantly spending 190 - 220 rubles on a new lamp is not a pleasant prospect. What is the reason, what needs to be done to eliminate the possibility of something like this happening again - we’ll figure it out.

A common “diagnosis” made by various “experts” is that it’s all about the quality of the supply voltage. But is it really that simple?

Possible reasons causing LED lamps to burn out

It should be understood that no specialist can determine exactly why the LED device failed “remotely”. There is such a concept that the pros use - “repair on your fingers” or over the phone, which, in principle, is the same thing. To find the true cause, you need to take a lot of things into account.

Wiring condition

An indicator of this is the systematic burnout of LED lamps only in a specific sector (in one room, a wing of the house, and so on). It all depends on the electrical supply scheme of the building (structure). Therefore, you should not immediately blame the LED device, but start working on the track. At the same time, carry out its revision along with prevention. And then when else will you get around to it?

What to do:

• Open the terminal box and check all connections. If there are twists, especially aluminum and copper wires, redo them. There are mini-pads, sleeves, adapters on sale - the store will tell you what is more convenient to install. They cost pennies, but in the future you can rest assured that there will be no sparking, burning of wires, etc., which leads to burnout of LED lamps.
• Similarly, inspect the quality of connecting the chandelier to the intra-apartment (house) wiring.

You should not think that these are trifles that do not deserve attention. As practice shows, it is precisely such little things that lead to frequent burnout of LED lamps. It is worth repeating - they are sensitive to voltage fluctuations, they need its stability.

Condition of the chandelier

The electrical circuit of the lamp itself is simple, and even a person very far from electrical engineering can understand it.

What to do:

• Make an audit of all contacts in the cartridges. This means inspecting them + cleaning them. This mainly applies to the central, so-called “tongue”. Yes, and bending it up a little won’t hurt either. This ensures that once the LED bulb is screwed into the socket, the connection will be secure.
• Check that all wires are securely fastened in place. This is especially true for cartridges. A loose fastening screw gradually leads to burning and sparking. For a regular light bulb this is unimportant, but an LED light bulb perceives such a defect in the circuit very “painfully”. Simply put, contact burning is a change in resistance at a given point. The result is current instability, which is undesirable for the normal functioning of the LED device.

Poor quality LED lamp

If it is “made in China,” then the likely cause of the burnout is the absence of a device called a “driver” in the electrical circuit of the product. It is he who is responsible for protecting semi-automatic elements from current surges. As a rule, all cheap LED lamps are available in a budget version. They use “ballast” instead of a driver. At those moments (on/off) when current surges are maximum, it is completely useless.

When tested on a bench, cheap LED light bulbs look very impressive and provide good, even light, but they do not stand up to practical tests and burn out quite quickly. By the way, for them various twists, sparks, and poor contacts are the main cause of failure. While this is not critical for a high-quality LED lamp from a well-known manufacturer, for cheap products it is fraught with breakdown.

Conclusion

Don't try to save money, especially since it's not justified. If you think about the durability of a lighting device, then you should purchase products only from well-known companies. And not at flea markets, but at specialized retail outlets. The high cost of an LED lamp will be well worth it, since it can last for many years without replacement. Under all other operating conditions met - up to 30 or more, without burning out. About, .

Switch type

Few people pay attention to this, but it is this that often becomes the reason for the fragility of the LED device. In everyday life, for ease of use, backlit products are often installed in rooms. Even if the circuit is broken, current flows through this miniature indicator. When the switch is in the “off” position in the room, in the dark, it is clearly visible that the LED light bulb installed in the chandelier either flickers or glows dimly. But any LED device is characterized by a guaranteed number of on/off cycles. It is for this reason that the use of backlit switches in the same circuit with LED lamps is not recommended. Therefore, you will have to choose - either durability or comfort. Although most often the latter is nothing more than a tribute to fashion.

What to do

It is hardly advisable to replace the switch if it is in working condition. It is enough to turn off the input circuit breaker (de-energize the line) and use a thin screwdriver (removing the cover) to split the mini-indicator bulb.

Voltage quality

This mostly applies to new buildings. Phase imbalances and voltage surges are commonplace in neighborhoods that are just being populated. It is under such conditions that LED light bulbs quickly fail (burn out).

What to do

In relation to the chandelier, there is hardly anything that can be done. But if we are talking about a table lamp in which an LED device is installed, then there is only one solution - connect it through a voltage stabilizer. How rational this is is at the discretion of the owner. Or even abandon the use of LED lamps in the house for a certain period, until the peak of mass construction has passed. Otherwise, there is no guarantee that they will not burn out. Moreover, even if both the chandelier and the electrical wiring are new and installed according to all the rules.