Soffit/Eave LED Lighting

[dipan]

This is from my post on candlepower forums where I first learned of the concept of soffit lighting. Thought I would share here, though ...

I have selected locations around our relatively large house for 25, 40, and 60 degree optic'd 3 watt Cree XPE powered prebuilt recessed lights and have installed some of them. The fixtures themselves are from superbrightleds and look well made and appear to be have a cast aluminum body. Pretty well sealed but not waterproof or anything, but should be reasonably protected from rain by the soffit and overlying roof/gutters. They are all working since the installation about 6 months ago. These will be primarily accent and slight intruder deterrent type lights. We also have floodlights that will be motion triggered if someone decides to walk up to our property.

Here is the fixture:

I drilled 2.5" holes with a hole saw in the thin plywood eaves/soffits. The fixtures look very clean installed. As there will be 25 x 3 watts of these, I decided to buy a 150 watt power supply from them for some headroom:

This is mounted in the attic and powered by an automated outlet so I can set on/off times and other triggers if I want. I am using 12 gauge landscape wire in the attic with landscape connectors to tap into the long wire without cutting and splicing at each light attachment. What's nice about the fixtures and not specifically stated or pictured at the vendor's site is that the "tail" wire is pretty long, I'm guessing around 4 feet, so it was relatively easy to grab the wire from the eave from within the attic without having to solder on a longer wire before installation. Plus it gave me a great reason to buy a Milwaukee fiber optic inspection scope to locate the wires from the attic

I bought 12 gauge wire to minimize voltage drop (12v DC power supply), and planned to limit runs to 100 feet without having a parallel voltage "reinforcing" run to keep the voltage up. I tested a fixture at around 200 feet of wire from the power supply and it was fine, so voltage drop or not, I just ran two big 500 foot loops to all needed areas and all the lights work fine.

Feel free to ask questions or offer up any other suggestions. Pics coming ...

Thanks ...

 

[dipan]

25 degree optics in the following two pics, one daytime, the other night. As I see it, these are good for a nice narrow wall wash effect from a second story eave. Those 18' long ladders are scary.

 

[dipan]

40 degree optics examples below. Nice tight wall wash effect from a fist story eave. I did put some of these on windows as in the pic, but would not put them on a bedroom window. That's my garage under construction.

 

[dipan]

Since I like the tighter light cone look I did not use many 60 degree fixtures. This is a good example of a decent application for it though, an outside first level corner.

 

[dipan]

And an overall view at night of a handful of these fixtures:

 

[gatchel]

Nice write up. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Vegaman_Dan]

Far brighter than I would have expected. I prefer a more diffused glow for general ambient lighting, but the way you have those done does a good job of keeping light out of the windows.

 

[Big-Foot]

Nice look!!!

I used high intensity LED lighting inside my cabinets in the kitchen during the remodel and bought the direct wire 120v units from Patriot Lighting. No transformers to worry about as the step-down / rectifier is built into the puck.. Low temps as well... I don't know how weather-proof they would be however..

 

[Strouty]

I think your stone makes this look nice. I wonder if the paint or vinyl would reflect too much?

 

[CitadelBlue]

Here is the fixture:

.

Can you post the stock number or URL link?

 

[dipan]

http://www.superbrightleds.com/moreinfo/recessed-downlights/led-product/948/

 

[dipan]

Far brighter than I would have expected. I prefer a more diffused glow for general ambient lighting, but the way you have those done does a good job of keeping light out of the windows.

In general for lighting I would agree that diffuse would look better, but I was very surprised that I liked the focused look. Two main reasons for using lenses LEDs were energy savings and interior light spill. I'm not sure an unfocused 3watt LED would be very effective at lighting the ground, especially from a second story. Lighting the ground was important for me for security. There is also very little light spill into the house. Some of these 25 degree fixtures are mounted between bedroom windows with great results.

Nice look!!!

I used high intensity LED lighting inside my cabinets in the kitchen during the remodel and bought the direct wire 120v units from Patriot Lighting. No transformers to worry about as the step-down / rectifier is built into the puck.. Low temps as well... I don't know how weather-proof they would be however..

I saw these as a BETTER solution than AC fixtures because I didn't have to deal with AC voltage...

I think your stone makes this look nice. I wonder if the paint or vinyl would reflect too much?

Not sure, but you're probably right. Brick would probably look nice too though.

 

[lessersivad]

WOW!! Those are bright and look nice.

Did you use the cool white or warm white?

 

[rodm1]

Do you think they will work in a 3 inch soffit or any ideas on what would work? What do you recommend for a parking area? I would like to now if they are cool white or warm white all sow.

 

[dipan]

WOW!! Those are bright and look nice.

Did you use the cool white or warm white?

Warm White

Do you think they will work in a 3 inch soffit or any ideas on what would work? What do you recommend for a parking area? I would like to now if they are cool white or warm white all sow.

3" wide mounting space would be pretty tight. The hole needs to be 2.5" and the outer trim ring is about 2.7" so would be pretty tight in a 3" space. But possibly do-able...

 

[dipan]

Actually, I think I used a 2.25" hole saw, not 2.5", but according to the specs, the hole needs to be between 2.24" and 2.64".

 

[Kevin54]

Do you think something like those could be used in a vinyl soffit? I know some LED can get rather hot. I have vinyl soffits all around the house and garage. What you did looks great, and I am also very surprised as to the light they put out.

Nice job and nice writeup.

 

[PhantomEB]

Definitely something I want to look into, lightin up most of the area between house and garage as well side yards is of utmost importance to me for the safety of my future wife.

 

[RickP]

Your lighting looks great - nice job! I'd like to try something like that, and I think your idea to run low voltage wire is definitely the way to go.

 

[IONH]

Definitely something I want to look into, lightin up most of the area between house and garage as well side yards is of utmost importance to me for the safety of my future wife.

Good idea for a space between a house and garage! I'm thinking that plus a motion detector at each end would be perfect.

 

[dipan]

Do you think something like those could be used in a vinyl soffit? I know some LED can get rather hot. I have vinyl soffits all around the house and garage. What you did looks great, and I am also very surprised as to the light they put out.

Nice job and nice writeup.

Thanks...

I will check the housing temps tomorrow and get back with you. I don't think vinyl soffit will be a problem, though. Might want to try and keep the hole as tight/snug as possible though, so the bent metal spring clips have enough to grab on to.

 

[dipan]

Temperature checks with an Extech IR thermometer, LED's running for a few hours tonight:

Wood soffit temp (in south Texas in the evening) is 88 degrees. Face of LED fixture is 125 and back is 118. So about 37 degrees over ambient. The fixture was warm to hot to the touch, but not too bad. I think it would be fine with vinyl soffits, especially if vented and especially in cooler climates (like not south Texas).

 

[Falcon67]

Thanks for this. The house next door has soffit lighting and it really adds to the street presence of the house. Me wanna and 3W a pop would be an easier sell to the lady that pays the light bill.

 

[dlenkewich]

Looks great and very timely as I was looking for some LED lighting for a reno.

I wanted to do soffit lighting in my new porch like you have done. My only question if anyone cares to learn me is does it require that transformer the OP used or can one wire these right to a regular light switch to be powered from the electric panel of the house?

 

[dipan]

Looks great and very timely as I was looking for some LED lighting for a reno.

I wanted to do soffit lighting in my new porch like you have done. My only question if anyone cares to learn me is does it require that transformer the OP used or can one wire these right to a regular light switch to be powered from the electric panel of the house?

The lights run off 12V DC. Any acceptably sized 12V AC/DC transformer should work, but these do not run off of 120V AC line current. You could have the wall switch wired to power an outlet (effectively what I've done) to control the transformer and lights.

 

[tomme12]

25 degree optics in the following two pics, one daytime, the other night. As I see it, these are good for a nice narrow wall wash effect from a second story eave. Those 18' long ladders are scary.

Great job on the list. Im assuming this was new construction and you put the lights during the build? Im trying to add the LED recessed lights to my existing vinyl soffits, or about to. I cant figure out how to pop out the vinyl so I assume I could drive a hole for access and fish the 12v wire down the outside soffit. Then where i want a light, drive the recessed hole, fish the cable out, splice into it and move to the next.

Good idea or bad idea?

 

[Dennis93]

Personally, not liking the focused look. I just put regular 4 inch cans on my house and put LED bulbs in them, it was cheap since they were on sale and now I can just change the bulb when it goes bad. I have mine spread about 5 feet apart and put them on a dimmer so I can control just exactly how much power it takes to get to the ground. On your house it looks like you have several dark areas between the lights. Around here the goal is to light up the outside of your house without any shadows/dark spots. I went online and planned the lighting output and distance to ground and between, it really helped. Again, no offence, it's just not usually what I see, and what I see illuminates the house much better than these focused lights.

 

[dipan]

Personally, not liking the focused look. I just put regular 4 inch cans on my house and put LED bulbs in them, it was cheap since they were on sale and now I can just change the bulb when it goes bad. I have mine spread about 5 feet apart and put them on a dimmer so I can control just exactly how much power it takes to get to the ground. On your house it looks like you have several dark areas between the lights. Around here the goal is to light up the outside of your house without any shadows/dark spots. I went online and planned the lighting output and distance to ground and between, it really helped. Again, no offence, it's just not usually what I see, and what I see illuminates the house much better than these focused lights.

Not a problem! No offense taken! I do still love the look. There is much more light spill than I can capture in a photo also. And in terms of security, these are not all. I've got lots of flood lights (also with LED bulbs). But those are tied to motion detection or I can turn them on with the flick of a switch.

The look was striking (in a good way) to me and everyone that has seen it, and there is a decent amount of light for around 70 watts.

 

[pearltsi]

So bringing this back from the dead a little bit, but i wanted to add my picture. Just got finished installing. 16'walls and the garage is 60' long.
Used these lights. http://www.superbrightleds.com/more...e-recessed-light-fixture--bridgelux-cob/1303/

Going to put up the same thing on the back side I think too.

 

[madosta]

Awesome!!!

 

[red5001]

Looks great. is that the cool light color?

 

[ibmrduck]

I went with the 3" remodel can lights from home depot. I paid about $13 apiece I believe. They use GU10'S so I used the LED's. A little expensive, but they last a long time and are easy on the light bill. They are all wired to 120 volt timer switch I put in the garage.


I have 5 in the front of the house. One on each side of the garage and one on each of the columns.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[pearltsi]

Looks great. is that the cool light color?

Yes it is

 

[JohnX14]

I'm new here and realize I'm responding to a thread started a year ago, but the installation in the OP is not a legal or safe method of wiring within a dwelling even if it is done with a 12V supply.

Granted, nothing bad may ever happen, but it is not the best installation practice or at all in compliance with the NEC>