Saturday, February 6, 2016

Please help me find these lights

I've been hip-deep in boat maintenance projects since arriving here in Riviera Beach, and a separate blog post with the status of various projects and our current plans is forthcoming. One of the projects on my plate is to repair a pair of LED ceiling lights up on the flybridge, and I've run into a brick wall. I'm turning to our readers for help, a tactic which has worked well in the past.

Specifically, I am having trouble finding either direct replacements, or else something which can be made to work in the same space. There are no identifying marks on them which would lead me to a manufacturer or model. If you recognized these lights, drop me a note in the comments or send me an email at the address in the "Who We Are" link in the sidebar. Alternatively, if you know of a model that will fit the space (see below), let me know that, too.

Here's what they look like:


Overall side view.


The business end. Glass is glued in place; they are "sealed" units.


The top side, showing heat sink fins. Wires are sealed in place; I had to cut them to remove it.

The dimensions are critical, because they are installed in custom housings. The overall diameter of the mounting flange is 2-5/8" (66mm), and the diameter of the cylindrical body is 1-7/8" (47mm). Overall height is 1.5" (35mm). These are mounted in annular rings made of HDPE with an inside diameter of 1-7/8" (so the body is a fairly tight fit) and an outside diameter of 2-3/4". A trim ring snaps over the mounting flange once it is screwed into the enclosure.


Mounting enclosure.


Completed installation.

We have six of these on our flybridge. Four are "warm white" and light the entire area up well enough to read. The other two, above the upper helm area, emit red light for night operations. The four white ones are still working, whereas the two red ones have failed, within just a few hours of each other.

Ideally, I would replace the two red ones with similar red or perhaps combo red/white models. However, I'm not all that concerned with having red lighting on the flybridge (the notion that somehow red light preserves dark adaptation is mostly nonsense perpetuated by WWII submarine movies) and I'd be happy to replace these with white ones identical to the other four, or alternatively replace all six with something slightly different which still fits the enclosures. I'm guessing failure of the other units is not far behind.

I've spent hours on various marine lighting web sites as well as chandleries, Amazon, and eBay. I've found nothing that looks identical. I've also found nothing that will fit the enclosures -- either the recessed body is slightly too large, or the mounting flange is too small. The body needs to be no larger than 1-7/8" diameter, and the flange needs to be at least 2" and preferably closer to 2.5".

I'm willing to completely remove the HDPE (a.k.a. "Starboard") enclosures in order to fit "puck" style lights, which could then be perhaps as large as 3" OD (but no larger). The pucks would have to be water resistant (this is outdoors, after all) and pretty bright to replace what's there now.

Thanks for any suggestions, and we'll return to my usual blather in my next post.

1 comment:

  1. Are you able to get to whatever fastener is holding those housings to the metal bracket? If so it looks like an ideal solution would be to select your preferred fixture (color, intensity, and common as dirt for future replacement needs); then either ding a shop that can mill you replacement housings that mate to your bracket on top and fixture on the bottom. Short of a shop the housing looks an ideal canadate for 3D printing. I'm guessing there are online options where you upload your CAD or vector (pun accidental) drawing, and they ship you the printout.

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