Many general aviation aircraft today are still equipped with a variety of vintage incandescent lighting for the panel, cabin, and landing, taxi, and recognition lighting. The efficiency and longevity of halogen, LED, and other lamps have long since exceeded incandescent technology.
Today’s LED lights are remarkably powerful and fairly affordable. Best of all, there’s no ballast, so the installation is as simple as swapping in the new bulb and doing the paperwork for the logs.
LED technology affords many benefits over traditional incandescent lighting. When integrated into a well-designed lighting system with adequate heat sinking and solid-state mounting, LED-based lighting products will easily last thousands of hours of continuous operation, and their lifespan is not reduced by power cycles.
LEDs also have proven efficiency not available in incandescent bulbs. For instance, LEDs have high lumen efficiency ratings, and as a result, they typically use less than a third the power of halogen bulbs. Of importance here is the significant reduction in the electrical load on the airplane’s battery and alternator system. LED lights maintain full light output, even at lower battery voltages.
Exterior Lighting
LED Navigation and Position lights
Many LED products today incorporate forward position lights as well as flashing position and tail light functions with LED circuitry built in to eliminate the need for separate flasher boxes for operation.
Aveo Engineering sells the Aurora series AveoFlash LSA, which is popular on Light Sport Aircraft, experimentals and ultralights. It’s light—weighing 2.9 ounces—and built with an aerodynamic shape and minimal footprint. Aveo says these lights are unbreakable and offers a lifetime warranty against LED burnout. The system comes standard with synchronization, making it an all-in-one solution for position, navigation and strobe light. It’s available with multiple mounting adapters for composite fairings.
LED Anti-Collision Beacon lights
AERO LEDs makes the SunBeacon II and is a high performance aircraft beacon light that provides a 360-degree flash pattern around its vertical axis. This compact aircraft beacon light comes standard with a clear lens – available with either white or red LEDs. The SunBeacon II is a direct replacement for standard rotating aircraft beacons and flashing beacons. This aircraft strobe light offers superior anti-collision benefits with more light output for less power. It requires zero maintenance and has an extremely low profile for reduced drag.
Whelen Aerospace Technologies offers the Model 71080 Series and 90520 series LED beacons. Both are FAA TSO'd self-contained LED anti-collision lights. They are designed to replace existing beacons and can also replace remote mounted strobe lights allowing for removal of the strobe power supply. An internal mounting plate is provided with choice of mounting holes to retrofit most existing mounting patterns.
LED Taxi and Landing lights
Whelen Aerospace Technologies offers the Parmetheus PAR-36 and PAR-46-series LED taxi and landing lights. Keeping the tradition of industry leading performance and value, all while maintaining the same form, fit and functionality of a drop-in LED replacement for legacy landing lights. They also have a polycarbonate, replaceable hard-coated outer lens.
AeroLEDs aircraft landing, taxi and recognition lighting products offer numerous advantages over conventional Halogen and Xenon bulb based aircraft lighting technologies. AeroLEDs are 10x more efficient than incandescent lighting, draw far less current than conventional lighting and require no external hi-voltage power supply. The LEDs in AeroLEDs’ products are solid-state mounted devices that can tolerate high levels of shock and vibration without failing.
These are GE plug-and-play, drop-in replacements, meaning they’ll use the existing wiring and mount. It often takes longer to open the cowling to access the lamp than it does to swap one out.
Cabin Lighting
When creating a desirable interior space, ambience and aesthetics are important considerations in many industries. Why should an aircraft be any different? Your plane’s interior cabin lighting deserves more consideration whether it’s in the cockpit or the cabin, and your choices abound.
Whether you’re looking for interior cabin lighting for a single-engine airplane or a corporate jet, LED lighting is all about possibilities. From upwash, downwash, lower accent and galley lighting to lavatory and cupholder illumination, LED aircraft cabin lighting has you covered. These can be as simple as LED reading lights to whole-cabin accent lighting.
Quality LED-lighting systems can offer preset configuration options. Need a setting for a late-night flight? It can do that. Need a setting that matches a business brand palette? It’s available. Want to celebrate with a holiday-themed color palette? Of course, it’s an option.
Although LED aircraft cabin lighting is chock full of the cool factor, that’s not the only advantage over traditional, fluorescent lighting. LED lights are physically small and weigh less than fluorescents. Operating on a low voltage, they emit almost no forward heat. LEDs are naturally directional, which means they emit light for 180 degrees by default. They are faster switching, with no warm-up or cool-down period required.
They’re also good for the bottom line. With low-cost, easy installation and a longer life, it’s hard to beat an LED system when it comes to the cost of ownership.
Most importantly, LED illumination is a small detail that makes a big impact on the passenger experience.
In Summary
There are numerous offerings in aircraft lighting, at various price points. The more popular brands for LEDs include Whelen and AeroLEDs and offer the widest variety of choices.
LED aircraft lighting is also good for the bottom line. A longer life span, as well as fewer repairs and replacements means saved time and money. When it comes to airplane weight, every pound counts. LED interior airplane lighting is lightweight while fluorescent tubes are heavy. LED cabin lighting easily replaces old, failure-prone lighting systems. Because they last longer, you’ll save on maintenance.
LED lighting is also easy to install and is usually a direct drop in replacement for existing lights.
Benefits of LED Aircraft Lighting
· Bright, Cleaner and more efficient LED light
· Longer Life, +60,000 hours
· Keep existing controllers
· No rewiring
· No glass & reduced maintenance costs
· Solid-state construction eliminates flickering
· Emits virtually no heat
It is recommend you do some research at trade-shows to see your options. There, you can judge quality and price, and get a demonstration of a system’s light-beam width and throw. Some companies offer side-by-side comparisons with their competitors’ products. Manufacturers today offer many options, and it’s reasonable to expect that this growing field will continue to evolve with new products at a variety of prices.
Like this article? Please share it with your friends and invite others to read our blog.
Comentarii