Actually it will be when MORE people start buying them. The more people buy the more they make, the more they make the more that the production cost will drop and also the more likely that more competition will jump in.

Since the PBL single frosteds are very reasonable, I think I will order 50 cool whites when they are back in stock to play around with. It will only be 15 bux, so no biggie if I don't like em. I got some good info in this thread. Thanks for starting it, Crash. And thanks to all the experienced LED guys for the knowledge.

LOL! You gotta love The Goonies playing in the background ...

http://bcspinball.com/44-white-w1-1led-frosted-non-polarized/?osCsid=cn1a5h04udaean050hf7h4pgo3

These are the best GI LEDs I've found. It's an awful company to deal with; shipping times are horrendous, they don't reply to emails, etc. etc. etc. I still haven't received some blue 44s and that's been over a year. I wouldn't order anything again without calling first, and making sure they can ship them in a reasonable time. Having said all of that, they really are a nice looking LED at a very reasonable price. They also have Cyan / Teal, which are nice in some machines. I compare them with the Ablaze, including the 3-bulb, from Pinball Life. The 3-bulbs are close in terms of brightness, but these really do have a better look, especially if the bulb is visible--then again Terry is amazing to deal with so...

PS: Longshot, but is anyone from my area (Tri-State WI, IA, IL) going to Chicago. I need a sheet of glass from Pinball Life.

Hey, check that out - that's my video. Glad it was able to help you.

I'm telling ya - these lil LEDs are well worth it. Everyone goes after the $1.00+/piece ones, but these cheaper ones really are worth their money.

It's 80's night here nearly every night .

I have decked out 17 machines in LEDs and I used to be so anal with picking out and spending a shit ton of money with cointaker. No disrespect he has nice stuff but its way too much when your doing a few machines.

Last few I used the Ablaze 3 and 4 from Terry on everything and they look great. No difference from the flex and ultras on my other machines but feels better not knowing the bank was broken.

Also there is always lights the burn out monthy from defects, etc. So using the ablze are easier to replace.

Also I use cool white for all the gi and back glass.

Also another tip at least in my opinion is not to waste money on LED strobes. The 906 bulbs look and work the best. Belive me I have spent a ton on 50-60 LED Flashers and have went back to 906 since they spread the light better and they are not $3.00+ each.

I'd say pin led's are cheap compared to the latest auto led's, I'm waiting for these to become avail...

http://www.v-leds.com/page/V3TRITON.html

I really like the CT frosted for GI...but lately I have noticed a flicker in the back box of my Williams games?? My older frosted don't have that affect...I wonder if Chris changed.

I only use ablaze 1 LED's for inserts, but I use the concave lens bulbs since they have better light spread. I use frosted bulbs for incandescent bulbs on the playfield that would normally be capped. For GI, I use the ablaze 4 LED/SED bulbs.

For flashers, I use Cointaker super flashers.

This is the BEST Post on the Thread !!! CoinTakers Leds are Getting Better and Better !!

The Premiums and Retro's might be a $ 1.59 a Pop , I Don't care , because my Pin's lOOk like a New Shinny Ferrari when I Bling them out .. The Banker bought a Scared Stiff and All the inserts were in Led's except for the GI's .. He had me take the Left ramp off because of 2 - 555's incandescent bulbs were about to melt his ramp from underneath .. $ 200 to $ 300 per Pin in Led's and that's No Kit ,,
( if you do it rite ) is Well worth the $$ to me ...

I prefer LEDs over bulbs in my games.

The only additional thing Im going to say is the 'We are buying $5000 games and bitching about LED costs' is kind of a bullshit thing to say. When you buy a house, you still look for the best deal in contractors and improvements, you dont say 'Well, I spent $200k on a house...I shouldn't bitch about paying $25,000 on a new deck!'

Its a dumb thing to say. Just because we like pinball and are into what can be considered an expensive hobby doesn't mean we give up the right to complain about the money that goes into it. We have people here from all kinds of income brackets and all sizes of collections, so maybe dropping $200 a game on LEDS is small change for some; but for others thats a third the cost of their rent for the month.

Meh. Can't please everyone. I'm a 2Lt in the AF - yeah - I'm making REAL BIG BUCKS ....

The right to complain - more like "The right to bitch about 1st world problems."

I love the internet - no one is right and no one is wrong, and if I'm in the minority about how I feel - fine with me.

I was doing a little more reading and it appears the singe led concave lens from PBL are very similare to the CT 170 degree bulbs. Do you have issues with them ghosting in your inserts? Thinking mainly for a newer Stern.

Like others have said. Use Pinball Life Ablaze 1's. Nice and bright for inserts, not obnoxious, and you can get them in quantity for $.25 each. Never buy a kit, buy individual bulbs. I don't LED the GI as I think it looks terrible so I don't have to worry about that.

I use the same approach. Just like I want bang for the buck pins, I also like bang for my buck LEDs!

Though some inserts do require a little more juice, and I make sure to upgrade from the single LEDs when needed.

Only in my TZ. They tend to ghost in WPC games, but when I use them for inserts, I don't see them ghosting. However, when I use them on or above the playfield, that's the only time I notice them.

I did use some for the inserts and pop bumpers in my friends Tron, and I never noticed any ghosting. But we used Cointakers for the GI lighting.

But from what I've experienced, they only ghost on the controlled lamps. I've never seen ghosting in normal GI lighting.

Thanks. I went ahead and ordered enough of the single LED concave bulbs to do the GI and inserts in TRON. We will see how it all looks. I ordered some to play around with on others too.

Inserts you really don't want concave.. Concave is much better for GI. Ive been buying tons of the Frosted ones. In fact I ordered 1k Frosted from PBL this morning.

Well, there are conflicting opinions. If I don't like them, I can always order the frosteds. I'll see what these look like and go from there. I figured based on the larger spread, they would fill out the bigger inserts, like the light cycles.

Right. Certain areas sometimes need more, but usually those areas are few and far between.

I would use the 3-LED's or 4-LED/SED bulbs for GI.

While the PBL concave bulbs have a good light spread, most people (including me) still find them to dim for playfield lighting.

But those 4 LED bulbs throw out some serious light!

When you guys are talking about using the concave single LEDs for GI, are you talking about playfield GI? I was planning on ordering some in red and blue for my Pinbot. I had tried colored incandescents, but they were too dim.

The CT standard double leds are in the ACDC premium and I find them a bit on the bright side, so I hope I like these singles. If not, it costs less than 15 bux to do all of the GI, so I'm not out a ton of money and could repurpose the bulbs elsewhere. Heck, a year ago, I'd be in this thread bad mouthing LEDs and how they don't look natural or original. Since I got the ACDC, I've opened up to the possibility of LEDs in other pins. This will be my first LED conversion. Fingers crossed.

When you guys are talking about using the concave single LEDs for GI, are you talking about playfield GI? I was planning on ordering some in red and blue for my Pinbot. I had tried colored incandescents, but they were too dim.

Yes.

I use these for standard playfield lighting.
http://www.pinballlife.com/index.php?p=product&id=2561

I use the blue and red ones on my TZ and they look amazing. However, I use the white ones around the flipper/slingshot areas.

2012-10-15_19-08-08_359.jpg

Anyone notice the description of the Ablaze 4's on Pinball Life:

"Product ID : abl_fucking_bright_bayonet"

I just ordered some LEDs from CoinTaker. I ordered a bunch of the 170s and some of the frosted 2 LED (http://shop.cointaker.com/category.sc;jsessionid=1BCC9A4DDD47F08BF10780CA976E465F.qscstrfrnt04?categoryId=6). After reading this thread I had intended on using the 170s everywhere for GI except for a few places, but discovered that the warm 170s weren't nearly as "warm" nor as bright nor provided as good light spread as the frosted. I put a few of the 170s in the back, but I intend to get more of the frosted. They're worth the extra 20 cents.

The warm 170s were bluer but about the same spread and brightness as standard bulbs. The frosted 2 LEDs were about the same color as the standard bulbs, but maybe 50%-100% more bright and had a more even light spread. Some shadows in my slingshots (TSPP) were reduced and the center playfield and Itchy and Scratchy toys are much better illuminated. The few LEDs that are directly visible are very bright but not blinding, even in the dark.

Incidentally, I also bought some of the fancy flasher replacements and was unimpressed. Decided to keep my 906s. The 5x high power green LEDs I put on my pop bumpers, however, look terrific and I may take a small video to show them off. There is some ghosting but in this application (inside the SNPP cooling towers) I think the effect is positive.

The best LED's to use under the translite is the CT Frost Warm White/Cool White. Usually CT provides the super brights with no cap and they do create hotspots because of the directed intensity. I have LED's in most of my operated games and I do have to say that the LED failure rate is higher than industry standards which is disappointing. I have used LED's from both Cointaker and PinballLife and the Pinball Life LED's do fail more often than the Cointakers. I would say they fail 30 percent more than the CoinTakers do. I do prefer to use PinballLife flashers over the CoinTakers because I think that the light output is better.

We do the concave 170 degree bulbs for 25p each plus lots of other led products.

www.pinball-led.co.uk

Convave_#44_playfield_ba9s.jpg

Convave_#555_playfield_t10_wedge.jpg

We also do 3 types of white: Warm White, Pure White and Cool White...

100leds.com

Flashers 1.48 per 50

Frosted .59 per 100

Mini and Wide Angle .49 per 100

Flex .89 per 100

Supers and Retros .89 per 100

Enjoy!

these type of LEDS look like crap.. Sorry but true I have a fat bag that I have no use for.

I have kitted out a few lower machines with these and they are great for the price. About 20% brighter than incandescents. Plus you can colour coordinate them. Still get lower power consumption and less heat generated which is less wear on your boards.
This was a reply to this thread suggestion an alternative to a cheaper led price. If you want top of the range leds we do them as well. Premium 2 smd no ghosting anti-strobing effects and non polarity will fit anyway round. We also carry many other types. In general you get what you pay for. Enjoy!

I read somewhere last year that when Tim Arnold switched all of his games to LED he actually reduced the monthy price of his A/C bill too just from not getting all the heat from that many incandecent bulbs.
We have guys on this forum who have enough games in their basement to benefit from the heat savings too.
With the new technology in LED they are the way to go in every respect. I switched most of the GI in my Stern's games to CT's warm white retro. They are nearly identical in color to incandecent, but sometimes you cannot use them if the light is aimed directly in the eyes of the player. Maybe the frosted ones will eliminate that, but there is no ghosting with them in GI circuit. I only pay extra for the non ghosting in Sterns games. Some inserts don't ghost, so you just have to buy a crapload and switch around as neccessary.