How Era LED bulbs have changed in 2019
Recently, 370 LED lamps were sent to me for a test. Among them, there were 58 Era lamps, and some articles were repeated 2-3 times and these “identical” bulbs were produced in 2017, 2018 and 2019. Thanks to this, I was able to compare how the Era lamps changed in different batches. The results are distressing.
The first example. Balls G45 9W 720 lm with warm and cold light.
Of the three copies of each type, two were released on 01/31/2017. These bulbs weigh about 29 grams.
The third warm light bulb was released on May 28, 2018 and weighs only 18 grams.
The third cold light bulb was released on January 25, 2019. Her weight is 21 grams.
And here are the results of my measurements.
The measured power consumption of the “nine-watt” warm light bulbs, released in 2017, was 7.3 W, and that of the released in 2018, it turned out to be exactly 6 W (33% less than promised). Lamps in 2017 give about 680 lumens of light (this is about 93-95% of the promised 720 lumens and fits into the requirements of GOST, the bulb in 2018 gives 564 lumens, which is 22% lower than declared.
The manufacturer indicates on the package that the bulbs replace 80-watt incandescent bulbs, in fact, the 2018 bulb can only replace 60-watt bulbs.
But, unfortunately, that’s not all. On the boxes of all the lamps, “Color rendering index Ra> 80” is indicated, but the measured color rendering index of the lamp released in 2018 was only 72.8. I note that among the 58 tested there were two lamps with low color rendering indices, and both of them were released in 2018.
Compare the results of lamps 2017 and 2018 release.
The measured power consumption for “nine-watt” cold-light bulbs released in 2017 was 7.5–7.7 W, and for those released in 2019 –6.6 W (27% less than declared). Lamps in 2017 give about 730 lumens of light (this corresponds to the declared 720 lumens), a bulb in 2019 gives 669 lumens, which is 7% lower than indicated on the package.
The Nine-Watt Candles of 2017 and 2019 showed similar results.
The second example is the “candles” of 7 W.
The lamp with the release date 02/01/2017 is called "LED smd B35 7w-827-E14" and it shows a luminous flux of 600 lm. In the name of the lamp released on September 25, 2018, “smd” disappeared, it is simply called “LED B35-7W-827-E14” and the luminous flux of 560 lm is indicated on it.
The measured numbers are completely different.
The lamp of 2017 consumes 5.6 W (19% less than promised), the lamp of 2018 5.1 W (27% less than declared). The measured luminous flux of the lamp in 2017 amounted to 456 lm (24% less than declared), for the lamp of 2018 - 383 lm (32% less than declared). The manufacturer promises that the lamp will shine like a 60-watt incandescent lamp, but the actual equivalent of the 2008 lamp is only 45 watts.
I note that the weight of these lamps is almost the same.
I will not argue that all Era lamps in new batches are worse. For some lamps, the measured parameters exactly correspond to the declared ones, for example, the “candle” LED B35-7W-840-E14 released on 03/15/2019 shows parameters of 7 W, 560 lm, the equivalent of 60 W. Measurement results: 6.57 W, 559 lm, 60 W equivalent. However, her warm "sister", released on 09/25/2018, with the same declared parameters, has only 5.1 W, 383 lm and is the equivalent of a 45-watt incandescent lamp.
Luminous flux, color temperature, and color rendering index were measured using a two-meter integrating sphere and an Instrument Systems CAS 140 CT spectrometer, and the power consumption of the Robiton PM-2. Additionally, a control power measurement was made by the GW Instek GPM-8212 device. Before measurements, to stabilize the parameters of the lamp, they were heated for half an hour.
I can assume that in general, Era lamps released in 2018 turned out to be worse than 2017 lamps, and in 2019 they became slightly better.
The test results of all Era lamps can be viewed on Lamptest: http://lamptest.ru/search/#currency=rub&type=LED&brand=Era .
Some people believe that all my measurements of the lamp parameters and the Lamptest.ru project itself do not make sense, since the lamp parameters can vary greatly from batch to batch, but the main point of the project is to accumulate information about lamps of various brands, so you can judge the products brand as a whole. If we talk about Era lamps, they are not bad (although there are misses in the form of lamps with low CRI or a strong deviation of parameters), but when buying them you need to consider that with a high probability the lamps will be less powerful and bright than the manufacturer promises, so it’s better to choose them "With a margin."
© 2019, Alexey Nadezhin
The first example. Balls G45 9W 720 lm with warm and cold light.
Of the three copies of each type, two were released on 01/31/2017. These bulbs weigh about 29 grams.
The third warm light bulb was released on May 28, 2018 and weighs only 18 grams.
The third cold light bulb was released on January 25, 2019. Her weight is 21 grams.
And here are the results of my measurements.
The measured power consumption of the “nine-watt” warm light bulbs, released in 2017, was 7.3 W, and that of the released in 2018, it turned out to be exactly 6 W (33% less than promised). Lamps in 2017 give about 680 lumens of light (this is about 93-95% of the promised 720 lumens and fits into the requirements of GOST, the bulb in 2018 gives 564 lumens, which is 22% lower than declared.
The manufacturer indicates on the package that the bulbs replace 80-watt incandescent bulbs, in fact, the 2018 bulb can only replace 60-watt bulbs.
But, unfortunately, that’s not all. On the boxes of all the lamps, “Color rendering index Ra> 80” is indicated, but the measured color rendering index of the lamp released in 2018 was only 72.8. I note that among the 58 tested there were two lamps with low color rendering indices, and both of them were released in 2018.
Compare the results of lamps 2017 and 2018 release.
The measured power consumption for “nine-watt” cold-light bulbs released in 2017 was 7.5–7.7 W, and for those released in 2019 –6.6 W (27% less than declared). Lamps in 2017 give about 730 lumens of light (this corresponds to the declared 720 lumens), a bulb in 2019 gives 669 lumens, which is 7% lower than indicated on the package.
The Nine-Watt Candles of 2017 and 2019 showed similar results.
The second example is the “candles” of 7 W.
The lamp with the release date 02/01/2017 is called "LED smd B35 7w-827-E14" and it shows a luminous flux of 600 lm. In the name of the lamp released on September 25, 2018, “smd” disappeared, it is simply called “LED B35-7W-827-E14” and the luminous flux of 560 lm is indicated on it.
The measured numbers are completely different.
The lamp of 2017 consumes 5.6 W (19% less than promised), the lamp of 2018 5.1 W (27% less than declared). The measured luminous flux of the lamp in 2017 amounted to 456 lm (24% less than declared), for the lamp of 2018 - 383 lm (32% less than declared). The manufacturer promises that the lamp will shine like a 60-watt incandescent lamp, but the actual equivalent of the 2008 lamp is only 45 watts.
I note that the weight of these lamps is almost the same.
I will not argue that all Era lamps in new batches are worse. For some lamps, the measured parameters exactly correspond to the declared ones, for example, the “candle” LED B35-7W-840-E14 released on 03/15/2019 shows parameters of 7 W, 560 lm, the equivalent of 60 W. Measurement results: 6.57 W, 559 lm, 60 W equivalent. However, her warm "sister", released on 09/25/2018, with the same declared parameters, has only 5.1 W, 383 lm and is the equivalent of a 45-watt incandescent lamp.
Luminous flux, color temperature, and color rendering index were measured using a two-meter integrating sphere and an Instrument Systems CAS 140 CT spectrometer, and the power consumption of the Robiton PM-2. Additionally, a control power measurement was made by the GW Instek GPM-8212 device. Before measurements, to stabilize the parameters of the lamp, they were heated for half an hour.
I can assume that in general, Era lamps released in 2018 turned out to be worse than 2017 lamps, and in 2019 they became slightly better.
The test results of all Era lamps can be viewed on Lamptest: http://lamptest.ru/search/#currency=rub&type=LED&brand=Era .
Some people believe that all my measurements of the lamp parameters and the Lamptest.ru project itself do not make sense, since the lamp parameters can vary greatly from batch to batch, but the main point of the project is to accumulate information about lamps of various brands, so you can judge the products brand as a whole. If we talk about Era lamps, they are not bad (although there are misses in the form of lamps with low CRI or a strong deviation of parameters), but when buying them you need to consider that with a high probability the lamps will be less powerful and bright than the manufacturer promises, so it’s better to choose them "With a margin."
© 2019, Alexey Nadezhin
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