LED module Dual Colour for Navigating at Night
We are very proud to confirm that our new SeaLEDs project Night Watch Dual Colour LED module finally left the production and verification lab. Marine led G4 bulb is an easy replacement for a halogen bulb.
The idea was inspired by our own experience, when during dark nights - night watches especially in crowded, busy areas like channels, fairwater, ship routes, someone needs to go down for a minute or when changing watches, accidentally switches on all luminaries under the deck. It makes helmsman blind for 20 seconds and distracts his concentrated sight for several minutes. From below the deck, you could hear honest „sorry” but what you could hear as a response from helm, I would not repeat.
Me, as a guy who likes to make improvements and sailors patents to solve discovered problems, first „invented” stainless steel guard cage for regular light switches – did not involve a lot of intelligence, just observation and quick time and cost calculation ( hand drawing, next week was done).
This solution prevented approximately 50% of accidentally switched ON’s done on the rough sea by the hip or bounced body in such wavy conditions by the crew going through the corridor to their cabins. These statistic results don't satisfy any technical guy with high aspirations. So I knew I just bought the time, with fewer complaints from our crew.
As our SEALEDs general idea of LED marine lighting is to give the uncompromising quality solution, leaving our loved already proven luminaries systems made by Cantalupi and installed by Oyster Marine or any other experienced and trustful boat manufacturers, we designed a simple retrofit.
Yeas, G4 bulb retrofit, as I like so much my light fixtures and believe there are not so many sailors enjoying changing their current electrical circuits.
For me, it's easy as I like the challenge of electrical job but I understand those who don't enjoy it. Sailors should prefer sailing more than repairing and for these people we created our retrofit plug and play:).
I had to believe that I am not alone with these problems, so easy retrofit LED modules for boats is our priority.
General features:
SEALEDs Night Watch Dual color LED module requires from you only to get rid of old halogen G4 bulb ( I also do not like to throw anything which still works, I am sorry, but the whole world is expecting to do so from you! Just throw it to the right bean) LED for boat Red/White module will save you a lot of energy which you will really appreciate during long passages and in SEALEDs case without any compromise of quality of light in any today known factors – my promise.
LED modules how it works?
Let's assume you have our SeaLEDs modules in. The almost must have is Nav table or Navigation table or that kind of area where you complete the log book every two hours or make equipment check. Imagine you are going downstairs to make a deserved tea or coffee. Why distract your eyes from the night concentration?
NO need with SEALEDs design.
How SEALEDs Night Watch works?
As you turn ON lights, even accidentally it will turn RED and safely for your pupils will give you enough visibility at night as you need for most night activities.
SEALEDs will let you accomplish the logbook notes, making a tea or coffee for your exhausted crew or other very important actions.
The microcontroller is on uphold to never let you and your crew switch on serious disturbing light at night by accident!
When you switch ON your regular light switch it will always set first RED (delicate, soft and subtle) light not disturbing your conjunctiva.
But if your intention was to light (white) full power of your luminaire it will give you after 3-4 seconds a gentle sign by blinking twice. So, to switch ON you need just to press OFF and ON again in 3-4 seconds then full power white will appear.
This algorithm was discussed with several boat owners and reflects their preferences, we feel is the most natural and expected by sailors.
However, our microcontroller software is as intelligent as our software programmer and we are ready to change it according to your preferences if your commercial request is serious.
Every time you switched OFF then, it will always start from gentle reduced power RED light color. All algorithms start again.
The SEALEDs Dual Night Watch is built with carefully selected LED’s. On 30mm diameter disk are 8 LEDs. 6 LEDs mounted around, are white the same quality and efficiency as in our bestseller SEA6-200lm-2700K-95-12-24AC/DC module giving 200lm a pleasant warm light with quality of colour fidelity assured by 93 CRI factor.
Among them are located 2 pieces of Red Leds with limited to 25 lm (10-14 lm each) light output to avoid distracting sailors' night vision, but delivering enough light to the working surface due to wide-angle of 120’ (provided they are located from a 1-2m distance).
When SeaLEDs Dual operates in night mode - Red uses only 76 mA which means the power consumption is below 1W.
Algorithm of Led module:
- ON >> Red
- In 3-4 sec gentle blink
You choose :
- do nothing it stays RED until you decide to switch off
- press OFF and ON if your intention is full white light ( you have to do it in 3-4 seconds after a blink)
- OFF>> no lights
- ON >> repeats the cycle from RED
This configuration is most useful when you have one light fixture for example at the nav station.
What to do if your current design of the electricity pattern is different?
For example, our kitchen has 6 light luminaries connected together at one switch.
You can use the general RED/White Double color LED module. Then if you switched ON all 6 lights will be lighting RED and all the above procedures remain the same.
For us was too much light at night, even the RED are very gentle to the human eye. This is because it is not the truth that light with a wavelength around 630 to 700nm ( red) will not affect your so-called "night vision" it also depends much from "how much" light energy gets to your rods and cones, the parts of the human eye which are responsible for our sight. In other words, if the light is too powerful, even if red, it will affect your night vision.
So there is an option to use a sister module designed especially for this purpose SEALEDs 0/White. It is a similar module as Red/White equipped with uC and software but without RED LEDs.
You mount one or two modules of RED/White SEALEDs dual and the rest 0/White SEALEDs.
The procedure and algorithm remain the same. The result is different.
Once you switched ON the whole sector only Dual will light their Red sections, after 3-4 seconds gentle blink of RED LEDs appear giving you a chance to switch OFF and ON again during 3-4 seconds (after blink) will result in the full light of each luminary in the pattern.
When SEALEDS Dual operates in night mode - Red, in the same time SEALEDs 0/White are in standby mode ( no lights) use only 4,5mA which means the power consumption is below 55mW. Our marine led G4 bulbs do not interfere with RF equipment on board.
Dual color G4 LED bulbs - seaLEDs, are designed and manufactured in the EU, (well) made in Poland.
I am sure You are convinced of the solution but if you are still a bit confused about how it works please look at a small video here.
