What are flicker free LEDs?
By Radiant Lighting | 19 Jan 2022 | 0 Comments
When selecting new light fittings, here at Radiant Lighting, we always recommend that you select high quality, LED lights. For the purpose of this article, we want to delve into the ‘high quality’ part of that statement.
A little knowledge can be dangerous and we often hear customers who decided to install cheap, low quality LED’s and find themselves having recurring headaches with their new lights due to flicker.
As we’ve mentioned in our article on what makes a quality LED - not all LED’s are made equal so keep on reading below and we’ll get into how that happens.
What is ‘flicker’?
LED lights oftentimes have an invisible flicker or flash - rapid changes in brightness that occur many times per second. Because of its rapid speed, this "flicker" in an LED may not be visible, but can have physiological and neurological effects on our bodies, such as eye strain, fatigue, headaches and difficulty in concentration.
Even "invisible" flicker is sometimes noticeable. You may have observe moving objects create a distinct "trail" (stroboscopic effect) or vertical streaking lines when taking photos. Both are signs of a flickering light source.
How to measure flicker?
Percent flicker is calculated by measuring the relative difference in brightness between the maximum and minimum brightness exhibited during a flicker cycle. 0% flicker means that its brightness does not flicker at all, while a 100% flicker value would indicate that it alternates between completely on and off - not ideal.
For a golden rule, any light source should preferably have less than 5% flicker to ensure there are no negative effects.
What’s the impact of flicker?
Flickering light bulbs can cause undesired health effects. When exposed to flickering light, your eyes have to rapidly adjust to the changing light which causes strain. Prolonged exposure can lead to:
- Eye strain
- Headaches
- Blurred vision
- Fatigue
- Reduced visual task performance
- Neurological problems
If you’re concerned that your lights have flicker , here’s a simple test using your smartphone camera to determine if your LED’s are at fault.
Turn on the camera and aim it at the light in question. Look at the screen and if you see a series of dark and light bands travelling across the screen, then you have a flickering light.
The easiest solution to ensuring you have no flicker in your LED’s is to buy “flicker free LEDs”.
What are flicker free LED’s
The issue with LED’s is they have no persistence so when the power supply to an LED is switched off, the light output stops instantly. If you connected your AC mains supply, the LED would turn on/off 50 times a second (50 Hz) which would be perceptible to the human eye. The solution to this is a quality driver. An LED driver converts the current from AC to DC and steps down the voltage so you get a constant current to your LED’s - eliminating any visible flicker.
To be sure you’re purchasing a quality LED, simply look for ‘Flicker Free’ on the packaging. Our Faze Pro Adjustable downlight is an example of a high quality LED with a flicker free driver.
We hope you enjoyed reading this article. If you have any questions surrounding LED’s, our expert lighting consultants would love to hear from you. Please email us at sales@radiantlighting.com.au or call on 08 9240 2227.
Back To Blog Entries