LED Strips for the kitchen - recommendations

Vanilla

Vanilla

Vanilla

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
9,540
Hi all,

I know there is a separate LED bulb thread but LED strips information is pretty hard to find. I've got a few tid-bits of info on here (thanks) but want the following;

- One LED strip at foot level pointing down from the foot plinth (blue)
- One LED strip under the wall cabinets to highlight the work surface (white)
- One LED strip above the wall cabinets to add a bit of colour (blue)

These will all be connected to another switch next to the light switch. One for the spotlights, the other for the LED strips.

Can anyone recommend makes, methods, give any advice?

Similar to this although my kitchen is not so fancy!

4g98Mfx.jpg


Thanks
 
Can't say I'm a fan of the plan but...

I've SMD 50:50 LED's to illuminate my worktops. Strips easily cut down to size, are adhesive and provide a good amount of light. This was 5 years ago mind so probably some more advanced options available now.
 
Philips Hue strips seem to be popular for this sort of thing, although I'd expect it to cost a pretty penny if you do use those.

It depends how much you want to spend and how customizable you want them to be.

I'm looking at doing something similar with the Hue light strips then getting one of their remotes and fastening it to the wall to control all of the under cabinet lighting.
 
I'm amazed that people are putting coloured led strips into kitchens, op just make sure what you do is completely reversible in case you ever sell the house
 
I installed 5050 RGB strips bought from eBay. They look good, they change colour, they are remotely controlled, and bright.

I have one set under the cupboards, and one set in the kick boards. They stay on white 99% of the time, but do get switched to party mode when we have friends round for drinks.

BUT, the LEDs are starting to degrade. Some of the strips are a slightly different shade/colour. It's difficult to tell without looking directly at the strips, but I reckon they'll soon get worse.
And secondly, I've had trouble with the LED drivers/controllers. I've had to replace both controllers now. They are cheap, jut a pain to gain access to change them.
 
I was going to go with cheapo 5050 RGB strips when I do mine up, but having just got into the Philips Hue ecosystem, while expensive, it's miles better.
 
We have an outdoor led strip at the edge of our decking from TLC direct. They're very reasonable and where our sparky buys from.

Just a thought on the LED at floor level, depending on the type of floor you have (shiny vs. matte)... Shiny floors reflect each and every LED bulb and don't give that gentle glow that you get with more matte floors
 
Had really bad service from Brightlightz, sets of faulty strips, really poor connectors on some extensions and the support I got was really poor. I never got the return postage cost back after days of chasing for some of the faulty strips and the replacement cables sent out were no better. At least buying the cheap chinese strips from ebay you have them to claim from if the quality isn't good enough.

The "waterproof" strips the LED's overheat and die out, one set lasted just over a year, 3 more strips showing the same signs after 6 months use. also getting rust/discoloration on the metal connectors under the strip. I've since bought some cheap off ebay non waterproof to test but the quality control is bad. One strip used two different shades of green along the strip, the other had about 20-30 LED's that are faulty.
 
Don't buy cheap tosh, soo many people get the cheapest crap out there! The 14.4w/m SMD 2835 strips are cracking. You need 10W+ for under cabinet task lighting.

Hi line lighting do great LED kits in a hige variety. Just go for a set of warm white IP65 CRI80 strips from them. Brilliant quality strips at decent prices.

Also go for warm white, 3000-3500k, anything whiter will look like a morgue or operating theatre :p

I would use the warm white ones above for the under cab task lights and kick plate, then get some RGB ones to go ontop of the cabinets for the disco fun. Make sure you get the RGB+W ones that also have a specific warm white chip as part of them. As an RGB strip on its own cannot produce a proper white light as the normal warm white strips, so the RGB+W would be needed if you ever went for a full white layout scene now and again.
 
Last edited:
Steeps said:
Had really bad service from Brightlightz, sets of faulty strips, really poor connectors on some extensions and the support I got was really poor. I never got the return postage cost back after days of chasing for some of the faulty strips and the replacement cables sent out were no better. At least buying the cheap chinese strips from ebay you have them to claim from if the quality isn't good enough.

The "waterproof" strips the LED's overheat and die out, one set lasted just over a year, 3 more strips showing the same signs after 6 months use. also getting rust/discoloration on the metal connectors under the strip. I've since bought some cheap off ebay non waterproof to test but the quality control is bad. One strip used two different shades of green along the strip, the other had about 20-30 LED's that are faulty.
Click to expand...

That's a shame, my experience has been great. My kit is over a year old and still looks and functions like new. Mine are the waterproof strips and have zero problems.

They also sell on ebay if you wanted some protection :)
 
Slight threadomancy here, had a look at those suppliers listed and they're dead. Looking for about 3m worth of these to put behind a desk in my study, anyone able to recommend anywhere else?
 
i have had the cheapo non-waterproof ones behind my TV on a false floating wall for 4 years with no faults apart from the one I will go in to below.

I have always ran a single LED strip behind the TV and then I decided it would be a good idea to have a 2nd strip underneath the TV cabinet, this is when problems started, PSUs and LED controllers both began to die at this point.
Since I have gone back to a single strip I have had no problems. I could I suppose run 2 strips off 2 controllers, I suppose that might be an option, but for now I have gone back to 1.

the waterproof ones I have only used in my fishtank and I have killed quite a few of these, I always assume it was down to water eventually finding its way in to them, but reading above it seems that might not be the case.
I even bought some that had been mounted into aluminium "U" shaped track and they have started to play up as well.
 
That's why I asked here. Most reviews on amazon just talk of them failing or burning out after a relatively short period of time.
 
If its for a kitchen make sure you get the waterproof ones. As long as its all wired up properly it should last years. I just went for a basic SMD5050 60 per meter in warm white from ebay for under cabinet lighting and they have been installed for about 5 years now and still going strong. You can get them cheaper if you buy direct from China. All these companies just import the same products but put a big markup on them.
 
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