Customer Reviews

Designers Edge L-949 10 LED Rechargeable Solar Panel Shed Light

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I purchased this item for a 10x15 shed. A lot of people of commented on the amount of light this thing throws out so let me start the review with that.

This shed light is powered by 3 AA batteries that get recharged by the solar panel. The solar panel does not provide any direct power for the lights and that is not what it is designed to do. If you expect 3 AA batteries to provide the same amount of power and therefore light as a 120 volt AC shop light you are going to be disappointed in this product, or ANY product that provides light from 3 AA batteries. If you expect it to provide the same amount of light as a flashlight powered by 3AA batteries then this product is going to deliver exactly what you expect out of it. In my 10X15 shed this product delivers about as much light as a night light. The light it emits is an unnatural blue color but it is adequate. It will keep you from tripping over stuff and help you to make out the difference between a lawn mower and a leaf blower in otherwise complete darkness. It is not suitable for performing detailed work and is not a substitute for lighting that would normally require an electrical connection. When used during the day with the shed door open, using this light does not increase the ambient light inside the shed at all- normal daylight completely washes out the shed light. This light is very useful at night.

The product documentation is severely limited but installation is fairly common sense. The screws that come with the unit are inadequate drywall screws and the Phillips heads will strip when you try to drill them into real wood. For some reason it also comes with drywall anchors as if your shed is going to be finished with drywall. If your shed has drywall it probably also has electricity and you wouldn't be reading this review. The product comes with a large threaded L bracket that is not in the documentation. It looks like it can be used as an alternate mounting bracket but you would have to partially disassemble the solar panel to use it. I threw it in the recycling along with the NiCad batteries.

The product comes with 3 AA NiCad batteries. I recommend that you immediately recycle them responsibly upon opening the box and use NiMH batteries. For one, NiCad batteries have a memory effect that modern batteries do not and they are poorly suited to solar chargers due to the charging cycles associated with a dubious power supply. Secondly, the flawed design of this shed light requires you to unscrew the "permanent" mounting in order to change the batteries. While NiCad batteries would have to be replaced annually NiMH batteries should last many years in this configuration and also can supply 6X the amount of power (longer running time) than NiCads.
Another flaw of this product is that the 3/16" cord running from the solar panel to the light unit has an approximately 1/8" plug but unfortunately it has a useless L configured plug that will require you to drill nearly a 1" hole in your shed to fit it through. I'm not sure what was going through the engineer's mind when this ridiculous feature was added but hopefully the manufacturer will fix this problem if the product is ever updated.

While the LED lights in this product have a very long running time (especially if you recycle the NiCad batteries as I recommend) most people don't need to spend hours in their shed. They would go in, fetch what they need, and then turn the light out. This product would be a lot more useful if it provided much more light for a shorter period of time. I think a running time of 1 hour per day is way more than adequate. I would prefer to have 4x the amount of light for 1 hour than I having ¼ the light for 4 hours in a shed light.

I purchased this product knowing all the limitations and I am happy with it. It performs exactly as I expected and it functioned right of the box. Some of the design elements are cheap and you should plan on having upgraded batteries and screws on hand before you attempt to install it. You will not want to unscrew the light and reinstall it to swap out the NiCads later, especially if you attempt to use the cheap included screws that will most certainly strip.

The fact that you have to completely uninstall this unit in order to change the batteries highlights another feature that it is missing. It is not portable at all. A great feature it could have had was to be portable- imagine if the power went out and you knew you had a portable light source in your shed that could be quickly snapped out of its housing and used elsewhere. Or if you had some dead AA batteries you wanted to charge with your solar charger. The manufacturers really missed the boat on this one.

I can see why there is a dichotomy with the ratings. We purchased two of these for our detached garage. One of the lights gives off a relatively bright light, enough to find one's way around with ease at night. The other light was not as bright. The light has a hi-lo switch, and even on the 'hi' setting, the dud-light gave off only a dim glow. We did not return it for another light because after the hastle of installing this light with the solar panel on the roof, it didn't seem that important to us. For future purchasers, remember to give it a test run before installing.

Reading from the reviews I wasn't expecting much from such a low price solar shed light. I went ahead and ordered anyway and I'm very very pleased with the results. The light itself came almost fully pre-charged which aided in not only knowing how bright it would ultimately be, but also was useful in locating a good spot for it in the shed before permanent mounting.

So out of the box you get a

* solar panel with hardwired 16ft cable
* exterior mounting bracket with swivel feature
* interior light and mounting all in one
* all screws etc
* strange L shaped metal rod which appears to serve no useful purpose due to the design of the mounting bracket!

The light itself is super bright for a solar led; we have a small shed at 6'x 8' and it saturates it with enough light to find even the smallest item or even work in there. I couldn't say how long the light lasts on a single charge however, but it's perfect for popping in and grabbing some tool as the day gets longer. The light has a half/full option where the top row of leds can be switched off to increase the duration that the lights last at the expense of brightness - nice touch. There's also a small red led to indicate that it's charging and comes with a one foot toggle pull string to switch the light on or off.

My only gripe, which was mentioned in another review, was the connector for the panel to the light was L shaped not straight through as shown in the amazon product pic. This meant making a hole about the width of your finger to be able to push the connector into the shed and then having to silicon it all up to make it watertight. If it was a straight connector, the hole would barely be bigger than the cable itself. A surprisingly poorly thought out design given the rest of the product.

But the rest IS perfect and you cannot go wrong for the price.

Advertised as having a 20ft cord...at best it's only 16ft!
Pivot mount for the solar panel is totally useless...very poor design!
There was a 6 inch "L" shaped treaded metal rod included with the hardware with no instuctions on what's it for! The light works well so far...not real bright but good enough to find things.

I purchased this light to put in our outhouse at camp in Upper Michigan.
We do not have electricity at camp and I thought this would be worth a try to get some light. Installed it this summer and it has been working fine since then. On the low setting , 5 LED's, it gives off enough light to take care of business and even read by. The high setting, 10 LED, is better to read by and plently light to light up the outhouse. I was so pleased with how it work I purchased a second on for the storage shed.

I wanted something for my garage out in the back yard, thought this would be great since there is no power out there. The light works fine, for now, but it is bovious that it is not constructed well at all. It is no very bright, but enough so you don't trip over stuff. It was very easy to install, and yes, they should have given instructions as to what to do with the metal rod. Took me a minute to figure out that it is an optional brace for the solar panel. If it cost any more, I would pay for the shipping to return it. I would NOT buy another one from this company, but DO PROMOTE the use of solar power in any way possible.

The panel installed easily.The light is not very bright at all, even in total darkness. I guess it is better than no light at all.

I purchased this for a playhouse we built for our kids. We wanted some type of lighting so that it would not be completely dark in the playhouse (the size of a shed) in case they played in there at night during the summer or if they even had a sleepover in there. For lighting something the size of a small shed I'd say that the light output is reasonable for 10 LEDs.

The design of this system is mostly intelligent: the cord is long which meant that I could place the solar panel on the roof or side of the house and run the cord inside. It would have been slightly easier if the end of the plug was straight rather than L-shaped because it meant that I had to drill a bigger hole into the side of the playhouse in order to feed the plug through. There are several attachment options for the solar panel. The plastic base that it attaches to allows you to swivel the panel to face any direction, and it also comes with an L-shaped metal arm that could attach to both the bracket and the solar panel itself in case you are configuring it in a tricky spot. I've got the panel attached to the side of the playhouse but facing upward and it charges easily. The design of the charging unit that goes inside the building is smart. First of, it uses rechargeable batteries that can be replaced simply by taking the cover off. No screwdrivers are necessary for this. Thus, if a battery goes bad you can easily replace it. Secondly, the unit has a charging light on it. This meant that I could place the solar panel somewhere and have confidence in permanently attaching it to the building because I could see that it was charging. Also, because the plug actually plugs into the lighting unit, one could theoretically plug this into things other than the LED lighting unit. However, it's a very small plug but if you had matching appliances it could work.

Here are two minor tips I experienced:
1) The unit comes fully charged. I did not realize that there was a charging light on the LED unit so I discharged the batteries by leaving the light on overnight. The light stayed on for 27 straight hours and it gave off its full light for most of that time.
2) The pull cord it comes with is a string. I was hanging this high up in my kids' playhouse so I wanted a longer string and a more durable cord. I took the screws out of the back of the LED unit and found that the string was tied to a lever. Using some tiny pliers I was able to undo the knot in the string. I tied that end to a thread and the other end of the thread to a very thin ball chain that I had. I was then able to feed the ball chain through the level and cap it off with one of those connectors at the end of the ball chain. That way, it would be secure and not go through the hole. The ball chain had a tendency to catch on the lever itself so I took some scotch tape and wrapped it around that part of the ball chain that goes through the lever. I did this after I had fed it through so I had to push some of the ball chain back up but if you can plan properly and do it beforehand, you'll be in even better shape.

The light isn't the brightest but it serves its purpose. The package was a little beat up and there was a crack on the light. Since the light works and it was only cosmetic I kept the unit. I have it in my closet since I don't have any lights there. Having an older house I drilled a hole through the wall so I can attach the solar cell(mounted on my window)to the light inside my closet. The only thing that really bugs me is the angled adapter that plugs into the light. This made it difficult for me and I had to make a larger hole than what I expected to get the power cable through. I figure that if I re-build my room I can install this unit in my shed at a later time.

I love a product that just works when you pull it out of the box. This is one of those. I put mine in the greenhouse to provide night lighting and it does a great job. Worth every penny.