Barnstormer wrote:mtv wrote:...They are fantastic, period. The Parmetheus comes in two flavors: Landing and Taxi, with significant difference in beam width and focus...
I'm afraid my experience doesn't jive with Mike's. Oh, Whelen led's are great, and extremely bright, when they work. I have both these lights in the nose of my 185. For a short time they were fine, but then the taxi light started popping the circuit breaker as soon as I started to taxi. We replaced the wiring as it was old and cracked, even though there was no indication of a short. Then both my A&P/IA and myself pulled the cowling a couple of times and traced the wiring, no problems. We checked the pins and connector at the harness, and the wiring through the firewall and to the switch. Of course on the ground with the engine off it worked fine.
I rapped on the bulb with it on, no problems. Finally I gently flexed the lower cowling (upper cowling was off) and pop! This was 100% repeatable. Obviously a bad bulb. Called Spruce and found out I had to return the bulb to Whelen directly for warranty. I knew that would take at least a month so I ordered another one from Spruce and installed it - problem solved. I shipped the defective bulb off to Whelen with copies of the original receipt, the second replacement receipt, and a detailed letter outlining the problem, that cause, and the solution.
Whelen of course could not duplicate the problem. I wasn't surprised by this as they had no cowling to place the bulb in. I had a half dozen phone calls with their tech people explaining the problem, how I recreated it 100% of the time, and that a new bulb fixed the problem. Obviously it's the bulb. But not to them. I told them not to bother sending it back to me, just to throw it away. They sent it anyway marketed inspected and serviceable. I tossed it in the trash. Proper customer service would have been to send me a new bulb. Whatever. During our phone conversations I also mentioned that both the taxi and landing light have condensation on the inside of the lenses after use. They said that was normal and not to worry about it. Doesn't seem right to me but whatever.
But the story doesn't stop there. A few months in and the new taxi light is now displaying a totally new behavior, exactly the opposite of before. Now it pops the circuit breaker if the engine is running and the airplane is NOT moving. So I can't turn the light on until I'm rolling, then it works fine throughout the entire duration of taxi, takeoff, the flight, landing and taxiing. My best guess to this behavior is maybe heat related? As long as the engine is off, or the plane is moving and there is sufficient airflow through the cowling either from forward movement or prop wash, the light works fine.
I do know this, I will never buy another Whelen light nor will I'll recommend them to anyone.
I replaced the landing/taxi lights in my 180 with the Whelen Prometheus and they are fantastic. I did have one problem initially that sounds similar. Can't guarantee it was the same cause: when I first installed them I had trouble with the taxi light popping the circuit breaker. Unfortunately, 180K's are wired so turning the landing light on also turns the taxi light on, regardless of the taxi light switch position. This meant with the taxi light circuit breaker popped I couldn't use the landing light either. After much head scratching, and replacing the wiring in the cowl for the lights I realized the problem is the terminals on the back of the light are in a slightly different position than the OEM bulbs. Turns out the positive terminal of the taxi light was shorting out on the wire in the scat tube that runs from the inlet just behind the oil cooler to the muffler cuff. It didn't happen immediately after installing them, but it didn't take very long for the vibrations to wear through the rubber in the scat tube to expose the wire that keeps the tube formed. Once I realized that, I put an insulator around the positive terminal of the taxi light and never had a popped circuit breaker in the 200 flight hours since.
And illumination of the runway when landing at night far exceeds halogens. They don't necessarily shine farther down the runway on final, but they cast a much more uniform light, especially in your peripheral vision.
Hope this helps.
Eric
