The Marine Electronics Hub
Another Friday LED wonder: this shot of Lopolight’s production line suggests the extra high quality construction of these Danish-made navigation lights. The internal electronics are next potted in epoxy and a machined aluminum top plate finishes off the package. They are expensive but may indeed “work forever” on very little power. Note that you need to use Internet Explorer, not Firefox, to get beyond the home page of Lopolight’s Web site.
Ben Ellison
Panbo editor, publisher & chief bottlewasher from 4/2005 until 8/2018, and now pleased to have Ben Stein as a very able publisher, webmaster, and editing colleague. Please don't regard him as an "expert"; he's getting quite old and thinks that "fadiddling fumble-putz" is a more accurate description.
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We installed a Lopolight combo tricolor/anchorlight (24V) a year ago, and were quite disappointed that ours was almost always the dimmest anchor light in the anchorage. From some angles it is nearly invisible, blocked I believe by a 1/2″ diameter VHF antenna 10″ away. Has anyone else had similar experience?
Hope the brightness is due installation decisions. We are installing our first and have encountered several simple to correct issues:
1) VHF antenna: Lopolight makes a beautiful (and not expensive) replacement cap for the top which has a VHF base and a light path for light to reach a windex mounted on the antenna!
2) The light needs to be raised above the top of the mast more than their 1 inch Delrin shiv, we are using two.
3) On the bench the light seems very bright at 12v. Is the mast cable large enough to prevent significant voltage drop?
Thanks, a/s. I do suspect installation may be the problem, and getting the VHS antenna out of the way can’t hurt. We need to pull the mast in early July anyway, so we’ll check it all out then and report back.