Hi, I am new to landscape lighting. Just getting started. I purchased the kit with the transformer and 9 lights from Costco. I see the Costco version of the transformer has only 15v. The bulbs seem rated for 11-18v so I believe I should be ok. I was thinking of purchasing more lights. Does overvolting reduce the life of the bulbs? Was kind of surprised there is no 12V option on the transformer since the version on the Volt website does seem to have it.
With kits like the Costco Kit, the idea is that they are designed for certain size homes (smaller more standard sizes per se). With the main goal being ease of installation, many aspects are simplified and in this case, one would be how many voltage taps are provided. Rather than loading up the transformer with taps 12V-15V or so on, a single tap is offered that can more than accommodate the size the system was intended to be (as well as if the proper expansions kits are added). Given the wide operating ranges of our LEDs, the single tap can still meet the needs of the fixtures and it does not harm the bulbs as they were designed to operate within the range.
Hi, Nahe. My impression is that the Costco kit is meant to be a basic, plug n play starter set. It’s designed and configured to minimize ambiguity and guess work for beginners like us. It’s only for LED fixtures and includes only 100 feet of landscape cable. The 15V tap and included 14 gauge cable just simplifies your wiring options (meaning, if you follow wiring instructions carefully, you shouldn’t have any voltage issues). While it’s quite powerful, it’s not intended for a huge expansive system with several dozen fixtures and lots of long wire runs. The included fixture bulbs add up to 39 watts. With your 150w transformer, you should easily be able to add another dozen fixtures but ideally you should avoid adding more than 80 additional watts. Hope this helps.
